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fizzylex 's review for:
Battle Royal
by Lucy Parker
Battle Royal has a LOT going on.
I'll start by saying that I did enjoy the romance. Sylvie and Dominic's relationship felt fairly natural and believable. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the sex scenes - normally those are written very over the top or like the most perfect moments in all of literature, but sex can be weird, funny, gross, etc all while being enjoyable and romantic and I think Lucy Parker did a good job of capturing this. The relationship felt pretty real (for a couple of people doing a lot of not so realistic stuff).
The baking show premise was a cute one, but completely unnecessary. We visited the show several times, but it didn't do anything to progress the plot and it introduced us to a number of forgettable characters. Nearly every time a producer or contestant was mentioned, I had to double check to see if I knew who they were already. Was I supposed to care that one of the contestants was a cheat and two of them were fan favorites to hook up with one another? This information didn't do anything for the story. It would have been fine to say that Sylvie and Dominic met several years ago on the show, had the exploding cake moment which got her eliminated, and now they own rival bake shops across the street from one another. That's it. The rest of the show was completely unnecessary.
As was the dead uncle. I think Sylvie and Dominic going head to head on the wedding cake project and figuring out ingredients together was enough to bring them together. The uncle and his lost love felt forced. This research project introduced us to so many more unnecessary and forgettable characters.
Oh gosh, then we have the sister being stabbed, the security guard having the hots for her, the baking store partner being in love with Sylvie (which I think we were supposed to feel for Sylvie about, but he was such a minor character that I was annoyed by Sylvie's response), the shop intern sabotaging (but not really) Sylvie ... and the fact that Dominic figured it out but didn't tell Sylvie? That was completely brushed over. There were just so many over the top moments like this that did zero for the plot and could have been left out. All we needed were the back story (oh my gosh, not EVERY detail of their life stories - did we need the librarian who Dominic has known his whole life that we never hear about again?) and the competition (which was super anticlimactic and even acknowledged as such in the book).
I'll start by saying that I did enjoy the romance. Sylvie and Dominic's relationship felt fairly natural and believable. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the sex scenes - normally those are written very over the top or like the most perfect moments in all of literature, but sex can be weird, funny, gross, etc all while being enjoyable and romantic and I think Lucy Parker did a good job of capturing this. The relationship felt pretty real (for a couple of people doing a lot of not so realistic stuff).
The baking show premise was a cute one, but completely unnecessary. We visited the show several times, but it didn't do anything to progress the plot and it introduced us to a number of forgettable characters. Nearly every time a producer or contestant was mentioned, I had to double check to see if I knew who they were already. Was I supposed to care that one of the contestants was a cheat and two of them were fan favorites to hook up with one another? This information didn't do anything for the story. It would have been fine to say that Sylvie and Dominic met several years ago on the show, had the exploding cake moment which got her eliminated, and now they own rival bake shops across the street from one another. That's it. The rest of the show was completely unnecessary.
As was the dead uncle. I think Sylvie and Dominic going head to head on the wedding cake project and figuring out ingredients together was enough to bring them together. The uncle and his lost love felt forced. This research project introduced us to so many more unnecessary and forgettable characters.
Oh gosh, then we have the sister being stabbed, the security guard having the hots for her, the baking store partner being in love with Sylvie (which I think we were supposed to feel for Sylvie about, but he was such a minor character that I was annoyed by Sylvie's response), the shop intern sabotaging (but not really) Sylvie ... and the fact that Dominic figured it out but didn't tell Sylvie? That was completely brushed over. There were just so many over the top moments like this that did zero for the plot and could have been left out. All we needed were the back story (oh my gosh, not EVERY detail of their life stories - did we need the librarian who Dominic has known his whole life that we never hear about again?) and the competition (which was super anticlimactic and even acknowledged as such in the book).