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18soft_green's review
adventurous
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.75
Oooookay, I'm going to be honest. This book was interesting. Even while hating the characters and even the plot, I was entertained. I'm even going to listen to the second book. But I'm pretty sure I'll hate that one just as much as I hate this one. But, because I am a generous reviewer, I will tell you why I dislike this book so much. So you know if you'll hate it or not. Some things that erk me don't erk you, so maybe you'll like it.
First off, I hate how it's narrated. The story is told from the main character's, Fortuna Sworn's, point of view. We're stuck listening to her thoughts and feelings about the situations around her. She makes jokes and is incredibly sarcastic. This in itself is fine. I love a sarcastic narrator. Percy Jackson and Jude Duarte are great! Fortuna isn't funny sarcastic. She's just awful. She's the kind of sarcastic that teen girls who paint their nails black and write tragic Tumblr posts that romanticize mental illness type are sarcastic. She's the worst! I hated her as soon as the book started. I wish her harm. She's this way because of trauma, of course, so it makes sense to some degree. Everyone handles trauma differently and some people cope by being the worst person in every room they enter. At least she knows she's awful. But unfortunately, her thinking that she's awful is supposed to make us think she's humble. My therapist, when I was sixteen, explained the difference between humility and low self-esteem to me. Self-hatred/low self-esteem is not humility, it's just hating on your self. Humility actually doesn't center you, it is focused on others. Fortuna tells us that her brother is a good person and from what we see of him in the book, I can't state that she's wrong. But I can't say she's right either. She is also always judging other people! Always. She doesn't give them the benefit of the doubt, she just states outright that they are suspicious, that they are evil, they are selfish, they are gross, they are weak, and like, honey, I know we're in the faery court and faeries aren't kind and fuzzy but if you're using half your brain it wouldn't make sense if they were because they literally aren't human so their priorities CAN'T line up with ours! It isn't natural for their brains! But she does it anyway and the author seems to be on her side which is also weird. Fortuna's tragic past is tragic, I'll give her that. There are like, two times when she does a nice thing, and then she's like, yeah, because it's the right thing to do, and compassion is good when in her soul, she's the worst. She thinks so highly of her character compared to faeries and like, does Sutton know that Fortuna is a hypocrite?
Next is the romance if you can call it that. Actually no, next up is how fucking stupid Fortuna is. She is so fucking,, she couldn't add ten plus ten if the numbers appeared in two different places. Collith says things in intense moments like, "I can't lose you again," and "when I knew you before" and she doesn't think about it? And she's like, "he sees my real face and is still sexually attracted to me," and doesn't think that might mean something? And then she overthinks every nice thing he does for her because he CAN'T be a good person because he's a FAERY and FAERIES ARE EVIL! She's so stupid!
Also, she fell in love with her only friend - who is a person she made up in her dreams - whom she named Oliver. She wanted to screw that relationship over with romantic love and sex? And you can be like, love isn't a choice, and to some degree that is true. Most often it can be controlled. But Jesus fuck, woman! Sutton doesn't seem to understand that romantic love and sex can be separate experiences, like they don't always go hand in hand. To be clear, she made Oliver up as a child and they grew up together and fell in love and idk why, but that makes me feel icky. Apparently, a thing about Nightmares, which is a fantastical creature that Sutton made up, is that people will project the face they most desire onto the Nightmare and what the fuck is that? Sutton can do whatever she wants but I'm judging this choice. It feels like sex fantasy and not storytelling. (Collith see's Fortuna's real face btw, in case you weren't convinced that they need to be together and Fortuna isn't the most idiototic idiot to exist in her own story, also Collith is the most beautiful creature she's ever laid eyes on).
Anyway, why the hell is everyone so sexy? Faeries are supposed to be fallen angels which is actually interesting (I think Tread of Angels did it better but the concept is still there) so it makes sense that they'd be beautiful. But explain why Fortuna is beautiful and why is Oliver beautiful, why is Damen beautiful, and why is that random and basically only Black girl, who was in the beginning of the story, beautiful? Not everyone needs to be beautiful! Jesus CHRIST! Does Sutton know that bodies are allowed to just be bodies?! And sexual attraction has nothing to do with aesthetic pleasure. Why are the faeries beautiful by today's modern standards? If they've been here for thousands of years and were gorgeous to the people of that time then shouldn't they be more work muscular and not defined muscular and shouldn't their faces be rounder and their hair curlier? Shouldn't they be browner?
