Fantasy Lover by Sherrilyn Kenyon

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This was my first Kenyon reread since high school when I originally read the DH series. I struggled to decide between two or three stars but ultimately decided on three because the comedy somewhat redeemed the over-the-top cheesy smuttiness. But I struggled to unglue my eyes from the back of my skull at some moments, and it wasn’t easy to get through.

I feel like this only exists as a prequel to Night Pleasures because Kenyon or her publishing team was trying to attract an initial audience to the Dark-Hunter novels from trashy romance addicts. I think there is a reason the DH series gets noticeably less smutty and more plot-driven as it progresses. This story was okay—when there actually was a story and not just endlessly redundant sexual tension, eye-rolling foreplay, and explicit lewdness. I get that enjoying books like this is dependent on being able to turn your brain off for a while, but I think I would need electroshock therapy to help make myself as completely braindead as I would need to be to get fully into it.

The brand of being written in the early 2000s also weighs heavily on this book. It felt so dated. When there were mentions of Rolodexes and PalmPilots, I felt more like I was reading ancient history than when I read the anachronistic references to Ancient Greece.

I do appreciate the comforting predictability of the formulaic plots in romance novels. Sometimes, books need to be riveting and stimulating; other times, it’s comforting to turn to the tried-and-true realm of a couple in improbable circumstances finding their happy ending. It’s always the characters that drive the attraction to books like these since readers can safely assume the end of the story. The characters of Fantasy Lover are decent overall, but Grace is a horrible therapist, and I feel so bad for her patients.

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𝓟.𝓢. This review was crossposted from Goodreads because it contains actual thoughts rather than a typically facetious single-sentence remark. View all my book ratings and pointless takes on Goodreads or The StoryGraph.