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mashedpotatoandsaladcream 's review for:
Tempting Little Thief
by Meagan Brandy
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
“that’s right, rich girl. i’m a bottom feeder. nothing but a poor punk who rides for someone else at someone else’s call. that’s the life i live ‘cause that’s the he and i was dealt. no ace was slipped in my pocket at birth, but you better fucking believe when i die ill have the entire fucking deck in the palm of my hands”
i honestly don’t know what to think of this book, my first of the year and in a while if i’m being totally honest with myself. it took so long for me to get through but not because it was dreadful but because once is put it down, i just didn’t feel more excitement to pick it up. it follows the mafia princess who falls in love with the poor grunt worker who ends up because supposedly so different that he can weasel his way into the building that has the best ever security, but he’s a shadow so of course he can figure it out.
i found myself both liking and hating this book in equal measures, though rarely truly loving it. i found it totally unrealistic but it isn’t a book you look for realism in. but even then i just could not wrap my head around the face these are teenagers (like 19 max) running round doing everything that happens in this book, i constantly had to reimagine them in their twenties at least.
there’s a whole range of smut tropes and ideas and some people would love all of it but i did find some scenes so cringe that it like undid all the bits i did like about the book ( i think about four pages from the end she has been officially made the head of the greysons, still a teenager, wearing a skirt short enough that she can twirl around and flash her cheeks to the crowd of new students just to show a branding, the smile of disbelief that spread across my face was ridiculous because it’s sillier than i can describe ).
“did you know he had no idea how to dance?… shame, really. he never even got the dance he practiced so hard for”
and i did like parts of the book, i liked some of the writing and all but it kinda just gets overshadowed by all i found cringe. i loved the start much more than the end, the plot twist about what her father was planning was not shocking to me but it wasn’t really the big plot twist but even then it still wasn’t jaw dropping shocking to me (although maybe it was just because i flicked through the final pages at the end so had a hint of it already) but the clues were there and glaring. i found her little mental state dissolving some pretty well, i did feel bad for the shopkeeper since he lost his livelihood, and sure he got money but it was his store you know?
it just felt like as the story developed she lost this whole badass mafia princess thing like she stared at the ml in horror at one point and im there like? what were you expecting? and what she did with sai? i was shocked like you didn’t even give him a second to respond like i liked him girl.
“like shit. like losing. like lacking in every aspect of everything. it has felt like breathing with one lung in a room steamed with chlorine and acid, like walking on broken ankles and sleeping on spikes. that’s what ive felt like, that’s what missing you feels like”
i can’t tell whether i loved the characters themselves -i just don’t think the ml (bass) should have had the ending he did and how he even had the capacity to do all he did, by the end of his whole scheme thing i could just sit thinking about if a 19 year old did this to me i would laugh my head off at how ridiculous it is and i’m 21. rocklin? did i love her? not really but i didn’t hate her either, she had potential and i did like her but i just think it was him that kinda throws it off. they’re both crazy and i guess that’s why it works. but they’re 18/19!! i just couldn’t get over the idea of them doing all they do and did so young and reaching the end titles as they did like that.
the book isn’t some great literary work or even a perfect little dark(?) romance that i would rave about but i did finish it so i give it kudos for that because ive been in the fattest slump with reading. i’ll very likely enjoy her sisters story much more but we will have to see whether i feel the motivation to wait and find that story when and if it comes out.