I don't like how Sutton did "diversity". The only gay people were bad guys or in pain, except the diner moms who were only in the first quarter of the story at most. There were no trans people and homosexual people were characterized as overly sexual and violent. Her little brother is co-dependent and abused by his "lover" so idk if he is canonically queer or not. Not only has Sutton wrapped the plot around queer pain but she also made that pain self-inflicted. And she handled that abuse horribly! Domestic abuse isn't easy at all and the way that Fortuna treated her brother, the victim, was so selfish and arrogant. I just want everyone to know that ridding a victim of their abuser does not solve the problem! She isn't suffering honorably because Damen doesn't like her anymore; she has caused him more pain! The most important thing in helping victims of domestic abuse is listening to them! Fortuna should have stayed near Damen and talked to him to help him see her perspective instead of invalidating his experience. God! I hate! hate! hate! this story! People of color were basically non-existent. When they were they were not important characters. Basically they were the decorative rugs of the story. Except for the Indigenous appropriation...
Next, Sutton used a Native American mythologic monster in her book like it's the boogie man and not something that is actually very sacred to Native American spirituality/culture and handled it like a twelve-year-old on Wattpad and I just think that's inappropriate and worth canceling her over.
The things that are coded to be desirable in the story are wheird! Taunt muscles (does Collith work out? why is he so ripped, his job requires a lot of sitting), scars, not talking much, tall, can control Fortuna, has power, is separate from society, is in emotional/mental pain. IDK guys, it looks like internalized misogyny to me. Instead of getting rid of objectification entirely, why not just reverse its tendency and treat men like sexual objects? And to be clear, they're only sexy when they have some sadness in the background. White feminism at its finest!
Rating the names > Fortuna Sworn 0/10, Collith 1.5/10, Damen 3/10, Oliver 2/10, Lourie 6/10.
In conclusion: 1.75/5. Would not recommend this story to anyone ever. I hate it. It is trash. I mean, it's interesting because the pacing is good but that's the only good thing about it.
First off, I hate how it's narrated. The story is told from the main character's, Fortuna Sworn's, point of view. We're stuck listening to her thoughts and feelings about the situations around her. She makes jokes and is incredibly sarcastic. This in itself is fine. I love a sarcastic narrator. Percy Jackson and Jude Duarte are great! Fortuna isn't funny sarcastic. She's just awful. She's the kind of sarcastic that teen girls who paint their nails black and write tragic Tumblr posts that romanticize mental illness type are sarcastic. She's the worst! I hated her as soon as the book started. I wish her harm. She's this way because of trauma, of course, so it makes sense to some degree. Everyone handles trauma differently and some people cope by being the worst person in every room they enter. At least she knows she's awful. But unfortunately, her thinking that she's awful is supposed to make us think she's humble. My therapist, when I was sixteen, explained the difference between humility and low self-esteem to me. Self-hatred/low self-esteem is not humility, it's just hating on your self. Humility actually doesn't center you, it is focused on others. Fortuna tells us that her brother is a good person and from what we see of him in the book, I can't state that she's wrong. But I can't say she's right either. She is also always judging other people! Always. She doesn't give them the benefit of the doubt, she just states outright that they are suspicious, that they are evil, they are selfish, they are gross, they are weak, and like, honey, I know we're in the faery court and faeries aren't kind and fuzzy but if you're using half your brain it wouldn't make sense if they were because they literally aren't human so their priorities CAN'T line up with ours! It isn't natural for their brains! But she does it anyway and the author seems to be on her side which is also weird. Fortuna's tragic past is tragic, I'll give her that. There are like, two times when she does a nice thing, and then she's like, yeah, because it's the right thing to do, and compassion is good when in her soul, she's the worst. She thinks so highly of her character compared to faeries and like, does Sutton know that Fortuna is a hypocrite?
Next is the romance if you can call it that. Actually no, next up is how fucking stupid Fortuna is. She is so fucking,, she couldn't add ten plus ten if the numbers appeared in two different places. Collith says things in intense moments like, "I can't lose you again," and "when I knew you before" and she doesn't think about it? And she's like, "he sees my real face and is still sexually attracted to me," and doesn't think that might mean something? And then she overthinks every nice thing he does for her because he CAN'T be a good person because he's a FAERY and FAERIES ARE EVIL! She's so stupid!
