moth

dnf'ed at 4%. even more boring than carmilla. i just don't care i guess.

initially, i was a bit apprehensive picking this book up. i haven't read a horror/thriller book in years, the last being from an author that i don't like anymore. i was also worried over the warnings of body horror descriptors throughout this book.

despite that, i was pleasantly surprised by what i've read. i didn't expect to fall in love with the main character shesheshen so quickly, nor did i think that the love interest homily would be so endearing. i always found interest in love stories that included the trope of the love interests needing to kill each other for certain reasons, yet find themselves falling in love with each other at the same time. i adored how the author wrote shesheshen - a huge part of me enjoying the reading journey of this book was seeing the world through shesheshen's eyes, seeing how she navigates certain situations, being able to know her thoughts on certain relationships. if it was written in any other perspective, the book wouldn't have been as charming as it was. this book being the author's debut novel was also a delightful surprise!

there were parts of the book that did drag a bit long, where i skimmed some of it to get the gist. i mainly did this as i was itching to see what would happen next. i can't be sure if it's due to how these scenes were written, so i'm mostly summing it up to my impatience.

without spoiling this part: in the second half of the book, i was pleasantly surprised by the first plot twist. then, the second came. typically, i would be annoyed at another twist, one that was a bit obvious in hindsight, yet in the moment, i was completely unaware. i couldn't figure out how it was going to be resolved, much less end. i went into this book expecting the worst case scenario, seeing that it was fitting for a story like this. safe to say that the ending was satisfactory.

what surprised me most was the events that took place in the last 10% of the book, or at least once the main issue was resolved. throughout this book, the author wrote shesheshen to be a formidable monster, yet at the same time, she was written in a way that a typical "monster" of any kind isn't. different scenes were written with consent in mind, i.e. homily waiting for shesheshen to consent to letting homily touch her shoulder. simple, seemingly small things like that was a relief to read. this introduction of consent is sometimes not seen in romance related books, so seeing this from a mosnterxhuman romance of sorts was refreshing. it helped shape shesheshen's character, in a way that once the last 10% of the book hit, i was surprised that certain discussions were brought up. it helped humanize shesheshen, when she wore epigram's body and apologized for the abuse that homily received through her sister; when homily experienced nightmares from the trauma of killing her sister, shesheshen dealt with homily's nightmares and trauma with care. giving her room to talk about it, along with making the initiative to talk about something as important as that. towards the end as well, when shesheshen's describing how one works through grief, i.e. going on a picnic or going on swims, it struck me on a different level. oddly enough, the message hits a bit different when it's viewed through the eyes of a monster. shesheshen didn't need to do all these things for homily. she didn't need to try and understand how homily felt or how humans experience grief and the steps needed to surpass them. this entire sequence made the story much sweeter, and it solidified my enjoyment of shesheshen and homily's pairing.

i do like that shesheshen decided to keep the offspring and didn't want to bring it into herself. i realize as i write this is that it paralleled the baroness' want to have shesheshen's eggs. shesheshen didn't want to do the same thing, so she allowed the offspring to live. in a similar fashion, homily helped rear the offspring and cared for it when shesheshen was hibernating. i thought going into this story that homily would accept being made into a nest for shesheshen's eggs, yet with how she was deposited into her father in a loveless way, i can see why this ending didn't happen. besides, it felt satisfying knowing the baroness was filled with so much greed that she couldn't help but take the eggs, even if they were her undoing.

i think there's a ton of things i can pick apart in this story, little moments that i didn't realize when reading through it first. shesheshen grew on me, enough so that i was starting to enjoy the descriptions of how she would take shape, what things she took into herself to assume a form. it's morbidly cool, for lack of a better word. overall, i loved this story. i liked the plot twist, loved how each main character was written, loved how the main two navigated circumstances together. i love this pairing enough that i would be content reading short stories revolving them, almost slice-of-life stories of them going through their day to day. i'm happy that i went outside of my comfort zone with this and i will definitely be keeping an eye out for if/when the author decides to write another horror novel. and of course, the main couple being sapphics definitely heightened the reading experience for me.

