Take a photo of a barcode or cover
ihlonial 's review for:
A Dawn with the Wolf Knight
by Elise Kova
I always keep my expectations severely low with romantasy books, especially when it comes to independent authors. It feels to me like many of them sacrifice the plot to simply write as much smut as they want, which I hate. Why is it so hard to read romantasy books for plot instead of smut?
This book genuinely surprised me with how much it focused on the plot and the worldbuilding. It was rich in a history of the magical world Midscape and how the evolution of certain beings have affected the land. That becomes a major driving force of much that happens to this book.
I really appreciated that our main character was an intelligent, self-sufficient individual with her own set of morals. That was something I noticed the author was really focused on trying to get right, and even if it wasn't always done perfectly, it was something that I ultimately think did this book a huge favor. So oftentimes the women in these romantasy books are swept into these romances with dubious amount of consent or choice, and I appreciated that choice was a major theme of this book. As well as the main character's friendship with Aurora. I've decided that these books need way more female friendship than monster boyfriends. There was something really special about their relationship and I wanted more of it, so much more.
The romance was really good up until a certain point where the plot twist forced the biggest eye roll out of me because of course that would be the plot twist, which leads me to that a lot of the resolutions to the story seemed to be more convenient than earned, which I don't think was inherently a bad thing, but perhaps not what I would have expected considering how much I was loving the experience up to the end.
This book genuinely surprised me with how much it focused on the plot and the worldbuilding. It was rich in a history of the magical world Midscape and how the evolution of certain beings have affected the land. That becomes a major driving force of much that happens to this book.
I really appreciated that our main character was an intelligent, self-sufficient individual with her own set of morals. That was something I noticed the author was really focused on trying to get right, and even if it wasn't always done perfectly, it was something that I ultimately think did this book a huge favor. So oftentimes the women in these romantasy books are swept into these romances with dubious amount of consent or choice, and I appreciated that choice was a major theme of this book. As well as the main character's friendship with Aurora. I've decided that these books need way more female friendship than monster boyfriends. There was something really special about their relationship and I wanted more of it, so much more.
The romance was really good up until a certain point where the plot twist forced the biggest eye roll out of me because of course that would be the plot twist, which leads me to that a lot of the resolutions to the story seemed to be more convenient than earned, which I don't think was inherently a bad thing, but perhaps not what I would have expected considering how much I was loving the experience up to the end.