Title: Wicked by Jennifer L. Armentrout
Publication Date: December 8, 2014
Buy Links: Amazon, Barnes and Noble
Rating: 3/5
Synopsis: Ivy is a member of a group called The Order and fights fae who basically want to eat your soul and make you crazy. Naturally, she has a tragic past. Death, destruction, mayhem, she’s been through it all. Enter Ren, a super hot, kinda secretive member of The Order. Will he be the one to break Ivy’s self-imposed dry-spell? Oh, and there’s some other magical stuff too.
*Note there are some adult situations in this book. It is considered NA (New Adult) and not suitable for a younger audience*
I love JLA. Like, love her. My girl crush on her is no joke, so when I saw this new series I went BANANAS in excitement. Then I got the flu (twice) and then I got in a hard YA thing I just couldn’t break. Finally, I fired up the good ol’ Kindle ready to sit back and let JLA take me to her magical world where the men are hot and the girls are super sassy. This one took me awhile to get through. I don’t know, but it just didn’t have the usual pizzazz that I’ve come to expect. I didn’t hate it by any means, but it wasn’t my favorite. Let me break it down for you:
What I liked: TINK. Tink was the total stand-out character in this book. He was a smart, sassy, little S.O.B. and I loved the humor he brought. The scene where Ren (totally naked) discovers him in Ivy’s kitchen nearly gave me a hernia I laughed so freaking hard. Out of all the characters, Tink stood out as the most memorable. I felt like he was the only one with a real ‘voice,’ everyone else just felt a little blah. Outside of my love for Tink, I actually felt myself being more interested in the fairy legacy situation than anything else. I wanted to know more about the gates and the what the heck was going on with The Elite.
What I didn’t like: I found myself not being super invested in the characters. I know, I hate myself right now, but I didn’t feel a connection with Ivy or Ren and I was not feeling their relationship. Their whole situation was kind of ‘meh’ to me. Maybe Ren wasn’t enough of a bad boy for me. I’m sure somehow this is my problem! Either way, I just found myself hoping something would happen. There wasn’t enough steam or action to really catapult me into this world.
Overall, I liked the book. It was a solid read, but I’ve come to expect certain things when reading a JLA that I didn’t feel here. It’s a solid book but I was missing the sparkle. 3/5
THE GOLDEN MANTLE 