interesting enough, but i didn't enjoy it as much as i wished i did.

it was fine. some parts were boring and some parts felt rushed. i genuinely hated how this ended. what's the point of making the two mcs reconcile 94/96% into the book and then break apart at the end? everything felt incredibly surface level in terms of the actual characters. half lf this book was me painfully reading it out of boredom. some parts were cute but then it was completely ruined in a non-tasteful way. i'm not sure if i'll continue the series at this moment unless i get very curious on what happens with josi and maybe jamie. otherwise, i didn't bond with any of the major characters.

when i say it took nearly 4 hours total to go through this entire book, would you believe me? after taking 11 days to go through the previous book? motivation and a good storyteller is a wild combination. it was incredibly worth it, though!

this story follows deena, a 17 year old who's following randomly appearing letters from her presumably dead sister (who she believes is alive) and begins to unravel the tragedies that her female ancestors have experienced. the story was compelling and interesting right off the bat, and i could barely put the book down after a few chapters. the main character is immediately striking and i instantly took a liking to her, along with the other characters that follow the fmc.

the narrator is a very interesting one was well, and i absolutely loved the way this book was written. switching between perspectives, seeing how each story unravels and links with the main situation/journey, even the urgency is felt throughout the book. specific scenes at the end were described well, and i felt my body grow heavy in tune with the struggles of the fmc.

one thing to namely point out is the message that this book brings. i saw the term in the blurb of this book before i read it, yet when i read the author's note and looked up the term "magdalene's laundry", my heart immediately sank. i knew this was a woman-positive, feminist story. i wasn't surprised at the horrors behind these places, these sickly asylums that these poor women were put into just for being themselves back in the late 1700s. i was pained to read that these institutions were closed as recent as 1993. the author did a splendid job in writing these stories, where these events more likely were true when these institutions were running.

i also really loved the ever-changing banshees and the mysticism in this book. it did feel out of place now and again, yet it was something i didn't mind at all. overall, this was a really good book. i did feel like there could have been more, but that alone doesn't hurt my opinion of it.

genuinely, where do i start?

this book starts off with introducing the characters, of course, and i remember my first thought being that they couldn't have been more different. one was a former nun, one was a king's guard/knight, and the other was a servant. i didn't know how they were going to come together to fight starvation at this castle, much less face the issue of cannibalism, yet their journey from the beginning of the book to the end was incredible. for one, i love, and i mean LOVE the author's writing style. it was easy enough to understand for the casual reader with a few "big" words thrown in, yet it definitely doesn't read like a modern book (for me at least) and that's something that got me hooked on it immediately.

the start was slow, of course, yet by the time the "main antagonist" was introduced, i was literally at the edge of my seat wondering how, why, and what the hell was going on. in my mind, i already had an assumption on how things were going to go, on how the book would probably reach a turning point, yet i was proven very wrong. the plot twist was something i definitely didn't predict! i will say, this book did take me a while to read (11 days, some days i only read a chapter a day) and it did drag on in some parts, yet in hindsight, it was absolutely necessary for it to be written in this way.

i immediately fell in love with two of the characters, with a wary and more neutral like for the third. this didn't hinder my intrest in this book, thankfully. the third character wasn't unbearable, and her motives were incredibly interesting. this book touched on many interesting topics (especially around cannibalism) and the main antagonist was genuinely frightening. i remember feeling hopeless towards the last half of the book. to have such a strong, intimidating antagonist, written in the way that they were - it definitely added to the intrigue of the story.

i also loved that despite this book being sapphic, i forgot about that little bit for a good portion of the story until a later chapter played on that theme. i loved how that scene was written, how tense it was, how GAY it was. this book really played on desperation, primal hunger, and a ton of little themes here and there that made this book perfect to me. i now realize the implications of the HEAVY themes of honey in the story: honey usually symbolizes pleasure, truth, and knowledge. yet considering this book also has religious themes, it also refers to holy text. with the way things happened ... yeah. it definitely makes sense.

