#anti haunting adeline

[rosietrace]

This post is a safe space to rant about Booktok and the books they worship!! (I do not give a shit on what books you're shitting on or if you're shitting on the author of the books, I just want to be assured that I'm not crazy for thinking Booktok has 0% reading comprehension)

[misstwisted]

trigger warning for rape being talked about

I’d do anything for dark romance booktok writers to just admit they like rape. They’re into being raped. Just fucking admit it you disgusting fucking weirdos. Like, stop hiding behind having pretend morals when you’ve been practically writing what would’ve been a traumatic scene in any other book. Enough with this “dubcon” shit in your trigger warnings. Be an adult here and say what it is. It’s rape.

[fenrysmoonbeamswife]

Lately I feel so jaded when it comes to violence and abuse against women in media. It feels like it's everywhere, especially in books and tv spaces and I'm so bleh about it. I don't even have a better word just bleh, I'm sick of it. I'm tired. It feels draining.

I'm sick of being recommended movies or shows that romanticize abuse and male violence, I'm sick of enemies to lovers being so prevalent and popular when 99.9% of the time they're not enemies it's just oppressor x oppressed or abused x victim. I'm sick of people acting like things can't be interesting or high stakes or "realistic" if the female character isn't being physically or emotionally hurt. I'm sick of male characters who are no better than actual shit stains being the favourite book/fictional boyfriend and seeing them romanticized everywhere yet the women they abuse aren't good enough. I'm sick of female authors and female audiences spreading and lapping this shit up. I'm sick of the apathy that it's so very clearly causing. I'm sick of the normalization because it's "just fiction" or "it's fantasy". I'm sick of dark romance being an excuse for a r*pists wet dream to be published and forgetting about the romance part. I'm sick of the rampant misogny that it gives space to

I'm sick of the desensitization and the romanticization and the unrelenting onslaught of these themes. I'm not saying it should never be present in media ever but jesus

[cherries-in-wine]

A rant about Haunting Adeline:

Tw: rape

I'm not against dark romances or even cnc kink, I know it's a coping mechanism for a lot of people + I would rather have you read fictional scenarios than putting yourself into dangerous situations to experience them. The problem with Haunting Adeline is that it's just rape. That's it. The part where he goes something like "you're wet so you must enjoy this" actually made me wanna throw up. A physical response by the body is NOT consent. That's like stabbing someone then being shocked that blood is spilling out. Knife play, blood play, gun play etc is only okay when it's consensual. I don't know why people call this a cnc book, like where the consensual non con it's just non con (rape). Even fanfic writers put a big ass warning for rape when it's present in their stories. On top of that the rapist so called love interest just sucks. Nothing sexy about "little mouse". He's not morally grey he's black. The author did 0 research on computer science and hacking so it comes off as an 8 year old learning their first code and calling themselves a hacker. Also saving kids from being raped does not justify you raping someone (I can't believe I have to say this out loud). The red rose story is so corny like I love roses but the author couldn't even do a little research and choose a rarer flower that had a meaning significant to the story. The main character is so boring, i hate it when they make them an author but don't expand on that storyline or make it relevant to the plot, it just feels like a self insert fanfiction. I'm so glad tiktok is banned in my country so I don't have to look at booktok bs BUT WHY IS IT INFECTING INSTAGRAM TOO LIKE STFU STOP

[theacemenace]

Haunting Adeline is bad.

It only gained hype because of the controversial themes because the construction is crap. A poorly written book with shameful dialog and characters shallower than the drain in my sink. The book makes an effort to be profound, showing how cruel and dark the world is, but in the end it tries so hard that it's more like those One Direction fics kidnapping Y/N. Adeline herself as the protagonist seems to have come straight out of a Wattpad self insert. It's also unnecessarily long. There's no justification for this story being 600 pages long, let alone a sequel. If you take away all the unnacessary bullshit, the whole duology could fit into a single book.

Such a long book, but it still fails to introduce us to the basic concepts of the characters. So many things are poorly explained that they basically expect readers to accept just “because...”? For example, Zade's motivation? I finished the book without understanding his backstory and why he would go so far to do what he does. “That's because he's angry about the existence of child trafficking”, congratulations Zade, you're a normal person who is outraged by child violence, so what? One person finding abuse wrong (which in itself is ironic when it comes to Zade, given what he does to Adeline) isn't enough to justify everything he does. He ends up being the author's puppet for action and smuty kinky scenes, rather than a complex character.

