had me hooked from the first chapter

Two stars because I cringed so much to “honeydew” ew

Scenes of abuse, implied/threatened sexual violence. Not quite my flavor. It was a decent story, the author is good at dropping hints along the way to what is really going on in the world. I’m personally not a fan of the main character, but loads of other folks loved this book.

I look for a lot in a book series. I read acotar and it lacked an outstanding plot after book one. Throne of glass series had everything besides an epic romance right off the bat. THIS SERIES has everything, amazing story, constantly surprised, amazing love story. It's written perfectly, I suggest you give it a chance. This will be my favorite book series for a long long time.

I can honestly say this is one of the better books I’ve read in a long time. The writer was so descriptive, I felt like I was in the book, felt the feelings, understanding, the pain. Definitely better then the Court of Thorns and roses series!

But they were right!

I was the kid in middle school who DEVOURED books, I’m talking I finished Harry Potter in 10 days. Then during high school I just stopped, didn’t pick up a book for over a decade. I have a really hard time concentrating (thanks ADHD), and struggle to disconnect from my very stressful job when I get home. Then in April I see a TikTok recommending this book and have fallen in love with reading again. I have since read the entire series, A Shadow in the Ember series, and almost 20 other books. I am so grateful to this series for bringing this joy back into my life, it brings me such peace and I am so grateful to JLA. I love Casteels story and how deeply I relate to his traumas, I love how JLA uses his story to share her own experiences. Overall 10/10, I could not recommend enough.

Has a slow start but the ending pulls everything together! Stick it out. Worth it in the end. Looking forward to the rest of the series.

Started slow but read in two days

Ok so the story itself wasn’t bad. I really wanted to like this more than I did. But the writing is super questionable. Poppy’s inner monologues were too long and repetitive. I had to skip certain parts because I’m like “ok, I get it. Get on with the story.” Poppy and hawke’s dialogue was also pretty cringy. I get that hawke’s character was intended to be this cocky/confident guy, but some of the things he’d say didn’t seem realistic? Like it was too much. Honestly, I stuck it through because I had hopes it’d get better and I paid for the book. While the story was ok, I can’t get passed the writing enough to read the next one.