My biggest struggle with this Forever Marked was the writing. It was overly verbose at times and had me rolling my eyes frequently! For example:
Ellora sat back, enjoying the story. Behr was so funny; he changed his voice to a higher pitch when speaking as Fiona, and a very low when speaking as Fingal and Fionn. He eve used sound effects! Behr was the BEST storyteller.
I get it-he tells the story well. Did I need that entire 3 sentences to understand that? No. I would have rather had it incorporated into the actual story. This book did a lot more 'telling' and not showing the reading. Here is another example:
Aaaaaaaah!!!!!! Ella screeched out as Behr relentlessly ticked her ribs. Tickling. Worst torture ever!
Another issue I had was the overuse of exclamation points. Seriously, they were at the end of every other sentence. I found it to be distracting overall from the actual story. That is not something I want while reading!
Finally, since the book takes place in Scotland, most of the characters have Scottish accents. It got a bit difficult to read at times. I found this really seemed to slow down my reading. Again, that is not something I want when reading!
So, why 3.5 stars for Forever Marked? The plot really was good! Maybe you won't be as put off by the language issues I mentioned! Even with my irritation over those few things, the plot held my attention enough to want to keep reading!
POV: 3rd person (not my favorite and might be another reason I struggled)
Cliffhanger: sort of (you are given a bit to whet your appetite for book 2)
Trope: Damsel in Distress
Tears: No