It was a good book! It definitely had me engaged and I enjoyed reading it but the “I couldn’t stop looking at his muscles~” gimmick got old quick for me. There is real development and nice banter. That’s just a pet peeve of mine. 

This is complete cheese... YA Fiction styles with adult sexual content.
This is a huge mashup of a bunch of popular tropes; enemies to lovers, competitive survival/hunger games, magic school, magically branded, kid of the boss/warleader, with teen sensibilities but college age soldiers.

Spicy and silly with DRAGONS! .. and secrets, and libraries. telepathy, spirit bonds and a mildly unbelievable political premise.

This one gets bonus points for ethnic diversity and Disability rep.. the main character has joint hypermobility and chronic pain, and one of her friends is deaf-mute and uses sign language. This is a great illustration of people using various accommodations to allow people with different needs to meet their potential. The sexual content focuses on mindful and explicit consent.

The last part of the book annoyed me because BLAH battles.. I'm not really interested in battles. 

The hype is real and the hype is justified.
What an excellent fantasy novel. EXCELLENT.
The characters are brilliant, the world building is done so smoothly and in a way that doesn’t overwhelm but builds such a good picture.
The romance is exceptional with brilliant chemistry and then some excellent spicy (open door) scenes.
The friendships & family in this book are so good, and the plot itself is extremely engaging, entertaining and suspenseful without being info dumpy.

I highly recommend this to anyone who loves fantasy & romance & dragons. It gave me a little bit of a divergent vibe but this is way better!

Bring on book 2!!!!!