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A review by brokenrecord
Rituals by Kelley Armstrong
4.0
4.5 stars. Listen, since Omens I have been very consistent about this series, in that all I care about is Olivia/Gabriel. The main plot does not matter to me (I've read Betrayals like 3 times and still couldn't give you even a hint of a plot summary); as long as I enjoy the Olivia/Gabriel development, I'm happy. Which means I absolutely adored this book, because it did everything I wanted with Olivia/Gabriel. And it's a weird thing, because I've read other much more critical reviews, and the whole time, I'm like, "Yep, that's a totally valid complaint, I see where those criticisms are coming from, can't argue against that at all," etc., but those things just… don't matter to me at all. So that's where I'm coming from here.
I just really loved Gabriel and Olivia finally finding their way into a relationship that wouldn't have seemed possible in Omens but that made sense at this point in their development. I loved that Gabriel has finally gotten to a place where he can communicate with Liv (even if he still doesn't always know the right things to do) and how he's learned to care about people besides Liv as well. AND THE FACT THAT HE PLANNED A ROMANTIC GETAWAY TO WOO HER!!! And it also endlessly delighted me that Olivia was fantasizing about sex with Gabriel while thinking, "Well, that's not going to happen any time soon," at the same time that Gabriel was planning a romantic weekend for him to woo her. They're both so great and so dumb and everything with them made me so happy. And the fact that he told her about the kiss in the previous book!!! I do wish they had gotten together like a book earlier so we could've seen more of how they would actually navigate being in a relationship since we didn't get much of it here (they were too focused on plot-stuff after they finally got together), but I still loved how all the development we got between them in the previous four books culminated in this one.
I did have some minor issues with the Ricky stuff. It felt really weird for him to be completely absent from the first half of the book, although it made sense for him to be away while Olivia and Gabriel were getting their shit together, and then once they were finally in a relationship to bring Ricky back. But it still felt weird for him to not be around for half the book, and I also felt like it didn't give him enough time to deal with it once he found out since they needed to do plot-related things. And I've always loved Ricky (even though Olivia/Ricky never did anything for me), and I loved that he did his best to accept Olivia/Gabriel right away, but at the same time, even though this was why he dumped Olivia and he saw this coming, he still deserved more time to come to terms with it, I think. Like, I saw some complaints about him being the only of the trio to really tempted by the sluagh at the end, and I think it made sense since Gabriel and Olivia were more secure in their relationship after having gotten together whereas Ricky was the odd man out, but I also think if he hadn't immediately had to jump to being fine with everything and had more time to deal with them being together on his own, he would've been less susceptible as well.
Olivia's choice was definitely a cop-out and underwhelming, especially since even though she says she's choosing both, it does feel like she's choosing the fae. If I had ever cared about her choice this probably would've bothered me more.
So basically: I totally get people's complaints, but the Gabriel/Olivia stuff was perfect to me, so I loved this.
I just really loved Gabriel and Olivia finally finding their way into a relationship that wouldn't have seemed possible in Omens but that made sense at this point in their development. I loved that Gabriel has finally gotten to a place where he can communicate with Liv (even if he still doesn't always know the right things to do) and how he's learned to care about people besides Liv as well. AND THE FACT THAT HE PLANNED A ROMANTIC GETAWAY TO WOO HER!!! And it also endlessly delighted me that Olivia was fantasizing about sex with Gabriel while thinking, "Well, that's not going to happen any time soon," at the same time that Gabriel was planning a romantic weekend for him to woo her. They're both so great and so dumb and everything with them made me so happy. And the fact that he told her about the kiss in the previous book!!! I do wish they had gotten together like a book earlier so we could've seen more of how they would actually navigate being in a relationship since we didn't get much of it here (they were too focused on plot-stuff after they finally got together), but I still loved how all the development we got between them in the previous four books culminated in this one.
I did have some minor issues with the Ricky stuff. It felt really weird for him to be completely absent from the first half of the book, although it made sense for him to be away while Olivia and Gabriel were getting their shit together, and then once they were finally in a relationship to bring Ricky back. But it still felt weird for him to not be around for half the book, and I also felt like it didn't give him enough time to deal with it once he found out since they needed to do plot-related things. And I've always loved Ricky (even though Olivia/Ricky never did anything for me), and I loved that he did his best to accept Olivia/Gabriel right away, but at the same time, even though this was why he dumped Olivia and he saw this coming, he still deserved more time to come to terms with it, I think. Like, I saw some complaints about him being the only of the trio to really tempted by the sluagh at the end, and I think it made sense since Gabriel and Olivia were more secure in their relationship after having gotten together whereas Ricky was the odd man out, but I also think if he hadn't immediately had to jump to being fine with everything and had more time to deal with them being together on his own, he would've been less susceptible as well.
Olivia's choice was definitely a cop-out and underwhelming, especially since even though she says she's choosing both, it does feel like she's choosing the fae. If I had ever cared about her choice this probably would've bothered me more.
So basically: I totally get people's complaints, but the Gabriel/Olivia stuff was perfect to me, so I loved this.