Children of Blood and Bone

I'll be honest, when I picked up this book I wasn't expecting it to have an asshole turns nice because he falls in love plot. Had I known, I wouldn't have read it. I like the worldbuilding, I like the characters just fine (even though I do think they're not all that developed and you can tell it's the author's first book), I liked the plot idea... and yet it took me almost a month to get through the book because of the poorly written romance. It's not only poorly written, rushed and forced. It also makes no sense to me why the author would choose Inan as Zel's love interest when 1) romance isn't needed at all for the plot and 2) Amari and Roën exist. If the romance had been a slow build up one, with them falling for each other through the books and not in this one then I would have accepted it, but it's unrealistic that they want to murder each other one day and the next they're in love. And no, Inan wanting to destroy magic but still save Zel isn't romantic. Stop with this horrible trope of assholes will turn nice if you love them enough. Stop.

PS. I hope he's dead for real so that Zel can either have no romance or hook up with Roën/Amari in the next books.
PS2. With how Amari talked/thought about women all through her episodes I was actually surprised the author decided to give her a romance with Tzain. Then again, heteronormativity. I guess. I was sure she was in love with Binta.