Just Say Yes

This review will be shorter than usual. Not because it was a short story but there isn’t really much to say. I started off not liking this right out of the first chapter. Alden is stuck on a hike with his best friend’s boyfriend. He doesn’t like him and the boyfriend returns this dislike. This is all well and good but the girlfriend gave both of them the impression that there would be other people on this hike. Basically, she lied to them to try to force them to like each other. And then, when he calls her she basically hangs up on him and demands they be friends. The levels of wrong and insensitive for her to not only deceive her best friend but her boyfriend and then ignore her friend’s feelings was triggering on so many levels. Honestly, if I were the boyfriend that would’ve been the end of the relationship. How manipulative do you have to be to disregard the feelings of two people that you are supposed to love for your own selfish reasons?

The other issue with this whole annoying set-up is it serves no real purpose other than to have Alden stumble into another dimension and I can’t help but think there are many other more reasonable ways to have him stumble into a new world.

Then, once on the other side, he meets Tiernan the head of a vampire fae coven. Everything from here on in is you’re my mate, an overabundance of him using pet names for Alden. A big load of I’m here to protect you cause your my mate. ‘If anyone in the town has a problem they can answer to me’ type of attitude. And it’s like they are already in a relationship but he hasn’t even been there a whole day yet.

There’s no them walking through the town and learning about vampire culture. No real tension or angst and I don’t even like a lot of angst and I’m here upset there wasn’t enough. No consideration of the fact other than the friend he shouldn’t even have, that he has a whole life to clean up and people to say bye to if he chooses to stay. Literally everything is about them being fated mates and how Tiernan is going to take care of him.

The book is only seven chapters so I was expecting every page to milk the story of them growing together but the romance didn’t grow it just existed through the lens of them being fated mates and that was that. It was essentially plotless. Out of a seven-chapter book I barely read any of it cause every time I skimmed it felt similar, more stuff about how Alden is Tiernan’s mate and they will ultimately spend their life together complete with calling him love and sweetheart and stuff before a chance to commit to vampires being real has even had time to set in.

That’s it. Another paragraph will just rehash the same stuff. This story just didn’t go anywhere. The characters didn’t develop, and the romance never really took off. Nothing actually happens and that about sums up my take away from the shortest story I think I’ve ever quit on.