Speaking of kinky, I see a lot of people (including the author apparently) who don't know the basic difference between fetish and abuse. All fetish and kinks, including cnc, needs to be done in a healthy, safe and consensual way. These are the basics of the practice and are non-negotiable. Practically all the sex scenes in this book that take place between Adeline and Zade fall into the dub-con (dubious consent) spectrum. Whether it's because he's forced himself on her, coerced her, manipulated her, etc., from the lightest to the heaviest, all the sex between them has a non-consensual aspect in addition to the disparity of power in the relationship that was not negotiated between them. So you can't use the excuse that it's a fetish so anything goes, because that's simply not the reality. If you let go of the dark romance for a second and actually research how this works, you'll quickly realize that the way this book deals with fetish is extremely off the mark.

Lastly, there's the issue of human/child trafficking. I see a lot of people criticize how graphic the scenes are, which for me wasn't a problem, but very few people talk about how the vision portrayed in the book refers to a line of thought that connect whit the crazy right-wing american conspiracy theorist mentality . Whenever there was a scene involving violence against children, I had the impression that H.D Carlton had studied the subject on the QAnom forum. Anyone who does the slightest bit of research on the subject knows that the main victims of this kind of violence are not the white suburban American children of the traditional family, as we see repeatedly portrayed through Zade's missions. It's not a black van that springs up in an upper-middle-class neighborhood and steals away a beloved child while their parents cry copiously over the loss. Those who are targeted are usually non-white, disabled children from very poor areas who are generally forgotten by the system. Not to mention that the book kind of implies that most of the guys involved in the dirty work of kidnapping the children are Mexicans and mestizos. These are the people we see Zade, the white guy, fighting against to save the day. Also I'm not Jewish so I can't say 100%, but the way the author constructed the secret society plus all the strange and conspiracy-oriented things in the book gave me an anti-Semitic vibe. The secret society in this book is literally a ctrl+c ctrl+v of Blood Libel. Maybe I'm going too far with my interpretation, but considering that the author literally had to put a disclaimer at the beginning that she has no connection with conspiracy theory groups, I don't think I'm so wrong to notice parallels.

[alexandriastark76]

What is haunting alison or whatever it was in your tags?

Thank you for asking! I’ve been waiting to rant about this for a while now!

Beware though, dear OP cause we go into a deep dive about abusive behaviours, non consensual acts, stalking, obsessive behaviour, psychological manipulation, gaslighting, rape, and overall graphic themes which (sarcastically) is dark romance for you.

Please do not go further if you are a minor or are triggered by heavy topics like these

Stay safe <3

So, Haunting Adeline is a mature themed book written by H. D. Carlton.

According to the summary at the back, this is what you get:

The Diamond.

Death walks alongside me but the reaper is no match for me. I'm trapped in a world full of monsters dressed as men, and those who aren't as they seem. They won't keep me forever. I no longer recognize the person I've become. And I'm fighting to find my way back to the beast who hunts me in the night. They call me a diamond. But they've only created an angel of death.

The Hunter.

I was born a predator, with ruthlessness ingrained in my bones, when what's mine is stolen from me in the night, like a diamond hidden within a fortress. I find that I can no longer contain the beast. Blood will paint the ground as I tear apart this world to find her, and bring her back to where she belongs. No one will escape my wrath, especially not those who have betrayed me.

(In my opinion, this already gets very cliche but let’s carry on I guess)

Actual summary however, is:

The book is about how Adeline forms a “relationship” with her stalker while she discovers who killed her great-grandmother (who also had a stalker), while from the stalker's point of view, he is looking for an organization that kills children while stalking and searching.

This isn’t bad, per se, but it is a very hypocritical setting for what happens later on.

Now, as we move onwards with the book, we see that Adeline Reilly lives in her gran’s house where she is being stalked by her stalker Zade Meadows. She seemingly goes on date (and has sex) with a guy who (she doesn’t know about it though) is a very intimately involved personnel in a child trafficking ring. Zade knows this, so, he kills him (if i recall correctly), cuts his hand off and mails it to Adeline with a rose and warns her to not go on a date anymore.

This happens a couple of times, her doing things (not specifically just going on dates, because she doesn’t go on dates anymore either) that grates him, and so on.

Direct excerpts:

This isn’t disturbing, at least according to the range of ‘dark romance’.

But this is where it gets bad.

One day, Zade comes over blinded by rage that Adeline let another man touch what is “his” aka Adeline herself (let’s not even talk about how dehumanising that is), and rapes her.

And I’m saying rape, because there is no other word with which you can describe it.

