First, you think you’re too dumb for this book. But then you’ll keep on reading and you’ll discover that indeed you are too dumb for this book.
I had trouble connecting with the story and the characters. I also wasn’t able to envision this Hell she describes and I still don’t understand how the pentagrams work. But when I was quite sure that this book is not doing it for me, she hit me with a complex analysis of power structures, manipulation and exploitation and I remembered, why I faithfully vowed to preorder every single book this woman ever writes. Unfortunately it wasn’t enough to keep me intrigued for over 500 pages. I felt like the romance was lacking conviction and the main character, Alice, was not elaborate enough to keep the story running on her own. Maybe you need to be a scholar to enjoy this book. Maybe you need to have read Dante’s Inferno to enjoy this book. Neither of these things apply to me. So maybe I’m just not the target audience. Is this a bad book? No. I just missed the fun/excitement I usually experience while reading fantasy.
