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Reviews tagging 'Bullying'

Truly Forbidden by L.J. Shen

38 reviews

funny lighthearted medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character

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challenging emotional funny mysterious reflective tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Loved this! Definitely 5 ⭐️ feelings! 2nd chance grumpy sassy romance. Our MMC is legit grumpy and maybe my favorite grumpy asshole hero I’ve read this far. Here for the hot IDGAF vibes all day for Row 😍 I felt so pulled into and connected to these characters and the family dynamics. But HOLY MOLY the spice in this! 4.5 🌶️ First LJ Shen book and cannot wait to explore their backlog!

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dark emotional funny hopeful lighthearted reflective sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I enjoyed 80% of this, but the ending kind of tanked. It felt very rushed and felt like a lot of details got brushed over to jump to HEA. 

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medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: No

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dark emotional funny hopeful reflective medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Truly Madly Deeply is haunting. It is romantic and devastating, warm and chilling. It portrays the intense connection of soulmates, while also navigating the cruelty of, frankly, psychopaths.

Dot and Row are perfectly imperfect characters, each of them deeply flawed while also full of heart. Their love story was frustrating and emotional and worthy. It was difficult to see the two of them fight what was obvious for so long. I felt like they should both have very easily been able to understand what the other was thinking but really never seemed to until the end when they were apart.

Dylan is such a fun character and I’m crossing my fingers that the next book in the series is hers so we can see her get her Happy Ever After. I’d also love to know why she picked that name. No spoilers but… what?

Allison Murphy, I hope pops up in later books too purely so we can see
more of
her downfall. 

Overall, a dark romance that will give you chills in both the best and worst ways. 

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slow-paced

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sad tense slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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The narration is great and thankfully so since this is longer than I normally like to listen to. I'm unsure of how I feel about this one overall. Given the length of this book, I personally liked how we got enough time to get to know each character fully and get to understand them individually and as a couple. There were certain parts that make my inner feminist really struggle to keep listening but I was invested in how things would turn out. The spicy parts were to me, cringe at best and not really done well in my opinion. I did like the small town setting and the glimpses into NY and London. 

Lots of trigger warnings for this one do keep that in mind if you choose to dive into this book.

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dark emotional funny inspiring fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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