I am going through it with these books, ya'll. I've been dipping my toes into dark romance and oooooffff. I wrapped up Haunting Adeline by H.D. Carlton a few weeks back which was decent- I did enjoy. That one wasn't too bad- I briefly mentioned this in a previous post but I expected it to be a lot more suspenseful and scary. Our leading lady has a stalker who watches her both from inside and out of her home. Definitely freaky, no??? From a reading perspective, that lost a lot of suspense for me once the book introduced chapters from the stalker's POV. It was pretty much back and forth the entire time from him to her. There is definitely an interesting storyline and while some of the topics discussed are heavy, I found it to be enjoyable. I also had my suspicious about the ending pretty early on after reading the title of book two, lol. A bit predictable but it flows with the storyline. I was excited and ready to dive right into Hunting Adeline until I ended up reading a few spoilers on what comes in book two.
While I wasn't surprised by it, my excitement to start book two turned into dread, lol. I then made the totally irrational and stupid decision to hold off on that and to start Still Beating by Jennifer Hartmann. Here I find myself in the same sh*t, different day. Lol. I don't yet know which of the two is worse- I also may or may not find out. It's just kind of bizarre to me. I feel like all of us are unfortunately desensitized to a lot of bad things from the world we live in, social media, etc. Because of that, when you first hear or read about certain "bad" things that have happened, it's just sort of the way it is. We of course feel compassion, sorrow and empathy but unless you're directly involved, that's unfortunately the sad reality. I also think a lot of it stems down to "out of sight, out of mind." We dissociate when things are uncomfortable? I know I'm often like that- if something is really emotionally taxing, I try to keep it moving and limit my attention.
In the case of Still Beating, there are beginning themes of violence, kidnapping and SA. From the start, the experience for me is akin to reading or hearing something on the news. The author has also done a great job of sharing the topics tastefully. You know what's happening but not too much has been revealed. Despite that, things have still progressed in the book and the more I read, the less I want to. For that reason, I'm in a bit of a reading hiatus right now. My "I'll read some more tomorrow" has been recurring for the last week or two while the book remains untouched. The moral of the story- I'm either not cut out for it or I'm just not in the headspace right now. I'd like to keep them in rotation- maybe just with something more lighthearted mixed in? I still need to finish by HP re-read with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and I'm also excited to read an Elsie Silver book! I bought Flawless a few months back and also want to pick up Wild Love. That's the gist for now- chat soon with more updates!
What book are you reading right now?
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