Disliking me is valid. I probably confronted you on your poor behavior while everyone else just accepted it.

I'll probably be posting my book reviews as articles on here.

Oof.. I was 10.

I Clocked the Villain in Chapter One. I Stayed for the Shadow Phoenix Who Makes Pancakes Title: Frostbird Reborn Author: Kal Locksley ⭐⭐⭐ Warning: Contains slight spoilers Frostbird Reborn, by Kal Locksley is a fast, steamy read that makes you question which feelings are yours and which belong to someone you used to be. Lyra Vale is twenty-four and waits tables in Boston. She has carried a schizophrenia diagnosis since she was sixteen, and she lives with Damien, a boyfriend whose anger shows up as silence and then bruises. The night he beats her, a man with burning hair finds her bleeding in the hallway. He calls her Isolde and carries her through a gas lamp on Acorn Street into Ember Row. That man is Kael Redbird, ruler of the Light Fae, and he shows her the visions were never hallucinations. They were memories. Lyra is a reincarnated Frostbird. She was cursed to be reborn human and to die before her twenty-fifth birthday, in every life. Lyra has spent years bracing for the next blow, and the author shows it in small ways. She flinches when she’s complimented. She waits for the catch. When Kael seals the doors of Emberhall to keep her from leaving, she’s suddenly back in a padded room, pounding on a door no one will open. That’s the moment her frost breaks loose and blows the door off its frame. I liked that her magic answers anger rather than fear. It fits a woman who has swallowed her anger for years. By the end, she walks away from both brothers to choose herself, and it felt earned. Kael is warm, generous and patient. He heals her with Phoenix tears and kisses the scar on her wrist. He also keeps back everything that matters: who Isolde was, his old engagement and the prophecy. For a heroine coming out of a controlling relationship, a man who decides what she’s ready to hear and then locks the door is a red flag. I appreciated that the book lets Lyra call it what it is. Ryn, the shadow Phoenix brother, is the one I was immediately drawn to. He calls her Frostbite, makes her pancakes and mac and cheese, and brings the Seer glass mice. He gives Lyra the truth in pieces and lets her decide what to do with them. He’s sharper and less predictable than Kael, and his banter carries the middle of the book. Miro, the boutique owner and spy, steals every scene he walks into, and the necklace he gives Lyra ends up mattering more than either bangle. The romance moves fast. Within days of leaving Damien’s apartment, Lyra is in Kael’s bed, and then in Ryn’s. Lyra wonders whether any of it is hers or just Isolde bleeding through. I wish the book had answered that, because the answer would have grounded the speed. Fair warning: this one is open door, more than once. The plot devices do a lot of work. Objects trigger her past lives: a silver hand mirror, a pomegranate, a vinyl coin purse and an indigo ribbon. Each vision ends in a dream of her own death, and the poison dream nearly kills her for real. The stolen-ribbon courtship ritual is a clever way to put both brothers’ intentions on the table, and the memory mirror ties the climax together. That said, I found the plot fairly predictable, and I knew what the final twist would be long before I finished the book. The clues aren’t subtle. In chapter one, Tess “hadn’t aged a day” since Lyra met her. She promises to stay “in this life and the next.” She vanishes from the diner the moment Kael walks in, and her coat is still on the hook. Ryn tosses out “the Contessa” during a history lesson, and Lyra calls Constance “Contessa” before anyone has said that name to her. When Tess walked into that warehouse, I wasn’t surprised. I was waiting. The creature’s whispered “Mine” gave Damien away just as early. While I enjoyed the world-building, I don’t think there was enough of it. The three Faedoms are hidden under real Boston, and each has its own way in. You reach Ember Row through a gas lamp with the word Solkara, Umbravale through a door off the old Tremont subway line with the word Velmira, and the Veil through a painted mural. That’s a fun setup. But most of the lore arrives as dialogue. Ryn literally lists Fae species one by one while they walk to a glass shop, and the Old War gets one paragraph over breakfast. I’d have liked more history: why Frostbirds reincarnate into random families, how the Light and Dark Fae split, and what the Veil was like under Isolde. I suspect the third betrayal is where the real story lives.I’d also have liked to learn more about the antagonist. Her motive comes down to a lost crown and a stolen fiancé, and she explains it in a monologue. She says Isolde betrayed her three times but only names two. Damien gets “a drop of something” and turns into a winged monster with obsidian blades, and we never learn what that something was. Lyra also remembers she led the Veil, which the book never set up. Still, despite the predictable plot and the gaps, I plan to read the next book. I’m curious what that third betrayal was, and whether Lyra lets both brothers court her after all. Content warnings: domestic violence psychiatric hospitalization kidnapping death of parents I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

So damn relatable. 😭

I forgot my car registration had to be renewed at the end of the month, and I have to have my vehicle emissions tested to register it. Today, I'm scrambling to accomplish that. Damn, AuDHD brain. 🙃