He walks in dead of the night, holds her at gunpoint and forces her to undress and then forces himself on her. And proceeds to assault her with that very gun.

Excerpt if you want:

This is where shit gets disturbing and frankly, disgusting, even by the dark romance standards.

Note that I keep saying the dark romance standards because readers have a habit to excuse such behaviours and actions by claiming that it is “dark romance” this is what means to read “dark” romance. That such disturbing themes are going to be there, and we should’ve “read the trigger warnings”.

Now, one might wonder, that there should not be any issue with CNC, but, let’s go back.

The question that rises is, is it truly CNC?

CNC is a kink among the BDSM community, which features Consensual Non Consent.

CNC, is a role play of sorts, which has pre-discussed boundaries, safewords, and proper communication between the people taking part in it. Which, might I remind, did not happen.

Zade storms in, there is no discussion, and assaults the girl who he calls “his” by the way.

Common argument against this made by fans are, ��Adeline liked it, so it isn’t actually non consent.” Does reading Exhibit 5 make you feel like she liked it? She literally describes it as:

“My body is full of rage, humiliation, and shame—I know this. But it’s like my brain can’t process those emotions, so it’s just choosing to feel nothing at all.

Is this what trauma does? Knowing you’ve been violated but your body chooses to go numb instead?”

I beg your finest pardon but this does not sound like a person having enjoyed a deliberate sexual assault.

Finally we come to the topic that what is the issue of people with this book.

People, fans, readers, are not only idolising this behaviour (stalking, the apparent “CNC” and the rough way of assault) and before anyone comes to blab that “no one is idolising this blah blah blah”— one simple search on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok and the BikerTok apparently with Haunting Adeline edits will show you how much teenage girls and other people are fawning over a rapist. (If you still have doubts that Zade is not a rapist simply on the account that he helped trafficking victims, then you need to seriously re evaluate your moralities)

Such toxic/stalking behaviours have been labelled “sexy and hot” which frankly disgusts me that there are so many young people seeing this and becoming susceptible to abuse and toxicity.

No one wants to ban this book, we simply want people to stop romanticising it. What he does is not right, and to hold that shitty behaviour on high accord simply because the Stockholm Syndrome setting sets a rapist and his victim together, does not make it right. Real life stalkers are not pretty or sexy, why should we not hold the fictional ones accountable and then?

People will torch up actual morally grey characters for much less and then go lust over a fucking rapist.

Just because other readers are holding him accountable and criticising him does not make them snowflakes, it makes you look like a fan blind to the pretty privilege.

Booktok has developed a bad reputation because of readers like these, and considering most of the booktok does act as an apologist, it isn’t wrong to say that most of the booktok is ignorant to such characters and their atrocities.

In conclusion, we don’t want to censor the book, or criticise rhetoric writer for writing themes like these, it isn’t the worst of the “dark romance”, we simply want the author to tag it properly (it was NOT CNC) and for readers to not romanticise a rapist.

Hope that answers your question OP! Also, note that when I said You so many times, it was simply about the fans of this book series.

<3

[nestarcheronmommy]

I miss when enemies to lovers wasn't abuser an victim.

When you were slowly discovering that the enemy was not really bad, that he was another victim or when the situation in the story changed and the characters had to work together until they realized that the other was not so bad.

In today's books the abuse is romanticized. The love interest abuses the main character, then there is a monologue where he apologizes and victimizes himself and the main character forgives him, then they fuck and happily ever after. That's not love. That's not romantic. That's bullshit. And honestly, I think anyone who likes to read those kinds of relationships has a problem in their head.

[highladyelenna]

so apparently i’m an idiot and can’t separate fiction from reality just bc i said i don’t like zade meadows because he assaults addie.

“he never tries to justify it” like that’s some how even worse to me? he knows it’s wrong. yet he still did it? and people are still falling for him? it just turns me off immediately like i can’t feel anything towards him.

i guess i didn’t get the memo that morally grey= rapist, and that we were all okay with that now. lmao.

[rmelster]

Okay. I’m tired of all of this “but he is a morally grey character”. They have killed this trope for me.

To whoever that tries to justify a fictional’s man whole ark of doing nothing but harm to his significant other and killing people have the door right there. No, he isn’t “morally grey”: he is bad. He is evil. All of him is rotten and festering; if he has a soul, it reeks like putrid flesh.

If he did live, he would not deserve a morsel of the love and admiration he has from the readers. He is the kind of man that has me looking behind my shoulder when I walk to home late at night.