this is definitely a book that'll stay in my mind for a long while. this book has even solidified my love for the horror genre, and now i wish that the next horror books i read will be the same vibes as this (wishful thinking). i think i would recommend this book to someone else. it was something new, i felt like i was in a fever dream the entire time, and i genuinely loved it.

now to spoilers:

i genuinely thought that voyne and treila were going to fall in love or something - like toxic yuri style. yet the moment phosyne and voyne's relationship of sorts was solidified, i immediately knew they were going to do something with that (especially with phosyne's masochist kinks). i didn't know what they were going to do, but GOD. that relationship being the only thing to snap voyne and later phosyne from their bewitchments was so, so beautiful. reminding each other that they hated each other, phosyne needing to stay in the castle ...

this particular quote killed me: "give yourself back into my care, phosyne, and i will bear the weight for you." just that reminder of voyne wanting to protect phosyne, to care for her despite that command from the king already void due to his death? the entire fight between treila and voyne hit hard as well. i was genuinely pissed off when voyne ended up dying for a moment, as i had grown to really love her character. treila's heartbreak was horrible though. her imagining herself killing voyne, yet when she managed to do it, she immediately regretted it. then when she was brought abck to life and they spoke, the truth spilling out about treila's father .. i don't know, it was almost heartwarming once they made amends of sorts.

the scene where phosyne sheds her name, recalls her nun name in order to overpower the false lady was so, so beautifully written as well. reminding herself of her past lifes, accepting them as part of herself, it was just beautifully written considering how she always felt like a burden. the vision that she has, becoming the false lady, was her future and she ultimately decided against it. i think if she didn't have treila and voyne with her, she definitely would've allowed herself to fall into that hunger (or gluttony).

i think one thing i'm still confused about is the thing that treila has in herself, the core? i'm not too sure on what that's supposed to represent. was it her potential, considering she was born into a good family and had all the markings of being successful, only to be ruined after her father was killed for treason? i guess that's how i'll interpret that in the meantime.

leodegardis definitely deserved way better, though his sacrifices were so needed to keep the story going. i literally pointed at the screen when phosyne rememebered kindness, which she promised to leodegardis. he was literally at death's door and she kept it. just another little tidbit i like to now think about.

jacynde was barely in the book, yet her last sacrifice was so poetic. she literally called out the false saints day one of them arriving and despite being cast away from phosyne's care, she still took it upon herself to make sure that everyone in aymar would live, or that the survivors would win. the bees taking the shape of jacynde, working together to display that message of sacrifice to the trio just hit so different when you know how bees interact and communicate with one another. the bees literally just working overtime and vibing whilst still being jacynde's domain is funny to me.

the very last thing, though, is ornuo and pneio. i love these little beasts so much, even if they barely appeared in the story. i quite literally voiced out loud "let's goo!!" when they dove into the cistern to literally cook the false lady alive. they didn't want to touch the water intitially, yet since they trusted phosyne so much ... i like to think that they're alive (they're definitely not) and have escaped the castle as well. i initially thought they were caught at the first feast and were fed to the people, and i would've dnfed right there. gladly, that wasn't the case, and they were given a worthy sacrifice. rip ornuo and pneio.

i really, really wanted to like this book. it was okay, yet most of it was boring. i liked the notion of the book more than the actual plot. it just wasn't my thing unfortunately.

//☆ ┆ 5 stars (spoilers ahead)

“ i spent a lot of time ... convincing myself i wasn't built to last, wasn't built for romance, for love. but maybe ... maybe i was just built for you. ”

i think this book was a really nice way to end the story. i didn't read the blurb of this book so i was pleasantly surprised to see the fake dating trope! i loved reading how stevie started to slowly fall in love with iris and vice versa. the bits talking about stevie's struggle with GAD definitely hit home as someone with the same diagnosis.

i really loved seeing claire more in this story - there was something about it that really made me happy, as i dont think claire had many appearances in the second book.

after the breakup arc, it really hit hard when stevie opened that package to reveal the graphic novel that iris drew about their love story. i figured that something was going to be done about iris' drawings of stevie .. their reunion was so sweet, i absolutely loved it.

lastly, the wedding scene where iris and astrid walk delilah and claire down the isle was a very sweet and bittersweet way to end their stories. the first book started with those four getting close and becoming a fairly tight knit group, and it ended with them going into a new chapter in their lives. i got attached to all these characters.

i definitely recommend this book and the trilogy.

