Scan barcode
A review by tendaii8
All Packed Up by Lana Kole
2.0
FINALLY! Sweet, sweet release! 🫠 This took me so long to finish and I thought it would never end ⭐
This is honestly so rough because I love this series so much but I find myself dreading all the books that aren't written by Kathryn Moon. I find the premises of Lana Kole's additions so interesting but they have such lacklustre executions it completely ruins it for me (no matter how much I keep trying). To do these plots and characters justice required a finer touch that is just missing.
This was long. It was way too fucking long, especially for what it was. I literally cannot properly express how egregiously long this was. Over 1000 pages on my phone is way too fucking long. When your reader starts getting fatigued reading your book before the 50% mark it's way too fucking long. For what purpose is a chapter 59 pages long? I think the author wanted to take the time to develop the characters and their relationships with one another but that development wasn't even done well or in a way that could really hold attention so it just felt like such a waste of time. I will say I enjoyed this book just slightly more than the last one by this author in the series but that means very little when I was already over it when I was only 20% through it.
I think the thing that bothers me the most with these books (this and Fighting Instincts) is how unlikable the FMC is. For some reason, these books really struggle to make the woman characters as likeable as the male characters. Wendy was irritating and bratty in a way that wasn't fun to interact with as a reader. It feels like the author is trying the make relatable, sassy characters but doesn't know how to properly execute that without making that "sassiness" annoying. Wendy was so wishy-washy in her moods and feelings about the other characters (Griffith) but the justifications for those emotions didn't make sense so I couldn't get behind her on them. I understand emotions can be complex and sometimes act as a double-edged sword on occasion but I'm not convinced that this author is capable of executing such complex emotions in a compelling way which then does the story a huge disservice for me. Her aversion to Griffith (beyond her jealousy at his connection to Nic) was not properly justified in my opinion and it made that whole plot line unconvincing, which is a shame because it lasted such a long time 😒.
I'm honestly happy that there was such a central focus on Nic because if we had spent any more time with Wemdy I think I would have gone insane. I found Nic and Griffith's relationship to be much more interesting and it was satisfying when they (finally) worked out their shit. I would have liked to see Nic's relationship with "the stoners" (🙄) develop more. With how many times it was mentioned they were attracted to each other before the events of the story took place I was expecting something to have blossomed and I was a bit disappointed when it didn't despite the seed for it being planted. Lord knows there was enough time in the story for it to have happened.
Speaking of stoners, I read that word way too many times. The whole stoner thing was driven into the dirt so deep it may as well have ended up in the Mariana's Trench. Why are your characters still referring to these established main characters with personalities and a stake in the relationship as "the stoners"? It made sense when they were still just the hot neighbours but after they jumped in the car and went across state lines the term should have never been uttered again and it cheapened their characters in the story.
My last biggest issue of the book was the use of her heat. The fact that it took like 75% (rough estimate) of the book to get through is actually ridiculous to me. The reasoning was that her heat wouldn't start until she was settled and feeling safe and that was the biggest load of BS I've read in this whole series. In the last book Bad Alpha (my fav in the series easily), Adam started and waded through his heat in the back of a car with an Alpha that was contracted to kill him and he tricked into biting him. In THIS BOOK she herself has experienced essentially every single one of her heats in a state of fight or flight and anxiety because she was surrounded by abusive alphas she knew she had to be wary of when in such a vulnerable position. Despite knowing all this I'm supposed to just believe that her heat would forcibly delay itself in this situation. In doing this her heat, the driving force of the book and the reason she finally ran, lost all its urgency and importance and just became an outdrawn plot device as opposed to a critical catalyst.
This is honestly so rough because I love this series so much but I find myself dreading all the books that aren't written by Kathryn Moon. I find the premises of Lana Kole's additions so interesting but they have such lacklustre executions it completely ruins it for me (no matter how much I keep trying). To do these plots and characters justice required a finer touch that is just missing.
This was long. It was way too fucking long, especially for what it was. I literally cannot properly express how egregiously long this was. Over 1000 pages on my phone is way too fucking long. When your reader starts getting fatigued reading your book before the 50% mark it's way too fucking long. For what purpose is a chapter 59 pages long? I think the author wanted to take the time to develop the characters and their relationships with one another but that development wasn't even done well or in a way that could really hold attention so it just felt like such a waste of time. I will say I enjoyed this book just slightly more than the last one by this author in the series but that means very little when I was already over it when I was only 20% through it.
I think the thing that bothers me the most with these books (this and Fighting Instincts) is how unlikable the FMC is. For some reason, these books really struggle to make the woman characters as likeable as the male characters. Wendy was irritating and bratty in a way that wasn't fun to interact with as a reader. It feels like the author is trying the make relatable, sassy characters but doesn't know how to properly execute that without making that "sassiness" annoying. Wendy was so wishy-washy in her moods and feelings about the other characters (Griffith) but the justifications for those emotions didn't make sense so I couldn't get behind her on them. I understand emotions can be complex and sometimes act as a double-edged sword on occasion but I'm not convinced that this author is capable of executing such complex emotions in a compelling way which then does the story a huge disservice for me. Her aversion to Griffith (beyond her jealousy at his connection to Nic) was not properly justified in my opinion and it made that whole plot line unconvincing, which is a shame because it lasted such a long time 😒.
I'm honestly happy that there was such a central focus on Nic because if we had spent any more time with Wemdy I think I would have gone insane. I found Nic and Griffith's relationship to be much more interesting and it was satisfying when they (finally) worked out their shit. I would have liked to see Nic's relationship with "the stoners" (🙄) develop more. With how many times it was mentioned they were attracted to each other before the events of the story took place I was expecting something to have blossomed and I was a bit disappointed when it didn't despite the seed for it being planted. Lord knows there was enough time in the story for it to have happened.
Speaking of stoners, I read that word way too many times. The whole stoner thing was driven into the dirt so deep it may as well have ended up in the Mariana's Trench. Why are your characters still referring to these established main characters with personalities and a stake in the relationship as "the stoners"? It made sense when they were still just the hot neighbours but after they jumped in the car and went across state lines the term should have never been uttered again and it cheapened their characters in the story.
My last biggest issue of the book was the use of her heat. The fact that it took like 75% (rough estimate) of the book to get through is actually ridiculous to me. The reasoning was that her heat wouldn't start until she was settled and feeling safe and that was the biggest load of BS I've read in this whole series. In the last book Bad Alpha (my fav in the series easily), Adam started and waded through his heat in the back of a car with an Alpha that was contracted to kill him and he tricked into biting him. In THIS BOOK she herself has experienced essentially every single one of her heats in a state of fight or flight and anxiety because she was surrounded by abusive alphas she knew she had to be wary of when in such a vulnerable position. Despite knowing all this I'm supposed to just believe that her heat would forcibly delay itself in this situation. In doing this her heat, the driving force of the book and the reason she finally ran, lost all its urgency and importance and just became an outdrawn plot device as opposed to a critical catalyst.