⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4.25/5
** SPOILER ALERT**
I have to confess I really liked this book, most of all our heroine.
This book is a Dark Enemies To Lovers Bully Romance, so there are a few (a lot) of darkness themes in this book. So before I start this review I would like to caution sensitive people of the following, proceed with caution (at your own discretion):
Beware of Triggers Warnings there are a few.
○ Attempted sexual assaults [the Hero's friends try to force the heroine, Aspen, into giving a blowjob = could escalate to gang rape + Matteo tries to rape Aspen in the ball night after him been suggested by Quinton's father + drunken Quinton (the Hero) tries to rape Aspen after getting in a fight with his friend]
○ Dub-con (multiple times) [almost (if not all) the sexual encounters between the H and h were dubious consent, meaning, she didn’t want to have sex with him but she exchanged an hour a week to him for her safety, still at the beginning it's very clear how much she doesn't want this "sexual" deal]
○ Violence
○ Dark bullying
○ Sexual assault/ Harassment [the H forces Aspen into giving him a blowjob in front of his friends while they all held her against her will + the H jerks off into the h abdomen without her consent + Adela suffered sexual harassment/ assault by Matteo on a party]
Now after all that, the book is interesting, the PLOT revolves around Quinton and Aspen, who just enrolled into a Criminals offsprings university, Corium University. It's a fast paced plot where the interactions between both mc's occurred pretty quickly and also rapidly evolves into a sexual relationship.
There's a bit of an emotional, psychological edge to the plot in how both of the mc' deals with their different family problems and death. Although, its a criminal university, there's not much action, no mafia/ cartels, no drugs or assesins, however there are some mention to some of their parents business who revolves around those crimes or world.
The "ROMANCE" , there's NO ROMANCE in this book at least for now, there seems to be in the middle of developing some feelings but NOT LOVE, some affection (kind of) maybe, some liking of the friendship type.... This is a DARK BULLY ROMANCE so there are very dark themes, dark moments of the sexual type and of course there's A LOT of BULLYING from everyone towards Aspen.
The tropes in this book are:
♡ Enemies To Lovers
♡ Bully
No O/M or O/W drama, also the H is too possessive to share his "toys", although he constantly threatened her of sharing her with his friends, he actually NEVER went through his threats. In conclusion, it's a safe book in respect to the mc's only ever been with each other throughout the entire book.
The CHARACTERS , this may be the most complicated about all the book, most of them were not even redeemable, they were hateful, pure fucking ASSHOLES and some rapist here and there too. The only character which I truly loved was Aspen and Brittany.
☆ ASPEN this girl stole my heart from the very first second, she's been through hell and worse, although everyone thinks she's a coward she just chooses her battles wisely. Her family is a disaster after the mistakes committed by her father and everyone blames her to by association, her mother is on the run and she's sent to this hell hole of university where everyone hates her and to sum it up, his father worst enemy offspring goes to this same university.
☆ QUINTON, he's an amazing conceited asshole, an egotistical boy and a bitch boy. The best iconic scene that best represents him is the first fight he has with Ren, his best friend [after Ren sees the video in which Q forces Aspen into giving him a BJ, he tells Q off and askes him how would he feel if someone did that to his sister... and the worse of all is that after he's been told off he still doesn't feel remorse or regrets what he did] quite the golden boy he is. He sneaks into the h's bedroom while she sleeps and got her drunk to make her spill information of her friend Britt. [He's looking for his birth mother after everything exploded a year before when his sister died]
☆ BRITTANY, the hacker aka school librarian, is quite the mystery, she's hiding from her asshole (yes, another one!) exboyfriend, Phoenix, she's the only one friend Aspen has in the whole school, who seems to really care about her and her well-being.
The other supporting characters in this book vary from good like Luna (Ren little sister) and Scarlet (Quinton little sister), to awful like Anjia the Russian girl, Matteo the rapist, Nash, Lucas Rossi the Dean of the University, Xander (Quinton father) who's probably the worst of them all.
So the story it's pretty good, the angst, the darkness, the psychological edge, so even though a few things I didn't liked it had more to do with the personality (assholeness) of said characters than the book itself.
I highly recommend this book if you like me enjoy dark enemies to lovers bully romance!! Hope you like it as much as I did!! 🖤
Happy reading everyone!! ❤❤
QUOTES:
“What you did with Aspen. The forced blow job. Matteo took a video of it and saved it on his phone.”
“Look, you know I don’t give a fuck what you do, and I hardly ever make comments about shit. I mean, our parents are fucking criminals, but don’t you think…?” Ren drags his feet, and my frustration toward him mounts.
“Never, which is why I’m telling you I think you took it too far.”
“I saw the video, and then Luna called me a little bit after, and it made me think… if someone ever did that to her. I’d be filled with murderous rage. There would be nothing to stop me from slaughtering those fuckers.”
“What if something like that happened to Scarlet? If someone did that to her? How would you feel?”
My sister’s angelic face fills my mind. The thought of anyone hurting her or touching her in a way that would make her feel degraded or less than ignites a fire in my veins. Still, all the anger from that statement gets directed at Ren.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” I growl. “Scarlet and Aspen aren’t even on the same playing field, and that’s my fucking sister. Don’t ever talk about something like that happening to her again.”
Q just doesn’t want to share his new toy...
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