Ember Holt's Blog: Ember Holt's Smut Appraisals

Haunting Adeline
⭐⭐⭐⭐(4/5) Pushed my boundaries

Yep, so this one pushed me farther than I'd been before in the dark romance genre. The pewpew scene, IYKYK.

There was some fun supernaturalness to it that I enjoyed, and a little mystery plot on the side that was fun to accompany all the stalking.

It's sort of hilarious that the MMC is involved in hunting down human trafficking rings and freeing the women, and then goes on to stalk and dubcon abuse the girl he's obsessed with.

Whatever, very spicy and fun. Enjoyed.

Hunting Adeline
⭐⭐⭐⭐ (4/5) PUSHED MY BOUNDARIES AGAIN...

Yep, so this one pushed things even farther. On screen, detailed, graphic r*pe of the FMC because she's become human trafficked... good thing her stalker boyfriend hunts these fuckers for a living, right?

I listened to this on audio and was just curled up on my side crying for about 30% of it.

The healing journey that takes place afterwards was really powerful though, and I loved it.

Priest
⭐⭐⭐✨ (3.75/5) Catholic Erotica...

Yeah so a hot rich girl escapes her hot rich life and gets wet for buff priest boy.

There's no story other than that. They have lots of secks all over the church, using church stuff sometimes...

There's a third act breakup that went on for WAY too long and upset me, so...yeah.

Neon Gods
⭐⭐⭐✨ (3.75/5) Started so strong

This book started off as a 5 star read. I loved it. It hinted at deep world building and an interesting contemporary twist on Greek gods, but then did not deliver.

We got to Act 2 and things started heading down hill. By the back half of Act 2, it was so slow and boring I was very sad.

The resolution with the mini-villain was a huge let down and so anticlimactic...

Sad.

When She Unravels
⭐⭐⭐ (3/5) Another strong starter that fizzled out.

This book had such a great start, fast paced, powerful FMC who's taking charge of her life and not taking anymore shit.

We hit the serious spice at the 50% mark and the story falls apart. When it comes time for the characters to make hard decisions at the latter half of the second act, they wimp out and the plot falls totally on its face.

Another sad.

Writing you from the bed of my AirBnB in Japan. Sorry about August, it just kinda got away from me...

All right, I tried to read 5 books this month and I got through 3. Highest to lowest, let's go.

Breath Mints / Battle Scars
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (5/5)
Dramione smut is always high on my list. This was a very toxic and damaged Draco/Hermione 8th year post war Order wins. It had me angry crying at the 95% mark and I was about to lose my shit, but it was HEA so don't worry.

Glitch
⭐⭐⭐⭐ (4/5)
There was no substance to this book. Contemporary that reads very Gen Z. It was literally 90% smut. Good palate cleanser.

To Brew A Scandal
⭐⭐⭐⭐ (4/5)
A very cute, very short (for Dramione) victorian era with pretty much all the cannon events but set back in time. It was fun and cute, but both D/H were off in their characterizations, likely just due to the time period, but D was not as grey and vicious and H was not as bright or fiery.

Slaying the Shadow Prince
DNF
The prose is fine, its legible...it just reads very YA. The opening sequence is a very childish fight with a boy obsessed with her that puts them in combat with monsters. The MMC is a hot shadow daddy but he's not actually morally grey, or the enemy. FMC is chaotic and irrational in bad ways. Couldn't put up with it after 15%.

Knock Down Dragon Out
DNF
Got this on a bookbub deal and thought heck it, why not, love a good dragon shagon, but not this one. Made it about 5% in and the FMC is not in a mental space I wanted to inhabit for 4-8 hours. Don't know how else to put it. She's whiny...

Anyway, that's it! Hope I get to read some more when I'm home T_T

Yes I'm late, I know. Here we go. Rapid fire.

Power Play
⭐⭐⭐ 3/5
This was fine. It was like 30 pages too short in the middle where the actual development of relationships happens.
Two doms working at the same marketing firm make a bet at who can win the most clients and whoever loses has to submit to the other dom. It was smutty and fun, but not anything to write home about for sure.

Savage Prince
⭐⭐⭐ 3.25/5
Omegaverse stuff always gets me with "Heat" because it feels very dubcon. I feel ick reading it sometimes, like the girls can't say no, they don't want to even if they don't want to... its weird.
Anyway, this was fine. It was 30 pages too long imo, and a bit repetitive in a few places. Also, misrepresented. The dude in this book has RED SKIN AND HORNS. I'm sorry, but the man on this cover is a normal human broseph. False advertising. I mean I'm happier that I got aliens than contemporary, but whatever.

The Doctor
⭐⭐⭐✨ 3.5/5
An extra .5 stars added for buttstuff where he washes his hands. 👏👏👏👏👏
This was advertised to me as "Birthday Girl but better" and no, it was not. Birthday Girl had depth and a moral conundrum. This was just smut. Like, every other chapter was smut. Sure, the smut was GOOD, but the story wasn't there. I'm a story first person, honestly.
There was doctor roleplay smut which I guess made it pretty interesting. But it was age gap, ex boyfriend's dad, and like.... Birthday Girl did that better. Lots better. Okay, moving on.

Ensnared
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5/5
You fucking heard right. Spider-man monster smut is five out of five stars. I would rate it higher if the system went higher.
The world building was fucking amazing. The moral dilemmas of the characters knowing that they're developing an emotional attraction to an alien is GREAT. So so so so well done. Fully fleshed out alien culture. SO good. SO SO GOOD.
I recommend this to everyone. Read it. Read it. READ IT.
Gods I love this series. I'm reading book 2 right now.

Rapidfire, here we go.

Daughter of Darkness: Wielder of Shadows
DNF. The prose are too basic, the dialogue stilted, the sense of pacing not there. This is a baby author and I feel bad for calling it out. I don't want to crush their soul. I want them to grow and learn and get better and keep pursuing this with passion. My first book was all those things too. It takes time to grow into your own style and really learn how to weave stories. Keeping going little dude.

Tempted by the Gargoyle
DNF. The happy-fun-times words used were just not good. I couldn't get past it. This was supposed to be a fun fast snappy read and it just bleeeh...yeah, it wasn't that for me.

The Maleficent Faerie: A Sleeping Beauty Retelling
DNF. I wanted to love this book so bad. I loved The Sea Witch: A Little Mermaid Retelling and I figured, same author same deal, I'll love this one too. Nope...sad times. Made it to 76% and couldn't punish myself any further.
Degradation, Insta-Love, pacing problems, unbelievable amounts of info-dumping and more made it impossible to get through.

From Blood and Ash
⭐⭐⭐✨ (3.5ish stars). This book was really slow, but the burn for the romance was great and the banter was excellent. I knew the twist from pretty much the outset of the book because the author kinda smacked us in the face with it, but whatever. Still enjoyable. Long and slow.

Monster's Find
⭐⭐⭐ (3 stars). Knotting for the first time was weird. "In Heat" feels like non-con and I don't like that... Whatever, it was like a 20 minute read and it made me feel accomplished.

Warrior Fae
⭐⭐⭐⭐ (4 stars). I liked the conclusion of this story. I almost threw my kindle across the room and DNF'd at about 80%, but I made it through. The final battle was a little too basic compared to all the other epic battles they'd had and it was...sad. Whatever. Loved the conclusion but also OMG THE NUMBER OF EPILOGUES. There were seriously like 12 of them.

That's it y'all. Hopefully July will be a better reading month.
~ E