Also, she fell in love with her only friend - who is a person she made up in her dreams - whom she named Oliver. She wanted to screw that relationship over with romantic love and sex? And you can be like, love isn't a choice, and to some degree that is true. Most often it can be controlled. But Jesus fuck, woman! Sutton doesn't seem to understand that romantic love and sex can be separate experiences, like they don't always go hand in hand. To be clear, she made Oliver up as a child and they grew up together and fell in love and idk why, but that makes me feel icky. Apparently, a thing about Nightmares, which is a fantastical creature that Sutton made up, is that people will project the face they most desire onto the Nightmare and what the fuck is that? Sutton can do whatever she wants but I'm judging this choice. It feels like sex fantasy and not storytelling. (Collith see's Fortuna's real face btw, in case you weren't convinced that they need to be together and Fortuna isn't the most idiototic idiot to exist in her own story, also Collith is the most beautiful creature she's ever laid eyes on).
Anyway, why the hell is everyone so sexy? Faeries are supposed to be fallen angels which is actually interesting (I think Tread of Angels did it better but the concept is still there) so it makes sense that they'd be beautiful. But explain why Fortuna is beautiful and why is Oliver beautiful, why is Damen beautiful, and why is that random and basically only Black girl, who was in the beginning of the story, beautiful? Not everyone needs to be beautiful! Jesus CHRIST! Does Sutton know that bodies are allowed to just be bodies?! And sexual attraction has nothing to do with aesthetic pleasure. Why are the faeries beautiful by today's modern standards? If they've been here for thousands of years and were gorgeous to the people of that time then shouldn't they be more work muscular and not defined muscular and shouldn't their faces be rounder and their hair curlier? Shouldn't they be browner?
I don't like how Sutton did "diversity". The only gay people were bad guys or in pain, except the diner moms who were only in the first quarter of the story at most. There were no trans people and homosexual people were characterized as overly sexual and violent. Her little brother is co-dependent and abused by his "lover" so idk if he is canonically queer or not. Not only has Sutton wrapped the plot around queer pain but she also made that pain self-inflicted. And she handled that abuse horribly! Domestic abuse isn't easy at all and the way that Fortuna treated her brother, the victim, was so selfish and arrogant. I just want everyone to know that ridding a victim of their abuser does not solve the problem! She isn't suffering honorably because Damen doesn't like her anymore; she has caused him more pain! The most important thing in helping victims of domestic abuse is listening to them! Fortuna should have stayed near Damen and talked to him to help him see her perspective instead of invalidating his experience. God! I hate! hate! hate! this story! People of color were basically non-existent. When they were they were not important characters. Basically they were the decorative rugs of the story. Except for the Indigenous appropriation...
Next, Sutton used a Native American mythologic monster in her book like it's the boogie man and not something that is actually very sacred to Native American spirituality/culture and handled it like a twelve-year-old on Wattpad and I just think that's inappropriate and worth canceling her over.
The things that are coded to be desirable in the story are wheird! Taunt muscles (does Collith work out? why is he so ripped, his job requires a lot of sitting), scars, not talking much, tall, can control Fortuna, has power, is separate from society, is in emotional/mental pain. IDK guys, it looks like internalized misogyny to me. Instead of getting rid of objectification entirely, why not just reverse its tendency and treat men like sexual objects? And to be clear, they're only sexy when they have some sadness in the background. White feminism at its finest!
Rating the names > Fortuna Sworn 0/10, Collith 1.5/10, Damen 3/10, Oliver 2/10, Lourie 6/10.
In conclusion: 1.75/5. Would not recommend this story to anyone ever. I hate it. It is trash. I mean, it's interesting because the pacing is good but that's the only good thing about it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Fire/Fire injury, Body shaming, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Biphobia, Homophobia, Mental illness, Torture, Violence, Death of parent, Sexual content, Cultural appropriation, Death, Classism, Physical abuse, and Grief
Moderate: Gaslighting, Death, Sexual harassment, Slavery, Grief, Sexual content, Blood, Kidnapping, Torture, Cursing, Toxic relationship, and Vomit
Minor: Addiction, Misogyny, Ableism, Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail, Religious bigotry, Bullying, Confinement, and Drug use
bookishchef's review against another edition
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.0
TW: Sexual Assault!
This author treats men in her story like most male authors treat female characters. The men in this book are described in what can only be called the het female equivalent of "she breasted boobily". They are only described by their eyes, penis and muscles.
That would already be bad enough, but it gets worse. The female MC, Fortuna, is a sexual predator who preys on men when they are vulnerable, and sexually assaults them multiple times in this book. This is never adressed within the text, and I truly think the author did not realize that that was what her MC was doing.
A list of the sexual scenes in this book:
- I listened to the audiobook, so I am sorry if any of the names are spelled wrong.
1. Oliver x Fortuna - one of the few consensual sex scenes. Oliver explicitly asks Fortuna for consent, because consent is apparently only attractive when it is given by the woman in a heterosexual relationship.
