Angry Eastern Reads

Devil in Winter by Lisa Kleypas Lily Wolf review TLDR : definitely worth a read if you are into the good old rake x “good London society girl” genre.  Lisa Kleypas has a talent for creating characters that are completely incompatible but somehow find their way to each other. It’s part of the magic! Few things are more romantic than a gorgeous emotionally unavailable “fallen angel” dude falling madly in love with your average wallflower who was noticed by no one. The juiciest part is watching this degenerate rake fight his overwhelming feelings! I am also a big fan of the marriage of convenience trope. However, the book suffers from the typical flaws in this genre:  An incurable and unfeeling playboy turns out to be a puppy dog. Doesn't do a single dishonorable thing the entire time… come on! The wallflower who is supposedly shy and stuttery does just fine standing up for herself the entire time. What a phony.  The plot was great but the ending was a bit anticlimactic....

The Cruel Prince By Holly Black This book will not change your life, but it will certainly entertain you. The main premise here is of a human girl who ends up living among fey as a result of a deranged fey killing her parents and adopting (if you can call it that) her and her two sisters. She is viewed as inferior by pretty much everyone around her, and is tormented and bullied relentlessly. Despite all that, she aspires not only to become integrated with the fey, but to achieve high social status, possibly by taking advantage of the impending unrest at the imminent crowning of a new fey king. The things I liked: - The moral ambivalence of every character in the story, and the believable way in which they are the product of their environment. For example, the adoptive father of the main heroine acts like a bloodthirsty maniac one second but takes care of the children left behind by his victims the next. The heroine herself can be quite bloodthirsty and cunning and at times. She seems t...