Lidiya Foxglove

Well, I like fairytales, I love Beauty & the Beast and will happily read most retellings of it. And every now and again, I like a good erotica 😉

I really enjoyed this story! Had a nice love story, I enjoyed Nyar and Sabela as a couple, and the sex scenes were well-done and didn't go too overboard. And I liked the small twist on the witch who put the curse on him. Sabela came off as a bit Mary Sue at times and the goblin king reminded me of the typical tortured hero, but I still liked reading about their relationship, nonetheless.

Light and quick read and I will be checking out the other books in the series!… (meer)

Well, I like fairytales, I love Beauty & the Beast and will happily read most retellings of it. And every now and again, I like a good erotica 😉

I really enjoyed this story! Had a nice love story, I enjoyed Nyar and Sabela as a couple, and the sex scenes were well-done and didn't go too overboard. And I liked the small twist on the witch who put the curse on him. Sabela came off as a bit Mary Sue at times and the goblin king reminded me of the typical tortured hero, but I still liked reading about their relationship, nonetheless.

Light and quick read and I will be checking out the other books in the series!… (meer)

I enjoyed the world building on this novel. I realize that this takes place in the same world as another one of the author's series, which was much much darker than this book. Unfortunately, that darkness bled over at times, which impacted the coziness of this story. There is always the looming war, and the related threat of enslavement to Sorla and the other Fanarlems (the animated doll people). Dorr is also a walking embodiment of the war, being a reanimated solder who was killed on the front lines. So the premise already makes it hard to buy into the "cozy fantasy" tagline.

There are also some very uncomfortable and tone deaf points in the narrative that parallels the plight of the Fanarlems with free Blacks in pre-Civil War United States. There are mentions of slave catchers, free Fanarlems being kidnapped and taken over the border to be sold into slavery, and treated as second-class citizens working menial jobs even as free citizens on the supposedly enlightened Miralem-side of the border. This is especially problematic as there were zero indications of any people of color in the book, or even the universe.

I enjoyed the story, but the whole thing read as very unbalanced to me.… (meer)