Reviewed by Eve1972 on
SOAPBOX... I am seriously at a loss for words right now. I pride myself on always being honest in my reviews regardless of whether it is an ARC or a book I pay for. It is awfully hard to write an honest review if you can't tell people what things didn't work for you. I included two "small" spoilers in my review for this book. I say small because the first one the reader finds out at the very beginning of the book. --- what makes this even MORE ridiculous. I JUST found out that you can download a FREE sample of this book that gives away one of the "spoilers" I posted. The mind boggles at the ridiculousness...sigh. The second I left purposely vague. Both I put in "spoiler" tags so anyone who didn't want to be spoiled wouldn't see the info, and anyone who prefers to know spoilers before purchasing could make an informed decision. Especially if they know ME and we share the same likes and dislikes in our books.
Imagine my surprise when I got tracked down on FB messenger, received a message here on Goodreads, AND got an email all within the same ten minute period telling me to remove my spoilers ASAP. Authors/PR companies should not be trying to manipulate reviews. ARCs stop being "in exchange for honest reviews" when a reviewer's hands are tied by stipulations. This type of thing needs to stop NOW.
So that is my say on the matter. I will no longer read or promote this author or work with the PR company she is using for promotion. If anyone would like to know what the spoilers were, feel free to message me. The funniest part about all this was I wasn't sure how I was going to rate this book. That is why I was taking 24 hours to think about it. As you can see, after this fiasco I have now 1-Starred it...sigh.
I am going to hold off a bit on placing a star rating on this book. I've got a bunch of mixed feelings about it. I liked book one, and Damon was always an intriguing character to me, but his character (and 70% of this book) didn't work for me for. Like...AT ALL. I wasn't expecting sunshine and rainbows by any means, but I pretty much felt ZERO connection between Winter and Damon until the last 30%. Coincidently, the last 30% of this book was the best part of it by far. If the first 70% had been as good, I would have given the book 4-Stars.
Alas, I felt like there was way too much filler with all the past chapters, and they bored me. I did love the twists that came at the end (again last 30% of this was awesome). I loved seeing the characters from the prior books as well.
So yea...I need to marinate a bit before I decide on a rating.
Reading updates
- Started reading
- 7 February, 2019: Finished reading
- 7 February, 2019: Reviewed