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A review by sagittarian
House of Pounding Hearts by Olivia Wildenstein
5.0
*michael scott voice* — my heart soars with the eagle’s crow’s nest.
on every level — physical, emotional, spiritual — i am unwell. this book killed me. it simultaneously had me soaring through the clouds on the back of a sexy crow man and also buried 200 ft below the earth in a deep, irretrievable grave. i loved every second of this. EVERY SECOND. and i may never recover from it.
i hate drawing comparisons to other series, but when i first read HoBW, i said that it reminded me of ACOTAR — NOT in terms of plot, but in terms of how it made me feel. house of pounding hearts? ACOMAF embodied. ACOMAF energy exuding from its every pore. and not in the ‘copy + paste the plot’ way — in the BANTER. in the ANGST. in the TENSION. in the SEXY OLDER MAGICAL SHADOW MAN IS PROFOUNDLY IN LOVE WITH FRUSTRATINGLY OBLIVIOUS ORNERY FMC. in the ways that it kept me up all night squealing and smiling and blushing at every single motherf*cking piece of dialogue between the two characters. if you’re a rhysand fan — and of course you are — you will love the MMC of this series. the only downside to this installment is that fallon, our FMC, goes from charmingly naive in HoBW to bratty and childish in this one — at least for the majority of the story. it’s grating, but it’s an intrinsic part of her character, and though i wanted to punt her off the cliffs of monteluce more than once, i love her all the same.
i died. i’m dead. do not bring me back until house of striking oaths drops, please, because i have suffocated to death on the sheer amount of butterflies that lived in my stomach and esophagus over the 48 hours i devoured this.
this book picks up almost immediately after HoBW ends, and is chock full of all of the will-they, won’t-they teasing, patient-but-possessive flirtations from our MMC, and 'i hate you but i can’t stop thinking of you' stubborn refusals from our FMC that you could ever want. the tension it creates is literally so thick and delicious you could eat it with a spoon.
there are a few surprises in this one that i struggled to make sense of, but that could easily be my one-track-mindedness when it came to the romance. because while this story has a solid musical-chairs type of plot when it comes to the various kingdoms’ thrones, it is predominantly a romance. the entire countries of luce and nebba could sink into the sea for all i care, as long as lore and fallon are mind-flirting.
and for those of you lamenting the spice levels in HoBW (me, most ardently), pick up some gatorade before you dive into this one. for electrolyte replacement. for all the sweating you’ll be doing.
5 stars, easily, happily, and with eternal gratitude to my crow queen olivia for the ARC because truly if i had to wait one more day to read this book i would have combusted from anticipation. immediate add to favorites shelf.
if you see me on here rereading this next week, mind your business. i am but amoth to a flame crow to a shiny, pretty object.
on every level — physical, emotional, spiritual — i am unwell. this book killed me. it simultaneously had me soaring through the clouds on the back of a sexy crow man and also buried 200 ft below the earth in a deep, irretrievable grave. i loved every second of this. EVERY SECOND. and i may never recover from it.
i hate drawing comparisons to other series, but when i first read HoBW, i said that it reminded me of ACOTAR — NOT in terms of plot, but in terms of how it made me feel. house of pounding hearts? ACOMAF embodied. ACOMAF energy exuding from its every pore. and not in the ‘copy + paste the plot’ way — in the BANTER. in the ANGST. in the TENSION. in the SEXY OLDER MAGICAL SHADOW MAN IS PROFOUNDLY IN LOVE WITH FRUSTRATINGLY OBLIVIOUS ORNERY FMC. in the ways that it kept me up all night squealing and smiling and blushing at every single motherf*cking piece of dialogue between the two characters. if you’re a rhysand fan — and of course you are — you will love the MMC of this series. the only downside to this installment is that fallon, our FMC, goes from charmingly naive in HoBW to bratty and childish in this one — at least for the majority of the story. it’s grating, but it’s an intrinsic part of her character, and though i wanted to punt her off the cliffs of monteluce more than once, i love her all the same.
i died. i’m dead. do not bring me back until house of striking oaths drops, please, because i have suffocated to death on the sheer amount of butterflies that lived in my stomach and esophagus over the 48 hours i devoured this.
this book picks up almost immediately after HoBW ends, and is chock full of all of the will-they, won’t-they teasing, patient-but-possessive flirtations from our MMC, and 'i hate you but i can’t stop thinking of you' stubborn refusals from our FMC that you could ever want. the tension it creates is literally so thick and delicious you could eat it with a spoon.
there are a few surprises in this one that i struggled to make sense of, but that could easily be my one-track-mindedness when it came to the romance. because while this story has a solid musical-chairs type of plot when it comes to the various kingdoms’ thrones, it is predominantly a romance. the entire countries of luce and nebba could sink into the sea for all i care, as long as lore and fallon are mind-flirting.
and for those of you lamenting the spice levels in HoBW (me, most ardently), pick up some gatorade before you dive into this one. for electrolyte replacement. for all the sweating you’ll be doing.
5 stars, easily, happily, and with eternal gratitude to my crow queen olivia for the ARC because truly if i had to wait one more day to read this book i would have combusted from anticipation. immediate add to favorites shelf.
if you see me on here rereading this next week, mind your business. i am but a