⭐⭐
1.5 star (rounded up)
Kindle Unlimited read
Lissa.... Good God woman.
Look, maybe I was distracted by the world building in the first book, but Lissa is not interesting at all. She's as interesting as a rusty nail. I said it before, but the plot seems to push and bully her, and all she's able to do is react, cry, X to doubt, react some more, make assumptions, and promise to stop crying.
The plot... Other wasn't really a plot, honestly. The story focuses more on Lisa's beauty, and an incredibly fractured romance element. The entire book was just cliché trope soup, and Lissa is stranded on the lone cracker floating atop it. Every little thing that could have happened did happen, and it was fairly consecutive.
Brion just pisses me off, too. He's not really well written in this book. He contradicts himself a lot, gets angry, and despite being the choice for romance, he shows such little interest in Lissa.
He claims he cares for her, and perhaps he does in some way, but it certainly didn't feel like it was in a romantic way. Even in instances where he should feel jealousy, he doesn't even show it! I still cannot believe he let his uncle propose to Lissa, KNOWING the plan, and just laughed.
LAUGHED.
"I was afraid of what would happen if you said yes." That. Is. Not. Good. Enough. Quite honestly, for a hot minute, the entire situation felt like he brought her here so she would marry his uncle.
That entire dinner scene was not written well, in my. Opinion. The idea of the uncle proposing to her was honestly a bit surprising, but the resulting argument was Weak. If I was Lissa I would have walked my ass out and not gone back.
I'm so upset by how this book went downhill so badly, and so quickly. I'm afraid to read the third book, honestly.