To preface: I picked this book up as it was next in my nostalgia journey of reading a series so dear to my heart from when i was a kid. I had only read every book from “Into the Wild” to “The Last Hope”, excluding some special editions. I decided a while back to read everything chronologically so this book ended up being next after reading the DotC arc. 

To say picking up and reading this book, in the midst of an extremely bad reading slump, would be the sole reason I have cried multiple times in one day would be an understatement. I partially miss who I was before picking this book back up after months of starting it (around the 35% point) and reading the rest in one day - I had no idea a book about cats from my childhood would bring me so much pain and heartbreak. Even the little manga panels at the end that gave closure to the story hurt. 

This did take 5 months to read, which most of the reading was done in the first month and then the same day I am writing this, 5 months later. I don't regret any of it, however.

If anyone else reads this - if you're my age (24 at the time of writing), please don't think you're too old to indulge in books from your childhood. Sometimes, you just need a book like that to get out of a bad reading slump. I may still be in one, yet I feel as if this book had helped me gain motivation to get back into reading this series chronologically. 

Moth Flight will forever be one of the best characters to me.

There's something about reading a romance novel with the main characters breaking up in the end that just hits different. I really loved seeing their relationship grow and them even falling in love with each other, enough to when they fell out, they still decided to come back together to finish off what they started.

I like how this book gave me a slightly different perspective on passing relationships. I also like the premis of the “falling in love montage” because honestly, its so true.

I think it was really cute showing Saorise at university and meeting Veronica, who we don't exactly know much about except for the last half of the final chapter, showing her possibly having feelings for her. I definitely think this book wouldn't have the same effect on me if Saoirse and Ruby did end up staying together.

Cute book!

I loved every second of this book. I'm not particularly one to seek out slow paced / slow burn books but I absolutely loved everything about this. I loved watching Sutton & Charlotte's relatuonship grow from how it started to the end of the book. There wasn't a moment where I grew bored of it.

I'm not one to read spicy scenes either, yet the way it was written felt so intimate, I found myself putting the book down to breathe. Acrually, just throughout the book, even with the cute little moments, I was giggling and putting my kindle aside and internally screaming at how cute they were, even if they weren't official yet.

I saw a lot of ppl say that 600+ pages for a romance is a bit too much, yet I think the length was entirely needed. This book honestly gave me a different perspective on slow burn romances and gave me a way deeper appreciation for that character development & relationship development. If their relationship growth was written any faster, then I don't think I would have enjoyed it as much as I did.

This book won my heart over.

I read this book in one sitting. Normally I dislike amnesia tropes but wow, this one was absolutely worth reading.

This book was perfect. I do plan on reading this over again a few months from now as I probably missed a few things. I absolutely loved how the book started and the uncomfy feeling I had about one of the characters. I did call how Brandon was being made to look incredibly suspicious and how he's being written as the one who's guilty and the cause of it, which honestly yes he was, but I wasn't sure who to expect to be the killer. All we had to go off was Tristan, Nick, and Bug recognizing this person. It being the Sheriff makes so much sense, I wonder if there were any other signs of him acting suspicious since I don't recall any clues from my first read through.

I feel as if there's some underlying symbolism in this book, but honestly I'm still reeling from the last quarter of this book. I think my only nitpick is that I would have preferred for the author to “show” more of the buildup between Logan and Ashley, as it was more “tell” than anything, yet this book has wormed itself (in a positive way) into a portion of my heart and will probably always be there.

Please take heed of the warnings that the book mentions at the very beginning as it can get dark!! 

