- review this book in a way that makes sense
- keep it somewhere around PG or PG-13
- not freak out my coworkers and our patrons by my reading choices.
But I'm going to try anyway!
If you're a voracious romance reader of any and all types and enjoy hanging out in the bookish corners of social media, then this book has probably come across your feed. However, if you aren't constantly online, prefer your romances fairly sweet, and/or think that a knot is simply how you tie two strings together, then this is NOT the book for you. Please scroll away now, and if you keep reading, don't say I didn't warn you.
Temperance (Tem for short) is one of 14 young women eligible to marry the prince. Tem has long felt like an outsider - she and her single mom live on the outskirts of their village, raising chickens. She has one best friend, Gabriel, and one mean girl enemy, Vera, who is also in the running to marry the prince. Marrying the prince would make life considerably easier for Tem and her mother, so Tem wants more than anything to be the one chosen. Except... well, Tem doesn't have much experience when it comes to romance and intimacy, and the prince is going to pick his bride based not only on her looks and personality, but also on how well she performs in bed.
Which is where the basilisk comes in.
You see, many years ago, when humans arrived in that part of the world, they found that basilisks were already there. In human form, basilisks are alluring and seductive, and well-versed in pleasure. But in basilisk form, they are huge snake-y predators capable of killing you dead in an instant. As the humans moved into the basilisks' territory, a great and bloody war broke out, and the humans only prevailed once they learned that the basilisks' greatest weapon (turning people to stone by looking into their eyes) could be used against them by simply brandishing mirrors and forcing them to look at themselves. In the aftermath, the basilisks agreed to help keep the monarchy going by training eligible young women on how to have sex with each successive prince, since that will ensure that a new heir to the throne is always born.
Have I lost you yet? No? Good.
As Tem and the others begin their sex lessons, Tem finds herself paired with Caspen, who the humans know as the Serpent King. In truth, he's the son of the Serpent King, but his students usually get picked by the prince, so Tem feels like she maybe actually stands a chance to win the human prince's hand. But her relationship with Caspen quickly moves beyond the confines of their teacher/student role and into something deeper. Meanwhile, as things grow more serious between her and Caspen, she also gets closer and closer to the human prince, Leo, who clearly wants to make her his bride, despite his father's disapproval. Soon Tem is torn between the two, and what would be best not only for her and her heart, but also the two worlds she is now straddling. Plus, there's this mysterious voice calling for help every time Tem visits the castle, which only she can hear...
There is a whole lot more going on in this story that I haven't even touched on in this synopsis, and honestly, probably can't, given the explicit nature of this book (plus some things are best experienced without prior knowledge, if you know what I mean). Looking at other readers' reviews of this book on Goodreads, feelings are split - most reviewers either loved it or hated it, with some in the middle who enjoyed it for what it is while acknowledging that work still needs to be done. I'm definitely with those who are somewhere in between - the smut was incredibly smutty, which was honestly kinda great, but the character- and world-building do leave a lot to be desired. There are moments where you can tell Straube came up with a plot twist as she was writing, which I can almost forgive, as she initially released this chapter by chapter, but edits to lay more groundwork for those twists should have been made once it was picked up by a traditional publisher. There's also a sorta feminist bent to the story that is completely undermined not only by the lack of character development beyond the love triangle, but also by some of the actions of both Caspen and Leo and how Tem responds to them. Yes, the story basically revolves around Tem embracing pleasure and gaining self-confidence through that (that's the sorta feminist part), but there are moments when both men emotionally abuse Tem and no consequences happen beyond calling them out on it and them apologizing and promising not to do it again. Tem's relationships with the other female characters in the book are also trash. Either they have some familial relation to the main three characters or are an off-page cipher and therefore aren't a threat, or they're competition and deserve her ire more than anything. While I'm not totally a proponent of the notion that all women must support each other, no matter what, it was glaringly obvious that Straube was more interested in making sure that the reader knew that Tem was the ultimate chosen one, and the way to do that was to make sure Tem was superior to all other women in the book in a way that was detrimental.
All that being said, this was a wild romp that I read in the span of 4 days and the bonus, alternate-universe scene inspired by the movie Challengers may or may not, in my estimation, have made up for all of its flaws. I would one hundred percent read this again, I am going to read the sequel, and I may go ahead and buy a copy just because (especially if I can get my hands on one of the last deluxe editions with the fancy sprayed edges). But I'm not sure I can recommend it to the average reader, because it does fit into a very specific niche that will likely only appeal to very specific readers, and I'm not sure what that says about me.
