ourxstorybegins's reviews
582 reviews

Unconventional Hearts by Emmy Sanders

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 5%.

3 major issues:

I was already kind of "meh" on this author's books but I was excited about getting Will's story since he was my favorite character so far, but then...
WILL SIMPLY WAS NOT OLD ENOUGH. I'm so sorry if we watched a character grow up and now we're going to get to their romance story, they must be at least 25 not still in college. Literally the idea of him having sex made me feel weird.
After feeling weird about this book I checked out what the book was about and realized that it involved an asexual character who isn't interested in having sex at all. Which is great! We love ace rep in romance! HOWEVER, I hardly trust this author to write about gay men correctly so I certainly don't trust her to write about sexualities outside of that???

Virgin Hearts by Emmy Sanders

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hopeful lighthearted fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

Ok ok ok I was not even going to read this book because of the title but I ended up having a pretty good time? Mateo is a porn actor who’s studying to become a therapist but he isn’t going to therapy and honestly that’s kind of the main conflict with the whole book cuz if our boy just learned to ya know, handle emotions properly, things would’ve been perfectly fine. Seeing Hawthorne fall in love was so much fun though and Mateo thankfully got his shit together (even though it isn’t mentioned that he’s going to therapy till the FINAL CHAPTER OF THE BOOK?!).

This particular book also gave me some moments of "ah yes this was not written by someone who actually knows what it's like to be a gay man" which isn't like, BAD, but when you have one guy like "omg now I get to teach you about frotting" it just...sounded like a woman talking about something she learned about while reading a fic or watching porn instead of ya know, two men who are about to have sex???? Lmao

Do not get me wrong overall I still had fun but in a very meh kind of way.

Fool Hearts by Emmy Sanders

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emotional inspiring sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

Okay this is the absolute slowest burn I’ve ever read? Like Wyatt has decided he’s in love with Easton by the time he’s like 15 and they don’t get together until their mid-30's. I had not been prepared for Easton’s wife to die in childbirth so FAIR WARNING for that, but it still takes like 12 years for them to get together even beyond that, so their get together doesn’t feel icky. It was not a perfect book, but I cried a LOT and thought their romance was lovely.

Hiding the critiques under spoiler tag:

So the way that Easton and Wyatt reunite after Wyatt has moved to Chicago is that Becca, Easton's wife, dies in childbirth. I personally don't think this was handled poorly and wasn't bothered by the "dead wife trope", however I also don't read a lot of books that utilize this as a plot point so it doesn't feel overdone for me. I know this isn't the case for a lot of folks, though, so maybe it is an overused thing.

At one point, Easton is thinking about the concept of demisexuality and how maybe that's him! But it never comes up again? So as much as I'd love to be like "yay, demi rep!" that doesn't feel quite accurate here since it's never explicitly stated. It felt like him exploring his sexuality and figuring that out was dropped for the sake of getting back to Wyatt pining.

Speaking of Wyatt's pining, him being in a full on relationship with Harrison and living with him and "trying to love him" but never actually loving him...really sucked? Like I put that the characters were lovable but it was behavior like that that led to me marking that there wasn't much character growth because that was some childish behavior.

Content Warnings

Two Rogues Make a Right by Cat Sebastian

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hopeful lighthearted reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

THOUGHTS:

Petition for Joel Leslie to narrate all mlm historical romances!! I’ve enjoyed this series so much and Two Rogues was an EXCELLENT way to wrap up a wonderful set of romances. Martin (grumpy) and Will (Grumpy At Martin) are just couple of sad boys who don’t think they deserve much of anything but they finally got their friends to lovers story together. Can be read as a standalone, but I think part of what made this one as good as it was is the buildup that you get from the first 2 books in the series.

Ace: What Asexuality Reveals about Desire, Society, and the Meaning of Sex by Angela Chen

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informative medium-paced

4.0

THOUGHTS:

This book is for anyone who is curious about learning more about all the different facets of asexuality. As someone who’s been doing a lot of exploring of asexuality lately, this was great for me but also brought up some really interesting points of discussion with my allo friends. The book was super engaging and provided a variety of perspectives. I did feel like it got repetitive at times? But a minor sin that doesn’t even require forgiveness. Also, Natalie Naudus’s narration was FANTASTIC and I need her to do more nonfiction.

Here for the Wrong Reasons by Lydia Wang, Annabel Paulsen

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lighthearted tense medium-paced