#says all this absolutely romantically FUCKED UP shit to me that i believe 🤡

[larentslovechaos]

crazy how you dont believe someone/don't trust someone, they try their best to make you trust them, and then it turns out you were exactly right to not trust them.

said person also said i had a wall up that i needed to let down, and then secured THE FUCK out of that wall 😂😂😂😂😂

[separatist-apologist]

I always want to hear your unsolicited hater thoughts thought 👀🤡

Okay so here are my hater thoughts on King of Wrath. Please just scroll along if you liked this book, I am only speaking for myself.

First of all, when I bought this book, I knew better because I did not like the Twisted series by Ana Huang. I read three of them and quit 3/4ths of the way through with the book with the red head when [spoiler alert] the shitty romantic lead sexually assaulted the FMC for thin plot reasons I no longer care to remember.

But I am SUCH a sucker for an arranged marriage (as we all know), and I was in Kansas City in this three story Barnes and Noble and riding that Taylor Swift high that I let it cloud my better judgement.

My issues:

Dante is literally just two popular tropes in a trench coat. Dark haired and rich are his entirely personality. If you want to be charitable, you could tack on implausibly, compulsively violent. I'm sorry, but Dante is a BILLIONAIRE who was BORN into his wealth (strike one, but I'll let it go for the purposes of romance), in what world is he ACTUALLY killing people?? Be SO serious. This author wanted to give him an air of danger- baby just tell us what he pays his lowest skilled worker! You want me to believe this man is killing his enemies? LMAO I laughed out loud several times when Dante was making his threats.

Vivian is also personality-less. Oh, sure, she WANTS to have a personality but Huang absolutely REFUSES to do any showing. It's all telling. So I'm told Vivian is this badass working girl (not-like-other-girls because unlike all those OTHER heiresses, she WORKS god shut the fuck up- she spent 100k very casually in the course of a day, so like....which is it baby?) making her own way but then Dante shows up acting like the worlds biggest piece of shit and she's like, okay I guess I'll move in with you.

And I know someone is going to come in and say it was the cultural pressure that dragged her into this and I really wanted more of that. It gets touched on but like, so carefully like Huang was too afraid to really commit to her plot. Vivian is Asian-American, and we really dance around what that meant to her. There is a moment right at the end where her mother is discussing why their wealth will NEVER be enough for some people and I was like, oh finally here we go- but the mom is like, you know why. And Vivian is like, yeah, I know why. And that's the end of that! And of course, Dante is never asked to respect any of the cultural differences present, nor does he (threatening to take her dad down AGAIN was just like...oh so you learned NOTHING okay cool).

I think asking readers to believe a modern day arranged marriage was always going to be a tough sell and I wish Huang had really committed to it. She really doesn't, though- Dante is an asshole right up until the very end and one of the things I hate about Huangs MMC's is that they NEVER truly atone for their bad behavior. One of her MMC's stalks the love interest until she breaks down and then Dante is just like, "I miss you" "But I'm still threatening your dad" and Vivian folds like cardboard and ultimately, Dante got everything he wanted and only ever had to treat her well just long enough to get her down the aisle.

The closest this book every came to being self aware is when Vivian is like, we're bad for each other YEAH I AGREE. Like no chemistry AT ALL, the author really relies on Dante being hot (which we're told no less than 8 times a chapter) to do her heavy lifting. The smut is just mid, in my opinion- its not the worst thing, not the best thing, it just is.

Ultimately, Vivian and Dante have no personalities that we aren't told about, even if they directly contradict what we do see. This feels like a book written specifically to market the tropes/whats popular on booktok and so of course it's not good. It's got a few good lines I'll bet she used to market it, but everything in between reads like a first draft.

Would I recommend this? No. If you want to read it, should you? Sure. It's not going to harm you, I think you'll be like me and close it like, "well. thats done". Counts toward my reading goal.