Holy god, this book was an absolute mess. Many aspects of this remind me of the third season of OUAT. Anyone who has seen it will be familiar with what I mean. Before I get into the story, let's talk about the writing. It's... very subpar. I'm sorry, but it is. There are many spelling errors, fragments, over-usage of single sentence paragraphs and unbelievably poorly written dialogue. I find it hard to believe this was edited at all.
Something I want to point out before I discuss the plot. I understand this is a dark romance novel featuring a reverse harem. Yes, I read all the trigger warnings and whatnot. That being said. Choosing Peter Pan to center around your reverse harem erotica is strange. I think it's weird when anyone ages up a character who is traditionally a child JUST to write them having sex. The whole point of Peter Pan is that he's unwilling to grow up. Yet here, the author was like, okay but imagine Peter Pan but an adult, tatted, and he smokes cigarettes. And in doing so, it completely erased the character of Peter Pan. How did he grow up? She's changed his entire back story but has given us none of the details. What's the purpose of Neverland now? And there's also the case of our MC, Winnie. It is repeatedly mentioned that she has 'just turned 18'. Over and over again, we are told about how Peter takes the Darlings on their 18th birthday and that they are broken. The emphasis on the age is disturbing because it honestly reminds me of all of those ' FRESH adults JUST TURNED 18' pornos.
The main character, Winnie Darling, has no personality aside from enjoying sex. All we know about her appearance is that she has brown hair and green eyes and she's malnourished. The only women in her life are prostitutes. One of which groomed her to use her body to get what she wanted from boys from a young age. She resents her mother for being crazy and a prostitute but then uses that as a defense for why she has unhealthy sex all the time.
So the gist of the plot is this. Every woman in the Darling family gets taken by Peter Pan when they turn 18, and then he and his Lost Boys 'break them'. This means they get their mind broken into by a faerie who then drives them insane. It's purposely left as a mystery as to how she will get broken throughout the book, and it's a little odd mixed with Peter's 'no touching/fucking the Darling's'. It makes it seem like that's what was the cause of them being broken, yet later, Winnie fucks everyone with no consequence. So what was the point of this rule? First of all, why do only women get taken? Are men unable to retain their ancestor's memories? Secondly, if the Darlings are well aware of this 'curse' or whatever on their future daughters, why would they continue having children? Wouldn't you want to avoid that fate?
The way sex is portrayed in this book is incredibly unrealistic and laughable. The Lost Boys are so sex-crazed that they pop boners at Winnie moaning because food tastes good. She eats a pancake, licks some syrup off her lip, and now Bash has a boner. There's even a part where Winnie is being taught to gut a fish, and she gets aroused by the mention of the dead fish's ANAL CAVITY??? I just...what?!
The character of Vane(The Dark One) makes little sense to me. He is supposedly the worst one, the meanest one, etc. Yet he's the one who ends up saving Winnie in the end? It doesn't fall in line with his character at all. He spits in her mouth and constantly degrades her; at least, in my eyes, it didn't read as a consensual thing. Idk man; why is he suddenly bothered at the thought of Winnie losing her mind? Why does he care about her but not any of the other Darlings they did this to?
The Lost Boys narrative bounces all over the place. They constantly talk about loving to break women and seeing them cry, bleed, beg, etc. But then, at the same time, they're constantly worrying over Winnie and how thin she is (this is honestly mentioned a ridiculous amount and this book is only 200 pages), hoping Vane isn't too mean to her, and worrying about her getting broken even though they constantly talk about how much they love to break women.... like what?!
Idk, this book gave me major ick vibes.