2. Collith x Fortuna - both start making out, Fortuna makes a grab for Colliths genitals and starts initiating sex, Collith has to push Fortuna away
3. Collith x Fortuna - Fortuna pulls Collith into a corridor and forcibly starts making out with him. She remarks on him not seeming into it, he also tries to stop Fortuna verbally, but she continues and grabs his penis. At that point he gives up and stops struggling. No consent was given here, and although Fortuna is eventually the one to push him away, she did sexually assault him.
4. Oliver x Fortuna - Fortuna does not want have a serious discussion with Oliver, so she starts making out with him. She remarks on him not being into it, Oliver has to shove her off him.
This all happens before the 55% mark!
How the fuck am I supposed to root for a sexual predator?
The worst thing is, that this book is highly rated because the vast majority of people do not recognize sexual violence against men when it happens.
After the halfway point, it does not get any better. This stuff is not seen as a character flaw to overcome, instead it is seen as a perfectly fine character trait within this book.
5. Not a sex scene. But Fortuna walks in on a passed out Collith and starts sexualizing his unconscious body, paying extra attention to his genitals. Not SA, but still very creepy.
6. Collith innitiates the sex while Fortuna is bathing. Fortuna nor Collith verbally consents here, but both seem into it, so this might be the second consensual sex scene. Fortuna starts slut-shaming other women right after this scene though, which is also not cute
It was right about here that I started struggling with paying attention to the story. The MC has to go through some trials to become the official queen of the Faerie kingdom, but I lowkey wanted her to die during all of them.
Later on, there is a conversation between Laurie (her 3rd love interest, no I am not kidding) and Fortuna, where it is said lust and sexual desires should always be given into. Like, I am sorry, but no? Absolutely not? Consent is very much necessary, thank you.
So yeah. 1/5. Do not recommend .
This author treats men in her story like most male authors treat female characters. The men in this book are described in what can only be called the het female equivalent of "she breasted boobily". They are only described by their eyes, penis and muscles.
That would already be bad enough, but it gets worse. The female MC, Fortuna, is a sexual predator who preys on men when they are vulnerable, and sexually assaults them multiple times in this book. This is never adressed within the text, and I truly think the author did not realize that that was what her MC was doing.
A list of the sexual scenes in this book:
- I listened to the audiobook, so I am sorry if any of the names are spelled wrong.
1. Oliver x Fortuna - one of the few consensual sex scenes. Oliver explicitly asks Fortuna for consent, because consent is apparently only attractive when it is given by the woman in a heterosexual relationship.
2. Collith x Fortuna - both start making out, Fortuna makes a grab for Colliths genitals and starts initiating sex, Collith has to push Fortuna away
3. Collith x Fortuna - Fortuna pulls Collith into a corridor and forcibly starts making out with him. She remarks on him not seeming into it, he also tries to stop Fortuna verbally, but she continues and grabs his penis. At that point he gives up and stops struggling. No consent was given here, and although Fortuna is eventually the one to push him away, she did sexually assault him.
4. Oliver x Fortuna - Fortuna does not want have a serious discussion with Oliver, so she starts making out with him. She remarks on him not being into it, Oliver has to shove her off him.
This all happens before the 55% mark!
How the fuck am I supposed to root for a sexual predator?
The worst thing is, that this book is highly rated because the vast majority of people do not recognize sexual violence against men when it happens.
After the halfway point, it does not get any better. This stuff is not seen as a character flaw to overcome, instead it is seen as a perfectly fine character trait within this book.
5. Not a sex scene. But Fortuna walks in on a passed out Collith and starts sexualizing his unconscious body, paying extra attention to his genitals. Not SA, but still very creepy.
6. Collith innitiates the sex while Fortuna is bathing. Fortuna nor Collith verbally consents here, but both seem into it, so this might be the second consensual sex scene. Fortuna starts slut-shaming other women right after this scene though, which is also not cute
It was right about here that I started struggling with paying attention to the story. The MC has to go through some trials to become the official queen of the Faerie kingdom, but I lowkey wanted her to die during all of them.
Later on, there is a conversation between Laurie (her 3rd love interest, no I am not kidding) and Fortuna, where it is said lust and sexual desires should always be given into. Like, I am sorry, but no? Absolutely not? Consent is very much necessary, thank you.
So yeah. 1/5. Do not recommend .
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual content, Death, Murder, Sexual assault, Physical abuse, Slavery, Violence, Death of parent, and Torture
Minor: Addiction, Animal cruelty, Eating disorder, and Medical content
deesquared's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Blood, Cursing, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Gore, Sexual content, and Violence
Moderate: Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Addiction
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