3.5 stars, rounded to 4

“being vulnerable doesn’t mean you’re weak. it means you trust yourself to be strong enough to handle the hurt. it’s actually the purest form of strength.”

things we hide from the light by lucy score spoke of love, loyalty, and trauma in the finest possible manner. however, despite how much i adore nash and lina's characters and their heart-gripping tale in this book, reading through it got me questioning whether things we never got over was a one-hit wonder. while i immensely love the romance aspect of the book, the mystery side of it was a little off-putting for me to read as it was very messy and tangled to begin with.

for someone who has read the first book in the series and enjoyed it tremendously, i was quite disappointed to find myself liking this book less than i had expected myself to with how messy everything was in the book. the concept was there only it was poorly executed from where i’m standing. that said, i think it is well noted that while you can somewhat read the book separately on its own, i highly recommend you to get familiar with the characters from the very first book before jumping to this one as i too — having read the first book — find myself to be confused by who’s who at times as i read through this very book. nonetheless, i had a good time reading it still for its silly goofy moments.

lucy score’s humour continues to shine brightly through her characters and it is without a doubt one of the major factors as to why i find myself attracted to her books from the very beginning. in spite of the intense situation at hand between nash, lina and the very city of knockemout (i am still not over how silly the town name is but slay i guess), the comedic relief that was the cast of characters reminded me of how much i deeply loved the first book and the joy reading it gave me while i was at my lowest. knox and naomi’s story will forever have my heart but nash and lina definitely came to a close second. like most of the characters in the book, i loathe lucian. but despite that hatred, i am excited to see where his and sloane’s story would go. the author definitely set the pairing up very well in this book that i’m most definitely excited to see how it will continue to progress in the upcoming book, things we left behind.

speaking of pairings and their romances, as i said early on, i immensely love the romance aspect of the book. score is indeed an absolutely brilliant writer when it comes to depicting the intensity of romance in her book. she is one of many masters of the slow burn romance genre in my life and when i am in “dire” need of a slow burn romance to devour, her books came to mind immediately hence why i picked this one up to read initially. if you haven’t yet known, i have been reading my books very slowly these days and while the slow burn in this one wasn’t as fine as the first book, i still had a great time devouring it slowly despite it feeling like it stretches out months and months long in the span of a few days.

i am still trying to get the hang of writing reviews again after a while of not writing one and my recent review of the catcher in the rye on my spare account definitely did not do the book nor my skills any justice at all so while i slowly regain that momentum i once had, please bare with this mediocre review which i felt has no absolute substance (to me at least, i always think of the worst hahaha). to wrap it all up, would i recommend this book to all? it is definitely a 50-50 decision for me considering i also felt 50-50 of the book itself. if you have read and loved the first book then it is definitely worth giving it a go especially if you are interested in continuing their stories as i did and still do. however, if you are planning to read it as it is, then i genuinely don’t know if i would recommend it or not but each to their own taste i reckon. nonetheless, do not let my little disagreement of the book cloud your interest. explore the story to your heart’s content!