If I could give 0 stars I would. Even better, if I could remove the stars of others reviews I would.
DNF at 78%. Feeling like booktok keeps playing with me and I swear I’m gonna start blocking people who suggest this crap.
I tried, I swear. I almost finished it. Couldn’t put myself through it till the end. But let’s make a list of reasons why.
1. First of all it is NOT a slow burn, I don’t know why people keep saying this. Maybe it felt that way for me because the first chapter is actually supposed to me in the middle of the book, but starting like that with him basically already in love it’s in no way a slow burn. I mean c’mon he saw her in a bar, kissed her, found out he was her new boss, didn’t interact with her for a long time (because she kept avoiding him) and BOOM, he was in love. How is this slow burn I don’t know, felt like instant love for me, but whatever.
I don’t enjoy books where they’re both in love at first sight, I almost always go for slow burn, so this was not for me.
2. The whole mafia vibe/theme at the beginning. What? It felt so out of place, not talked about enough, just something thrown out there to make things interesting and different but it was so badly portrayed that it didn’t make sense. For me it was something they put in the book to make the mc look like strong woman who went through hell, which is fine, love me some complicated backstories and strong women, but it wasn’t developed, like at all, and later in the book (at least where I made it) was another thing to add just cause, I couldn’t empathize at all. Obviously when we read about mafia it’s hard to feel inside the book, because it’s not something people usually knows or have experienced, in this case it wasn’t developed well so I really couldn’t put myself in her shoes.
3. Their interactions. My god they were atrocious. First the insta love made it awful for me, but still I tried to push trough. It was ok at first but like her mafia past, the relationship wasn’t developed so it’s felt off. No passion, they barely knew each other, even what could have been a cute, sweet thing like her learning his language, was just meh.
4. The repetitions. I don’t know Portuguese, so maybe I’m wrong, but are you fucking kidding me? Aren’t there other pet names other than “querida”? After the third time I was already sick of it, but this word is written in this book 199 times. Why? WHY? How could the author write the same thing even 50 times and be like ‘you know what? let’s use it some more’ it’s besides me. I swear I never wanna see this word ever again.
5. The cover. I never comment on this, even when I love the cover, but (and I’m sorry to whoever he is) the man felt creepy and too adult, not in a good way, just a plain ol’ grown up, so not only I had to look at this man who gave me major creep vibes every time I wanted to go back to the book and finish it, but I didn’t feel any attraction towards the love interest because of it. I love cartoon covers because they give me the opportunity to imagine whoever I want, and every time there’s a real person instead I don’t like it, usually I ignore it but this time it just ruined the fun for me.
I wanted so bad to finish it because I hardly ever DNF books and it felt like a waste of my time, I was already at 78% might as well no? No. Kept being boring, cringe and nonsense. I’m sorry I feel this way because I saw a lot of good reviews. I kept going back to this book, gave it lots of opportunities and I waited to get better, I really wanted to like it, but it’s a no for me.