AngelFire's Reviews > Patience

DNF @ 21%

I'm so tired of authors using misleading marketing to draw in readers who are looking for something different and intense while the book delivers the same boring, generic crap that's been a done a thousand times before. This book is a prime example of it because when you look at that gorgeous cover and read the summary, it sets up certain expectations. The summary references one character having served as hell's ferryman for thousands of years as punishment. He's been forcibly separated from his mate for those years and then he's given a chance to reunite with him. It all sounded incredible! But it turns out that the supernatural elements and the referenced time spans are just set dressing that attempt to disguise a generic rom-com-type fated mates romance that's been done a thousand times before.

The story starts out with a bang. (view spoiler)[We're in the middle of Lucifer's battle against God, and Ferenc (I refuse to call him Ferry because the idea of Ferenc - a former archangel who is 4000 years old allowing himself to be called 'Ferry' is one of the many signs that the author didn't take any part of this premise seriously) has sided with Lucifer because God and Co. are against Ferenc's relationship with Leof (who is a human and has become Ferenc's bondmate). God and Co. drag Leof into the fight in an attempt to force Ferenc to back down (since he's one of the most powerful angels, next to Lucifer) and when Ferenc refuses, Leof is mortally wounded. Ferenc makes a desperate deal with another archangel, who is a long time friend: she'll break their mate bond and tie Leof's soul to hers so he'll be reincarnated over and over again as long as she lives. Leof won't remember his past life with Ferenc until the last hour of each life, during which he gets to visit Ferenc before dying and being reincarnated again. This pattern will continue until the angel dies, at which point Ferenc has Leof's current lifetime to find him and re-make their bond before Leof dies one final time. (hide spoiler)] This was an EPIC setup!! The angst involved was incredible, the emotions, the intensity, the creativity - I WAS SO EXCITED!!

But...I got very concerned when all of the above - ALL OF IT!! - takes place during the prologue. The prologue of a book that's nearly 400 (!!!) pages long. Somebody more optimistic might think 'oh, if the author crammed all that good stuff in the prologue then the actual story must be the most epic PNR to ever exist'. Well...I'm too familiar with the low effort, generic crap that most romance authors create via keyboard smashing so I hoped for the best but expected the worst...and my expectations were proven right.

From the start of the first chapter, this story turns into the type of boring, repetitive, low effort romance that has been written a thousand times before in this genre. Leo spends all his time living his normal life, constantly chatting with pointless side characters and angsting over how he's 100% straight but somehow incredibly attracted to 'Ferry'. There's lots of hand wringing about this, lots of discussions with side characters etc etc etc etc.

As for Ferenc - the guy may have spent 4000 years living in hell, ferrying the souls of the damned across the River Spynx and spending his days looking forward to that one special hour he gets to spend with the man he loves before he's back to his depressing grind for another 80-odd years - but none of that matters in the actual story. Ferenc acts and talks like anybody else who lives in the 21st century and after he's given a quick technology how-to by side characters, he's fully up to speed on how to live in the 21st century. Because you know - having somebody go from living in human society that existed 4000 years ago to learning how to use a smartphone is definitely a process that only takes a few hours. A lot of characters marvel over how Ferenc is able to easily adjust to life on earth in the 21st century and he just shrugs it off and readers are supposed to be impressed by how amazing Ferenc is. My eyes rolled so hard that they nearly fell out of my head.

The author did make a tiny effort to make the conversations in ye-olden-days sound old timey, but the effort was poorly done (as is everything else in this book). First of all - nothing even close to English existed 4000 years ago so it would have been nice to have a little throwaway line about the characters speaking Latin or whatever would have made sense. But then it gets worse because the author takes a lazy approach to writing old-timey dialog by just removing all contractions and considering that a job well done. Never mind that this isn't even close to reflecting how people spoke even 100 years ago but it made the characters sound like robots. But then the author also had Ferenc using modern profanity in those same conversations and that's when I knew that the author had no desire to take the premise seriously.

The other big problem is that the author claims this is a standalone and it's also the first in a new series. What the author doesn't tell you is that side characters from the author's previous series take up a huge amount of page time. It seemed like every few pages, side characters were showing up and it felt like readers were supposed to know who they were. Not only that, but these side characters have complex histories with Ferenc, they're either supernatural creatures or they're humans who are bonded to supernatural creatures and I couldn't keep track of who was who, what species they were or who was bonded with who. Several reviewers point out how confusing and annoying this made the story and it emphasizes that authors aren't doing themselves a favor when they lie about their book being a standalone in order to draw in new readers. When you add in other side characters (like Leo's brother and the brother's friends), there ended up being over a dozen named side characters who I didn't care about and couldn't keep track of.

Lastly, the story itself was incredibly boring and generic. The pacing moved at a glacial speed due to the characters constantly having the same conversations over and over again and having the same internal monologues over and over again. There were also odd rom-com vibes, like when Leo claps his hand over his mouth when he says something he shouldn't or that absurd scene where Ferenc pretends to know how to be a personal trainer when he's never stepped foot into a gym. There are readers who would find this sort of thing hilarious but I'm not in that group. My problem is that the book wasn't marketed as being a generic, silly rom-com with supernatural elements. The cover art and the summary make it seem like a dark, intense PNR that takes the characters' personalities, histories and 'creature status' seriously. That's what I wanted to read and instead, I get the same boring, generic plot that's been done a thousand times before. Except in this case, the author uses supernatural creatures as set dressing and somehow manages to pad the story out to be nearly 400 pages.

Sidenote: the author apparently lives in England and the book is supposed to take place in England (based on specific references, such as them living in Southampton, the store Boots and other things) but there's nothing British about the way any of the characters talk or behave. There are a tiny handful of British phrases spread throughout, but they didn't seem correctly written and felt out of place. Why bother having your story take place in a non-US country when you're going to write it as if it's taking place in the US anyway? It didn't matter in which English speaking country the story took place, so I didn't get it. This was yet another annoying distraction.

This author clearly isn't for me, which is a huge disappointment because I'd been looking forward to this book for ages.