Yes I know that we are Saturday and it is a First Impression Friday…but I was busy yesterday!
This meme has been imagined by Joe@Storey of Stories .
It’s a meme where you talk about a book that you JUST STARTED! Maybe you’re only two sentences in the book, a chapter or two , maybe a little farther. The goal is to give a few impressions and predict what you’ll think by the end. It will be fun to go back to this post once you’ll have finished the book! Did you think you’d love it and ended up hating it? Or did you think you’d hate it and wound up loving it? Or were you right all along?
Today is a first and last impression because I don’t plan to finish the book! This is not a review as I did not finish it but rather a detailed unpopular opinion of Captive Prince by CS Pacat.
DNF after 120 pages in the book!
I wanted so much to love this hyper hyped book! Most if not all my friends who have read it loved it and say it’s brilliant.
Well I will be the odd one here.
The thing that certainly is brilliant is the author’s writing as she gripped my attention from the very first sentence that’s true.
BUT
I am just plain disgusted right now…
Let make something clear:
–I love MM romance and some of the most beautiful and poignant books that I have read are Wolfsong and The Silver Cord and A Charm of Finches;
–I have no problem at all with BDSM, dominance in the bedroom and some kink;
–I love alpha males;
–I don’t have a problem with “Stockholm Syndrome” as one of the best books with Stokholm Syndrome that I have read its “Twist me” by Anna Zaires;
–I have loved books with sex slaves and my favorite is Captive in the Dark (The Dark Duet);
YET
This book did not work for me at all because …too many triggers and things against my belief.
-No I don’t like it when a royal court forces slaves to fight each other and rape the other for sport;
-No I don’t like when the main MC is forced to have a blow job and is betrayed by his body (physiological and normal reaction) because being betrayed by your body when you are raped is the worst kind of abuse;
-No I don’t like when sex slaves are children;
-No I don’t like when the “love interest” in this case the master Prince Laurent “shares” his slave with others. I love my heroes protective and exclusive;
-No I don’t like that the “master” is beating the other or witness his “rape” with boredom on his face, like his slave (and don’t forget our main MC) is nothing and no one;
-No….
So you see this book contains so many huge triggers for me I could not resume my read.
Maybe if I did it would become brilliant?
Maybe I would understand why Laurent did all that he’s done because there must be a reason.
Maybe it’s pretense because he has to survive;
Maybe…
But I will never know.
Now I am not judging others who love this book because to each his own and as I said the authors is not bad at writing, not at all. I guess that my upbringing, experience, beliefs have shaped me in the reader that I am now. A reader unable to enjoy this book even if her friends do love it.
And that makes me sad somehow as I wanted “in” but that’s who I am and I promised to be always honest in my reviews.
So here I am, ranting somehow to you and hoping that by the end of the day you’ll still be my friends and respect my opinion like I respect yours.
Will I read other books by CS Pacat?
Why not because her writing is certainly not at fault here but clearly none with the same triggers.
Have you read this book/series? What did I not see that you’ve seen in it? Does it get better and do we get an explanation to Laurent’s behavior?
Thanks for reading.
Sophie
Wow. I had no idea this content was in this book. I’ve read plenty of positive reviews on this book and thought it was a YA book because not a single review mentioned this sexual content at all. I don’t think I will be reading the book now.
Thanks for sharing! You mentioned in your Sunday post that you considered not writing a review, but I am glad you did. It sounds like there are a lot of triggers and its good to know about them! All of those things would make me profoundly uncomfortable and I have DNF a book for way less issues! So thank you for sharing, I will stay clear of this one!
I am glad if I could help Brittany!
I agree and in fact had to DNF a book by an awesome author just recently for similar reasons. Maybe I’m just getting old, LOL!
Maybe me too LOL
Great honest review, Sophie! I’m sorry this was a DNF for you! The first book made me a bit uncomfortable with those disturbing themes but I still continued because I loved the main characters. The second book and third book were my favorite! They mostly focused on the plot and the slow burning romance.
Raven that’s what I guessed but it was too hard for me to go on reading 🙁
I’ve heard about this one a lot and have always thought it was universally loved for some reason, but wow. That’s a long list of triggers within just 120 pages. 😮 It has me curious as to why it’s so popular though. Thanks for sharing this though, and I’m sorry that you had to live through those horrible pages without understanding why such scenes were even necessary to the story!
Well Lashaan I am curious too! I guess it gets better and Laurent has more depth and an agenda to act like this. Probably the other readers weren’t as put out as I was and did go on till everything got better…that’s the only explanation I can think of!
I wholeheartedly agree with Alexandra. And you couldn’t have explained better yourself! There are lines that just musn’t be crossed and when they are, I’m done. Even if the writing is good. Way too many things I wouldn’t like about this book YA or Adult fiction.
Thank you Laura! I feel better to know that I am not alone 😉
You have my respect, always, in your reviews. You are honest and passionate, and if this book crossed that line you made in the sand, then rightly so DNF it!
I too will not go beyond a certain creative limit in a novel, and I find it distasteful that so many authors writing YA think all this okay and even acceptable, shame on the publisher too!
Thank you Alexandra! Honestly to each his own but as you said there was a line in the sand I was not ready to cross!