Author: Scarlett St. Clair
Publication Date: 23 April 2020
Reading Method: Physical
Dates Read: June 8 – 9
Synopsis:
Persephone’s relationship with Hades has gone public and the resulting media storm disrupts her normal life and threatens to expose her as the Goddess of Spring.
Hades, God of the Dead, is burdened by a hellish past that everyone’s eager to expose in an effort to warn Persephone away.
Things only get worse when a horrible tragedy leaves Persephone’s heart in ruin and Hades refusing to help. Desperate, she takes matters into her own hands, striking bargains with severe consequences.
Faced with a side of Hades she never knew and crushing loss, Persephone wonders if she can truly become Hades’ queen.
Review:
Buckle up babes… it’s unpopular opinion time. Also… SPOILERS probably.
What is even the plot of this book? I couldn’t tell you. It just seemed like there were so much going on and yet, nothing happening at all. There were too many subplots that were completely unnecessary (like the demigod stalker that took up all of three pages total). They added absolutely nothing to the story. Take it out and literally nothing changes. Then there is the Apollo story line, the Demeter storyline, Leuce and Lexa and Summer Solstice and blah blah blah.
Here’s what I would have liked to see – Persephone and Hades working on their communication skills. While I found Peresphone to be quite insuffereable in this one, I ~do~ understand where she is coming from when she says she knows nothing about Hades and they need to tell each other things. That seems like relationship 101 and these two are AWFUL at actually talking to each other. They seem to be under the impression that sex solves anything, and that got annoying really quickly. Don’t get me wrong, we read these books to appreciate the smut. But to have a character constantly complaining about the lack of communication and then ravishing each other instead of communicating was irritating.
Spoiler – At one point, Hades proposes and she says no because she feels he’s hiding things from her and she doesn’t really know him. By the end of the book they are engaged and have had exactly zero productive conversations… so I’m not even sure what changed and I wanted to shake them both.
As I mentioned previously, I’m kind of over Persephone. She has so much potential to be a freaking bad ass goddess, but throws it all away on childish whims. She constantly defies Hades wishes and then seems confused when he’s upset with her. She publishes a scathing article about one of the gods and somehow expects no consequences for her actions? She’s continually saying she doesn’t need Hades to fight her battles but every time she is in trouble, he magically appears and solves everything for her. Which, of course, makes her angry but instead of talking about it, they have sex. I’m not saying that Persephone should bend to Hades every wish, or that the gods shouldn’t be held accountable for their actions. It’s just the way Persephone goes about things is like she sits there and thinks “what’s the worst possible way to handle this situation?” and then runs to Hecate when she messes everything up.
It just felt like this whole book was following the characters going in circles and never actually doing anything or solving any of their issues. They’re just throwing band aids on their problems and I found it all extremely frustrating.
Will I read the third book? It’s not at the top of my priority list. I can see why people enjoy these books, but it turns out they just aren’t for me. I was fully prepared to love them and make them my whole personality. I’m really bummed I didn’t love them as much as everyone else seems to.
