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A review by melles_gothic_reads
Show Stopper by Hayley Barker
1.0
It was alright, I was going to give it 3 stars up until the romance dripped in.
The book wasn't bad though, the premise was interesting, and the circus was quite interesting as well. I also think the end 'chase' was thought out quite well
But that's kind of it. There's not many characters I cared about, not even the main ones, though I definitely prefer hoshiko over ben. The world building is also barely there, it felt quite empty, with scifi you have to be sucked in a world, but this just felt like a set. With the almost no explanation given as to how and why the world came to this, it makes me feel like it's a bit unrealistic, and it made me take the whole world a little bit less seriously than I wished
A lot of the characters also feel just very one sided, they're either bad, or they're good. The bad guys are pure evil with nothing redemable about them. Bummer because Silvio could have been a great interesting villain character otherwise.
The romance is what took the cake though, it's what really brought the book down. The two characters are willing to give up everything in just three days of meeting, and I feel 0 chemistry between them, everytime they so much as interacted I rolled my eyes.
I did enjoy reading the book, it's a surprisingly quick read, it was nice, but nothing show stopping. Though I thought the world building was quite weak, the writer did pretty well in describing the acts and certain rooms of the circus, which was the best thought out part. The outside world felt quite empty. I did really like the ending of the book it a nice ending, and makes you wonder what will happen next to the characters, though I'm still not sure if I'm going to read the sequel
The book wasn't bad though, the premise was interesting, and the circus was quite interesting as well. I also think the end 'chase' was thought out quite well
But that's kind of it. There's not many characters I cared about, not even the main ones, though I definitely prefer hoshiko over ben. The world building is also barely there, it felt quite empty, with scifi you have to be sucked in a world, but this just felt like a set. With the almost no explanation given as to how and why the world came to this, it makes me feel like it's a bit unrealistic, and it made me take the whole world a little bit less seriously than I wished
A lot of the characters also feel just very one sided, they're either bad, or they're good. The bad guys are pure evil with nothing redemable about them. Bummer because Silvio could have been a great interesting villain character otherwise.
The romance is what took the cake though, it's what really brought the book down. The two characters are willing to give up everything in just three days of meeting, and I feel 0 chemistry between them, everytime they so much as interacted I rolled my eyes.
I did enjoy reading the book, it's a surprisingly quick read, it was nice, but nothing show stopping. Though I thought the world building was quite weak, the writer did pretty well in describing the acts and certain rooms of the circus, which was the best thought out part. The outside world felt quite empty. I did really like the ending of the book it a nice ending, and makes you wonder what will happen next to the characters, though I'm still not sure if I'm going to read the sequel