“But he kills bad people”. Door. I get the purpose is “noble” and appealing to many readers, but he is the bad man too, and nobody wants to see his demise.

His only characters traits are having a big schlong and a soul darker than the Devil’s.

[heaven4lostgirls]

sarah j maas is overall a bad human being consistently acting in ways that negatively impacts minorities and justifying her actions by ways of ‘ignorance’

ACOTAR is not this ‘great’ series of novels that will change the world, most of the content is plagiarized and the most complex of characters are written very surface level.

it is very obvious the books are written from a white woman’s perspective, and is arguably comparable to the writing and idealism of colleen hoover and the author of haunting adeline.

ACOTAR fans cannot sit back and defend this book when they realize how hypocritical and colonialist all of the novels are. the villianisation of tamlin, yet the glorification of rhysand is arguably one of the worst things to come out of the books, similarly with everyone’s excuse that what feyre did in the spring court was ‘excusable’ because tamlin ‘abused’ her.

read the last two posts i reblogged and any of the lovely @sonics-atelier ‘s posts on the critique of the acotar universe before you argue with me. their points are so valid and concise that i was unaware of some of the arguments and criticisms they had delved into.

they are eye opening and so very relevant to current affairs today. i beg if even one or two of you go to read some of these critiques, it would open up discussions about how problematic not only sarah j maas is, but white feminism as a whole, capitalism and colonialism too.

white female authors need to be held accountable to do better, especially those that have big audiences like sarah j maas, colleen hoover and the author of haunting adeline and similar ‘dark’ romance booktok books.

[bxriles]

I’m sure that this is not a hot take and that a lot of people feel the same way but like…

The question “does it have spice?!🌶️🔥” makes me want to jump off a cliff. I’m out here looking for gothic book recommendations on Reddit, tumblr, and goodreads and WHY is this the first question so many people ask 😭

Look, I love erotica as much as the next person but come on. There have got to be other things that matter when recommending books or choosing to pick one up, my GOD.

[synaspensprungvomdorf]

Regret it or was it worth it?

[misstwisted]

here comes my bum ass ranting again!

TW for talking about haunting adeline

Aside from the obvious shit like the FMC falling for her stalker rapist love interest, haunting adeline is just a terribly written book in general.

My biggest problem is H.D cannot write a emotional scene to save her life. Every time she tries to have a sad moment, it's so…empty. I think it's because she tries so hard to make Zade look like a good guy, it takes away from her writing any meaningful. She doesn't include the scenes she does because she wants to write a good story and make interesting characters, it's all for ulterior motives.

She legit made Zade the leader of a organization that takes down human trafficking groups just so people will think he's a good guy. It’s the laziest fucking attempt ever.

He’s saving a girl sold into sex trafficking one chapter, and for such a SERIOUS topic, I felt nothing reading it. It was so hollow and emotionless. It was just zade being a cringe weirdo with a savior complex.

Like he just goes on and on every time he's doing work about how good he is and just stating how he feels bad for the kids and women. She made the subject of human trafficking such a big part of zade’s character. And she had the responsibility of taking care of such a sensitive topic. But no. She knows her audience is too stupid to realize this is just a tool to have them like zade. The fact that his savior complex is so loud just proves it.

She tries WAY too hard to make him seem selfless. In another chapter he self harms himself. This could’ve been interesting and used to make zade actually sympathetic. But since the author doesn’t know how to write complex characters and emotional scenes, she just writes out him wanting to feel the pain along with the kids and women.

“I want to ease their pain by creating my own.” SHUT THE FUCK UP

Shes literally explaining EVERYTHING, and not showing. How hard is it to write emotional scenes about such a disturbing topic? It's fucking HUMAN TRAFFICKING. How is she so so bad at writing she makes me not care about fictional victims?

And there's so many chances to humanize Zane, but I'm sure she doesn't want to because it'll make him "unmasculine".

Personally when he’s doing a mission, I would’ve wrote him to be secretively scared of the men around him. It would’ve shown that at the end of the day, he’s a person and he understands that these are dangerous people who aren’t afraid to do disgusting things.

I’d also write that even if he’s scared inside, he’s still trying to be strong and put aside his feelings and worries about himself for the safety of the trafficking victims. Not just him blatantly talking about how sad this situation is and how amazing he is for being a hero.

[sluttypatrickstar]

[nathaniels-diary]

friendly reminder that reading rape romantizations does not make you edgy or cool and it should not be normalized as a trope

[vampireprose]

What a good day to not be on booktok and having no literary comprehension.