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A review by froon
Juniper & Thorn by Ava Reid
2.0
a lot of my criticisms of this book have been mentioned by other people who have given it a similar rating as me. i will say, as a primer for my review, that i don’t believe that just because an author sets out to write about sensitive topics means that they should be given exceptions on how people review their story. “that’s what the author intended!” just doesn’t work on me.
my biggest issue with the book is the excessive trauma. marlinchen reads like a YA protagonist (especially with her comments about her looks…), and it seems like the endless, gratuitous explicit content was just to hit the adult rating (probably so sevas and marlinchen could have sex after falling in love after three meetings). it really felt like a teenagers first foray into mature writing.
my other biggest issue was the plotting/pacing of the book. the whole time i was reading it, all i could think was “wow, nothing has happened this whole time.” everything dragged, to the point where i was just frustrated trying to get to the end of the chapter at times. this also impacted the relationships between the characters. as i said before, sevas and marlinchen’s relationship felt so unbelievable because they had only met for a second before they were both in love. i kept thinking that there had to be aspect of deception or magic at play, but no.
also… does everything need to be compared to breasts and nipples. i swear there was a nipple mention every other page in this book. everything was so overwrought with sexual undertones in a way that i don’t think served the author’s purpose or intention at all (or did so poorly).
anyways, i pushed through to the end so that i could mark this off for my library’s yearly reading challenge AND because i had bought it for $27.99 before i was in my no tbr book buying era.
my biggest issue with the book is the excessive trauma. marlinchen reads like a YA protagonist (especially with her comments about her looks…), and it seems like the endless, gratuitous explicit content was just to hit the adult rating (probably so sevas and marlinchen could have sex after falling in love after three meetings). it really felt like a teenagers first foray into mature writing.
my other biggest issue was the plotting/pacing of the book. the whole time i was reading it, all i could think was “wow, nothing has happened this whole time.” everything dragged, to the point where i was just frustrated trying to get to the end of the chapter at times. this also impacted the relationships between the characters. as i said before, sevas and marlinchen’s relationship felt so unbelievable because they had only met for a second before they were both in love. i kept thinking that there had to be aspect of deception or magic at play, but no.
also… does everything need to be compared to breasts and nipples. i swear there was a nipple mention every other page in this book. everything was so overwrought with sexual undertones in a way that i don’t think served the author’s purpose or intention at all (or did so poorly).
anyways, i pushed through to the end so that i could mark this off for my library’s yearly reading challenge AND because i had bought it for $27.99 before i was in my no tbr book buying era.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Eating disorder, Sexual content, Gore, and Sexual assault
Moderate: Pedophilia