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A review by ileana1
Marriage Claws by Paige Cuccaro
Things I liked:
- diverse side cast that felt like actual characters and not shoe-ins for extra diversity points. I would have wanted to see more of them, particularly in the middle part of the novel (surely someone would have asked her what is up with all the news coverage...), but I still bought into their presence and importance in Kate's life.
- I liked the character dynamic between the two MCs. It didn't feel like a lot of romance does, where the female MC (or less domineering man, really) stops having a personality once they get with the love interest. Kate still felt like her own person, who wasn't going to be pushed around, and I liked that a lot.
- I liked Jack, as well. He wasn't an asshole! I mean, he is kind of arrogant, but he didn't ever come across to me as someone who would purposefully ruin someone else's life, or try and break Kate so she'd be more submissive. You do still have the occasional 'being kind of harsh' moments, and he has a tendency of saying things that can be insulting without realizing it (I guess that bothered me less because I can read it as accidental), but he never crossed the line into creepy/rapey/wtf is wrong with you territory, for me.
Things I didn't like:
- some of Kate's decisions are... dubious. Shouting-at-my-kindle-because-it's-so-obviously-a-bad-idea dubious. I liked her enough that it wasn't a dealbreaker for me, but it still bugged me that she'd be all like 'hey how about I do things that are obviously dangerous with no actual reason'.
- similarly, some of the drama feels quite manufactured when it didn't need to be. Kate wasn't questioning people enough by far - why would you take everyone at face value when you know someone is going to try and manipulate you? Why wouldn't you question your feelings when you're away from people messing with your head, even if you fell for it the first time around? I guess what bugged me about this was that there were enough things to create a conflict between the two MCs without making Kate weirdly gullible. It would have also made a much more interesting story if she had fallen for a lie and then realized over time that she was being manipulated, but it still made her question her feelings because of the way other characters reacted to her being upset.
Tl;dr: I enjoyed the book! It has some flaws, but if you're looking for a werewolf romance that isn't rapey, this might just be your book!
- diverse side cast that felt like actual characters and not shoe-ins for extra diversity points. I would have wanted to see more of them, particularly in the middle part of the novel (surely someone would have asked her what is up with all the news coverage...), but I still bought into their presence and importance in Kate's life.
- I liked the character dynamic between the two MCs. It didn't feel like a lot of romance does, where the female MC (or less domineering man, really) stops having a personality once they get with the love interest. Kate still felt like her own person, who wasn't going to be pushed around, and I liked that a lot.
- I liked Jack, as well. He wasn't an asshole! I mean, he is kind of arrogant, but he didn't ever come across to me as someone who would purposefully ruin someone else's life, or try and break Kate so she'd be more submissive. You do still have the occasional 'being kind of harsh' moments, and he has a tendency of saying things that can be insulting without realizing it (I guess that bothered me less because I can read it as accidental), but he never crossed the line into creepy/rapey/wtf is wrong with you territory, for me.
Things I didn't like:
- some of Kate's decisions are... dubious. Shouting-at-my-kindle-because-it's-so-obviously-a-bad-idea dubious. I liked her enough that it wasn't a dealbreaker for me, but it still bugged me that she'd be all like 'hey how about I do things that are obviously dangerous with no actual reason'.
- similarly, some of the drama feels quite manufactured when it didn't need to be. Kate wasn't questioning people enough by far - why would you take everyone at face value when you know someone is going to try and manipulate you? Why wouldn't you question your feelings when you're away from people messing with your head, even if you fell for it the first time around? I guess what bugged me about this was that there were enough things to create a conflict between the two MCs without making Kate weirdly gullible. It would have also made a much more interesting story if she had fallen for a lie and then realized over time that she was being manipulated, but it still made her question her feelings because of the way other characters reacted to her being upset.
Tl;dr: I enjoyed the book! It has some flaws, but if you're looking for a werewolf romance that isn't rapey, this might just be your book!