***This review has also been posted on The Social Potato

The only thing working for this book is the concept. The characters are iffy, the romance is weird and the plot is rushed and the world building? Well I have no idea about the world building. It’s just the idea of amulets and how they work that really intrigues me, even now.

Caleb is basically the perfect guy. He is hot, modest, smart, kind of rich and oh he likes helping people. Except he is horrible. He is self-centered from what I see. When he helps a kid and realizes how bad the situation was, his first thought was, “This kid really does need my help”. I am sure that is supposed to be a good thing but no. Hell no. The kid needed help, not YOUR help. And any guy who chains a girl up so that she doesn’t get herself killed while he goes off to fight, especially when she is actually powerful and could help, is not a wonderful guy. He is a fucking nightmare.  He is also the kind of guy who emphasizes someone’s beauty above everything else. When he is telling everyone about ‘his girl’ he emphasizes her beauty because that is what is most important. Yes, you’re DEFINITELY the kind of guy I want as a life partner (they get married). Let’s not forget his policy about not fighting with women. Even when it’s to train him so that he doesn’t fucking die. Nope, not going to take this shit seriously. He is way too cool for this. I wanted to bitch slap him right then. Your chivalry is going to get you fucking killed, sure respecting women is important, showing them courtesy is a good thing but have some limits dude.

Our wonderful female lead, what’s her face Alexa is no better than her lover. For starters

“Caleb is my husband. It’s his job to protect me now.”

That was what she said to her foster parent when she tried to be ‘overprotective’. She is incapable of making smart decisions and rushes into danger without thinking things through. She is TSTL. When she learns that she is a speshul snowflake, she barely questions anything after the initial shock. Let’s not forget someone always needs to save her pathetic ass.

Both these characters feel like checklists or just lists of characteristics. They don’t feel like real characters. Just a bundle of characteristics. Their backstories don’t feel like stories, they feel like facts. There is no emotion involved, or if it is, it’s more rational than emotional. Her parents died and she is supposed to be sad about that, she is, but I don’t feel it. I don’t feel anything. I have no real connection to her. I feel a mild annoyance towards her but that’s about it. The same goes for Caleb, I cannot even bring myself to hate him because I just don’t care. I am annoyed, pissed, but at his actions not his character. His character does NOTHING for me.

The secondary characters were just… there. Like her best friend tagged along but she has a beau back home and what about her father? What? They all seem to fade into the background when it comes to Alexa and Caleb for they are the center of this stories. The secondary characters serve no other purpose than plot devices.

The romance though. Oh dear. *shudders* I was so excited about the fact that a relationship already existed but that theory was shot to hell pretty soon. Sure they were in a relationship but they knew NOTHING about each other. Not their middle names, not where they came from, not about their families, NOTHING. Yet in spite of this, they claim to be in love. How do you love someone you know nothing about? Oh and then moving on to getting married. That took everything a step too far. That’s just moving way too fast. You can love each other and still be in a dangerous situation, marriage won’t change anything. Seriously. Now I have nothing against marriage, but really they should have waited before taking such a huge leap.. I mean they JUST declared their love for one another. I cannot even. *storms out*

The plot is just.. bland. Things happen, more things happen, one after another. Like some sort of to-do list. This happened? Check. Next thing. Check. Check Check Check Check. *cricket noises in the background* At one point, I felt like I was reading some sort of ultra-dramatic soap opera.  Everyone has seen this story a gazillion times. Orphaned girl, secrets being kept, girl super special complete with a prophecy that declares her so. Let’s not forget she is supposed to save everyone. Did I mention she was speshul?

The world building made no sense to me. Ivy (the overprotective guardian) mentioned that she searched the whole kingdom for Alexa when Alexa decided to ‘screw it’. Is the kingdom small? Big? What? Everyone is confined inside for their own good until they become adults? Again … what? I have no idea what was going on with the world building and after a while I no longer cared to figure that tangled mess out.

I’d say something about the only good thing about this book, the concept of amulets but at this point I don’t care. The intriguing concept of amulets does not make up for everything else that didn’t work. I may have read this fairly quickly but I simply don’t care about this book. I was surprised when it ended.. and when I say surprised, I mean in the best way possible because I was miserable and really did not want to continue reading.

In the end this book is just not something I would recommend. It did not do anything for me and didn’t read like a story but instead like a fact book, a fictional fact book at that but still. There was no emotion rolling of the pages, I didn’t immerse myself within the world. A text book would have been more interesting.