I didn't hate it but I also didn't love it. Yeah, their relationship got cuter the more they interacted with each other, yet I have a few gripes with the story. One, Cassie is 21/22 whilst Erin is around 39. I'm more neutral with age gap tropes yet I would much prefer if the younger individual is at least 25. Two, I felt as if there wasn't really anything to the plot. It felt a bit flat after reading and there really wasn't much character building. Three, I'm perfectly okay with spicy scenes in books, yet I just felt as if I was reading a smut centered book for most of the time. I would have loved to have way more development in other areas. It was still an okay book though.

This was one of the best books that I've ever read. The way it was written, the two characters and their chemistry with each other, it just seemed very magical. At the same time, it upheld that level of mystery and made you want to continue reading to see what would happen. The reason why I docked off .5 was absolutely a me thing - the flowery prose and vocab used were on a higher level than I am typically used to. The beginning was incredibly hard to read and understand, and I'm absolutely grateful that I read on a kindle, considering how many words I had to check the definition for. 

This book was definitely out of my comfort zone for that reason along with it being one of those books that you might need to reread to fully grasp the story. Otherwise, this book was beautifully written. I find that letter writing is so intimate and incredibly sentimental, along with being almost sapphic-coded. 

I think my favorite part of this book was getting to the stories, seeing the fondness of the two characters grow into something more. I definitely wasn't expecting the last part of the book, having Red witness Blue's dead body and in turn begin to gather pieces of Blue just to bring her back and ensure both of their futures. The moment the texts began to match almost verbatim what was written at the beginning of the book, everything began to click for me and I was even more excited upon figuring out things for myself before I continued reading. I even looked up other's thoughts on the book and plot explanations. Its safe to say that I was even more in love with this book right after. I'm definitely going to reread this again later and continue looking up what other people thought of the story and get their own interpretations as well!

I want more books like this.

Literally loved this book so much. I really loved the chemistry between the two characters and the way their relationships developed as the story progressed. The slow build up to them realizing they have feelings for one another was so well written. I think it makes it even better that the authors for this book are a married couple as well! The last quarter of the book made me cry (positively) and i think this is one of my fav books to come out from the month of May 2023!

There was literally nothing in this book that I hated. It was so cute, so well written, and honestly just a good lighthearted read!

I absolutely love this author and the characters in this mini universe. Ashley Blake writes queer characters pretty well and she just makes all the characters really fun. I might even like this book a bit more than the first one mostly due to the main character's chemistry with each other. Definitely a good read <3

This is a pretty accurate depiction of someone with anxiety & depression. I loved the layout of the book, how chaotic each section feels. I related to the character a lot considering I have the same diagnoses/similar experiences.

I think Gilda being queer / a lesbian really adds depth to her depression as well.

I feel as if the plot was slightly rushed??? The plot twists were fine but god, some chapters had fast pacing.

I still liked the book though, really liked it actually. The main couple is rlly cute though I think them ending up together could have been better paced?

The cohet (compulsory heterosexuality) is so real tho, it frustrated me slightly (not in a bad way).

I think this is the perfect, lighthearted high fantasy book to read when you're trying to get out of a reading slump. The characters were very loveable, the tensions of the possible romance was quite nice too. I love books with a found family trope that makes you feel all warm and cozy inside.

This easily became one of my favorite books,, I would read short stories of these characters in this setting if there were any.

This book started out slow, yet it grew into something so reflective, something so deep. I had no idea that it would go in this direction and I'm glad I continued reading,, I nearly dropped it. It's definitely a good read.

this book felt like a little piece of treasure that one hadn't found before. i loved the concept and the way it was executed was wonderful. i loved the emphasis on platonic love and how relatable school was here. i just couldnt put the book down .. it drew me into another world for a moment and .. wow. im still reeling from how good this book was. if you read this, definitely put background music on..

“Hello, I hope somebody is listening ...”

i related with georgia so heavily. i definitely am aroace and i do want a relationship, yet at the same time i dont get sux, romance, any of that. seeing georgia go through that process of finding themselves is slightly similar to what i did.. idk, this book was just a joy to read and helped me put to words how i feel about certain things as well. it was so charming, emotional (i cried a ton), and a really good start to my aroace/aro/ace rep book list.