lk822zuh 's review for:

Arcana Academy by Elise Kova

DID NOT FINISH: 40%

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I really tried to give this a chance. I even switched to the audio because I knew I could speed up the narration and get there faster because that’s how slow it felt reading the physical copy. But guess what, even sped up narration when nothing’s happening does not help.

I do not like dark academia, and I never will, which definitely plays a large part in my distain for this. The only reason I picked this up is because it was a FairyLoot pick and I had no skips left.

Finding out that this author is also a young adult author makes a lot of sense. Because this should be a young adult book. I get that romantasy and even dark romance is getting a lot of attention right now, so everybody wants to dip their toes into it, but there are those that just aren’t going to be able to make the switch. And I fully understand that I’ve never read anything by this author before, but this does not entice me to even try to give anything else she’s written a chance.

I saw other reviewers that kind of danced around their thoughts, but the reviews were ultimately positive, so I thought this might be at least an OK read, if not a favorite. But now I’m starting to see that people danced around it because they didn’t want to be the one to say it was not that great. And also if I see one more person suggest that with this author, I just have to wait for the whole series to be finished to get the nuance of it all, I will lose my shit. I should not have to read multiple books before I start to like a series. 

(I have to say that a lot of my DNF reviews lately have been really mean. And looking back at this one, it’s no different. But I swear I do actually like things and that I’m not usually as mean when I don’t like them. It’s just been the theme lately.)