Lexi 's Reviews > House of Marionne

2⭐️

🎧📖🎧 An audiobook and physical book read along!!! 🎧📖🎧

“It’s your life, and you should live it like you want.”

Trigger Warnings:
✨Abuse (both physical and verbal)
✨Violence (both depicted and discussed)
✨Murder
✨Constant Threatening
✨Gaslighting
✨Abandonment

I first came across J.Elle last year when I discovered her book Wings of Ebony. While the cover of that book is ABSOLUTELY beautiful to me, I couldn’t seem to get past chapter 3. So, when I came across House of Marionne, I was really hoping for a second chance. I was hoping the cover (which fascinates me) would also belong to a story that would keep my attention and introduce me to the dark academia aesthetic. Although I was introduced to dark academia and plan on continuing my adventure within this aesthetic, this book, unfortunately, failed me in more ways than one.

The messiness of this book:
(1) A reader has to constantly remind themselves that this is YA!!!

(2) This entire book is extremely SSSLLLOOOWWW!!! Patience is required.

(3) The FMC, Quell, appears younger than 17. She is forever making dumb decisions and whines way too much.

(4) The MMC, Jordan, comes off as an 18 year boy who is boring; robotic; and lacks a personality.

(5) The romance between Quell and Jordan just SUCKS!!! I am sorry but it does.

(6) Quell’s Grandmom, Darragh Marionne, is both abusive and just plain evil.

(7) The side characters are far and few between.

(8) The chapters with Yagrin’s POV felt both off and misplaced.

(9) The magic system is so hard to follow and difficult to understand.

(10) There is sssooo much information dumping, which leads to more telling than showing throughout EVERY chapter.

(11) A huge premise of this book doesn’t occur until the last 6 chapters. By then, one has slightly forgotten that it even belongs in the story!!!

This entire book is very flawed. There were several moments were I wanted to DNF this. But, given that I’ve received the ARC to Shadows of Perl (Book #2) and I have DNF’d 11 ARCs, I am planning to stick this series out.

However…

If you decide to read this series, lower your expectations and try to keep an open mind. Also to: REMEMBER THIS IS A YA NOVEL!!! Things are going to be off and weird and just plain wrong. If you can and are willing to genuinely give this book a chance, try to see past the flaws and find enjoyable where you can. 🫶🏽🫶🏽🫶🏽!!!
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***Pre-Read:***

The way I have been waiting for my Libby hold to come through just to curl up and read this. My excitement knows no bounds right now. 🫣🫣🫣. 🫠🫠🫠!!!