Carry On

Yet another recent one-star rating in a row. This is the eleventh or twelfth, I think. When my city first went into covid lockdown and the initial panic subsided, despair set in for me as I dreaded running out of books to read. The library was closed, so there was no browsing. My city was in Phase One for over a year, and recently, as of this writing, skyrocketed to Phase Three. Library's still closed, but slowly getting somewhat back to how it was. A year ago, though, I decided to look at my Goodreads account and make a list of books I'd read, but not written reviews for. I wrote out fifty-two titles and placed ebook hold after ebook hold, thinking certainly it'd be two months before I got through the list--plenty of books to read.

I whipped through the list in less than a month. Part of it was, I decided if I was bored by just reading a sample that I'd remove the rating and title from my Goodreads list entirely. My profile looked much nicer as a result. This was one of the books I'd read and rated in the past, but not reviewed. It had a boring ebook sample, so I cleared it from my profile. Now, I thought of it again and wanted to get through it, no matter how boring. And boring it was. Some nice things: The magical academy is indeed elitist. This reminded me of a certain other book series, but it's more modern and grounded, with different rules and the author having more LGBT+ and POC rep. It was folded in so easily, and I appreciated this a lot. The spells are song lyrics in English or loud commands, which at first is fun but soon becomes grating. Good choice, though. And having the students create their own spells was good. It helped with characterization and world-building.

For the first twenty-nine (yes, 29) chapters of the ebook, nothing freaking happens! There's slow world-building, the showing of the friendship between Penelope and Simon, and Simon's clear crush and stalking behavior of Baz. I remember being surprised at how quickly I figured it out the first time I read this. I still think some of it is well-done. But there is absolutely no reason at all that this needed to be spread over twenty-nine ebook chapters. It could easily have been condensed into five. Ten, if the author wanted to structure it a certain way. Jesus Christ, this choice of hers alone had me vowing to never read another book of hers, and I have read maybe two others! What a waste of my time; and for print editions, what a waste of paper, ink, and glue for bindings. Twenty-nine chapters is often a whole book. BAD WRITING CHOICE.

Baz reappears in chapter twenty-nine, and from the first sentence, is insufferable. Readers were warned previously of this, but ugh. When the actual story does indeed begin in CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO, it is soaked in boring and nothingness. I'm not sure whether it's on account of the author's twenty-nine chapters of bad writing choices. Lovers To Enemies is a trope I actively avoid, and even here, it's poorly done and grating. It's spread too widely over the book, in drips and dabs, where it needed to be slathered on, and the pace much faster. The action scenes were poorly structured and boring. The sad scenes had me staring off into space like a boring English class. The epilogue went on and on. It could have easily been two whole chapters, not an epilogue.

Save yourselves time and brainpower by finding better magical academy books where students fall in love and actually -do- something. I'm off to read a good book to remind myself they exist. ( )

I went into this basically knowing nothing of the plot besides it had magic and a little m/m romance. I guess I should have been a little more prepared since I spend over half the book just going, "Why is this all Harry Potter?" Apparently, it's the fanfic of a character is the author's book 'Fangirl' which I have yet to read, though that's never referenced in this (and why would it be).
If I'd never read Harry Potter, I might have enjoyed this a lot more, but I did enjoy the characters and the different references. The author choosing Aleister Crowley's name as a curse and substitute for saying God/Jesus Christ was a weird choice since he was just a weird pervert into Satan, but nevermind. It had pretty much every trope imaginable and I can only assume (hope) it was on purpose since this is blatantly a fanfic.

I listened to this via Audible and the narrator was very good. I hope he's also doing the sequel. ( )

I really enjoyed it. It was super fun to read. I love how everyone got their own pov. From time to time, I literally screamed reading Simon and Baz's interactions. They were so cute and hopelessly in love with each other ( )

Review - 09/01/2019
Previous review and opinions still stand.
This one is FUN. Sometimes that's the only thing that matters.

Review - 11/10/2015
How on earth do I review this?
I was so giddy to start reading. So very excited!
It does read like fanfiction. And it IS, in a roundabout way. So if you weren't curious about Simon Snow while reading [b:Fangirl|16068905|Fangirl|Rainbow Rowell|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1355886270s/16068905.jpg|21861351] you might not enjoy yourself here. I did like the snippets about Simon, therefore I was intensely curious. Gosh was I a spectacle when "Carry On" was announced.

The honest rating is 3.5 stars because it's not as good as it could be. And it's not without hiccups.
The romance felt a little off (though yes, those two are cute together). The disappearance of Nico - one moment he is coming along, the next he isn't even mentioned - made me frown quite fiercely. The world was not properly fleshed out, leaving me with more questions than answers and more than a little baffled. Plus some minor annoyances that I don't remember well enough to point out (they did crop up, but I was more interested in the story).

Overall, it's not a bad book. It's interesting and fun. It's a fast read. Of course most readers can see the Big Twist from a mile off, but I don't think it diminishes the story.

I suppose you can give it a try, but I would not go so far as to guaranty enjoyment. It's a mixed bag.

Now I sort of wish for a villainous story from Rainbow Rowell. With villainous self-righteous character, and perhaps a failed world domination (for their own good!) plot, with a vague promise of more villain to crop up in more subtle ways.

FINAL VERDICT : TRY IT ( )

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