Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Title: The Ballad of Never After
Author: Stephanie Garber
Genre: YA Fantasy / YA Romance
Setting: The Magnificent North
Month Read: September 2022
Book Type: Hardcover
Publication: September 2022
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Pages: 416
TRIGGER WARNING-
Sexual Content / Murder / Blood / Attempted Murder / Vampires / Death
"He held her with the type of intensity that only happens when a person wants something that isn't quite theirs."
No Spoiler Summary:
Not every love is meant to be.
After Jacks, the Prince of Hearts, betrays her, Evangeline Fox swears she'll never trust him again. Now that she’s discovered her own magic, Evangeline believes she can use it to restore the chance at happily ever after that Jacks stole away.
But when a new terrifying curse is revealed, Evangeline finds herself entering into a tenuous partnership with the Prince of Hearts again. Only this time, the rules have changed. Jacks isn’t the only force Evangeline needs to be wary of. In fact, he might be the only one she can trust, despite her desire to despise him.
Instead of a love spell wreaking havoc on Evangeline’s life, a murderous spell has been cast. To break it, Evangeline and Jacks will have to do battle with old friends, new foes, and a magic that plays with heads and hearts. Evangeline has always trusted her heart, but this time she’s not sure she can...
Review:
I thought at a time that I couldn't love a series more than Caraval, and then I thought I couldn't love a book more than Once Upon a Broken Heart... and then Stephanie Garber wrote this book. You dive right in after the last one, and it has just enough callbacks to the Caraval series to make it part of the same universe, but my GOD what a novel. I forfeit sleep, I couldn't put it down, and towards the end my husband was genuinely concerned about how much I was screaming (but the, my toddler is sleeping so I need to scream in a way that won't wake him screaming.) Now knowing there is, indeed, a third book coming out next year(!!!!!) I feel a lot better than I did when finishing this book.
Jacks is as hot, if not substantially hotter, in this book than in OUABH, and Evangeline is just as charming and spirited as the female lead and reluctant love interest. The chemistry in this book was perfection, it was hot, it was a little older in content which I loved as someone who is not a teen anymore, and I just felt like everything was done right when it came to them. You get just enough to keep you on the edge of your seat/couch/bed/car/wherever you choose to read. I was frustrated, and elated, and happy, and distraught, and all within 416 pages. You also get answers to so many questions from the first book, and left with a lot more.
Go get this book. Now. Do it. You won't regret it. I do recommend reading Caraval first for a lot of backstory, and some of which comes into the plot for this one, and obviously read Once Upon a Broken Heart which is the direct prequel to this. You really won't regret it.
Recommendation:
Caraval Series by Stephanie Garber
Heartless by Marissa Meyer
Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard
Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo
Everless by Sara Holland
"She feared that dreams were like fairytales, a little bit true and not entirely trustworthy"
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#yaromance #ya #yafantasy
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