TL;DR: Unpopular opinion time: this book was severely underwhelming. I didn’t hate or love it but to be honest, I was kind of bored throughout. It’s a slow-paced read and the whole time I felt like I was just waiting for something to happen and whatever I was waiting for wasn’t delivered. Although I loved reading about Alyce’s villain origin story, I didn’t feel particularly attached to her or any of the other characters we’re introduced to. Sadly, this one just didn’t live up to the hype for me but I’m definitely in the minority with my feelings!

I buddy read this with Leslie and sadly, both of us felt the same way about this book. I personally didn’t feel the stakes and I didn’t really connect to the characters which meant that I didn’t feel the romance. Despite the major info dumping that’s pretty consistent throughout the read, I still had so many questions and seriously, this really would’ve been a great book to have a map—I know I would’ve benefitted from it as many other lands/countries were mentioned but their presence was kinda vague and I had a hard time situating their locations in relation to Briar in my head.

I really appreciated the retelling aspect of it. It’s Cinderella meets Sleeping Beauty and it was refreshing! The SB aspects appear more towards the end of the book and I loved recognising the very familiar elements and seeing how Walters forms them in this story. I loved the diversity and representation and that it was a sapphic romance—who needs Prince Charming when you’ve got yourself a sorceress, right? But at the same time… I just wanted a bit more of certain things and a lot less of others.

The author remains pretty consistent with the pacing for the most part and it’s a slow one. There’s a lot of info dumping for a good chunk of the book. We are inundated with all this historical information about Vila, the light fae, the greedy humans, the war of the fae, all kinds of magic, bloodlines, rulers, etc., but so much ended up feeling irrelevant to the main story and yet it took up so much space. That’s not to say the history wasn’t interesting but I felt that the info was a bit vague and it got repetitive after a point. There was so much “general” information but not enough character and event-specific information. I got frustrated that Alyce didn’t push to learn more about her mother, father, and the identity of the original Vila and I still have questions about so much at the end!

Although I didn’t really connect with any of the characters in the story, the one I did sympathise with most was Alyce (naturally). I felt upset for everything she had to endure. I will never understand bullies who thrive on enacting cruelties upon others! Why is it that they never understand that the person they victimise is literally a product of their own making and then they act all surprised that they’re bitter and angry? Pls! 😡 It made me pretty sad for Alyce but I did love reading her “villain origin story”. I wanted to see her rage and unleash her power against the people who literally made her life hell cos they 100% deserved what came their way… With everything that happened, I never stopped rooting for her happiness and my heart broke every time something would get in the way of that. 

Sadly though, while I was interested in her character’s evolution, I also didn’t feel entirely invested in her or anyone else in the book. For the majority of the book, her relationship with Aurora felt platonic and maybe Alyce had a bit of a crush but I never got the indication that Aurora felt the same and it felt like too much telling and not enough showing. The other characters were a little cookie cutter and existed simply for Alyce’s development so we don’t get much from them either. I thought Laurel was perhaps the most entertaining with her dry quips and she definitely had my interest piqued though and I’m sad that we didn’t get more interaction there.

By the end of the story, I was definitely curious to know what happens next but at the same time, I’m not invested enough to continue with it either. I was really looking forward to reading this sapphic retelling but unfortunately, the overall story fell flat for me.

Have you read Malice or is it on your TBR?

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