The way this book started off from a 5 star because the beginning chapter was PERFECTION and Lightning in A Bottle, and then dropped to a 4.5, held stThe way this book started off from a 5 star because the beginning chapter was PERFECTION and Lightning in A Bottle, and then dropped to a 4.5, held strong but dropped to 4 and then the whatso ending happened and I'm just staring at this book, in disbelief that I'm rating it 3.5 stars.
That isn't a bad rating, but bro, I had such... not even high expectations, just expectations that I would adore this book. There's something about Gianni's books that are absolute crack. I flew thru this book, didn't want to step away from it once I started (wc has been so hard for me lately, damn you soc med) and I just love her writing. It's not flowery or even the most brilliant or the best writing in the world.
It's writing that feels at home, feels comfortable and like second skin. It might not wow me, but it feels cozy and safe.
And it's precisely why I'm so disappointment with this book.
To be fair, there weren't any scenes that compels with why I'm disappointed. It just seems that what I had wanted to happen was at complete parallel to what this book gave, y'know? Like, this book was a me problem, but the book itself.
I just wanted something completely different from what this book gave and now I'm just left grumpy and sad.
That doesn't mean I didn't enjoy it. I did but I didn't love it.
Anyway,
Initial reactions: To think that I had highly anticipated this ever since its announcement and.... Are my expectations even met?
You ever read a book that made you stop, look at the world and your life and want to change everything in it completely because everything else seemedYou ever read a book that made you stop, look at the world and your life and want to change everything in it completely because everything else seemed so fake and insubstantial and you only now realized it? Yeah well, this book is making me think and tinker.
Tal Bauer doesn't tell you or show you a work of art, he makes you experience it so tremendously, so deeply that by the end of it, it's like you're a different person out of it.
I think that's why people come back and read his works. No because of the way he can write angst like the best kind of mental trauma, but a sense of connection he can make you feel... Almost like he's grounding you in life and living and breathing....more
(3.5★) This series pretty much downhilled since book 2. I think downhilled is not the correct term, because there wasn't anything wrong or unpleasing (3.5★) This series pretty much downhilled since book 2. I think downhilled is not the correct term, because there wasn't anything wrong or unpleasing with book 2 and this one. I just.... This just didn't hit as good as book 1.
I liked the way their relationship progressed for shore.
But that was it. The plot was decent, but I can't believe *spoiler* that Isa died.
Like yeah, he isn't a good guy. But man. I LIKED HIM. He would've had such a solid redemption arc (with first ...more
I dropped this when I first started it (back when it got released) because I wasn't feeling it. Then I can't believe this is an almost 400 page book.
I dropped this when I first started it (back when it got released) because I wasn't feeling it. Then I saw some bad reviews about this book and I was like: c'mon. It can't be that bad.
And yeah, it wasn't that bad. Most of the issue was because they got together too fast but I didn't mind it. I appreciated it because even though they got physical really fast, they were still trying to navigate and find their ways in each other's life and trying to also determine their feelings. I think that's an accurate picture of college boys (although there's no just 1 picture).
Like Loren said, she started this book with Shaw only but man, this book felt like it was Burke's. That man is ADORABLE, SEXY, CAPTIVATING, HOT, SWEET and a complete MARSHMALLOW.
“Yeah? How do you seduce a Burkie?” His voice is quiet. “You be Shaw.”
His growth was beautiful and the last few chapters that lead to the epilogue? ...more
→ the way homie went from: "I'll destroy you so I can have you all to myself" to "I'll destroy the world so I can have you all to myself" → the way homie went from: "I'll destroy you so I can have you all to myself" to "I'll destroy the world so I can have you all to myself" ...more
Okay the romance was cute and I like how there was no dumb third act conflict and the trust and loyalty Rem and Linc built. All goods, and nice and fun and whatnot. Especially the beginning. the arcade kiss was HOT. but man. I just wanted for them to have one damn conversation that wasn't so fucking deep or full of their undying love for each other (ofc after they met and hit it together) like Jesus Christ mate. I would barf if someone told ily more than i-lost-count times a day, or chapter. Sure it's cute shit but c'mon, you have better things to talk about!
It's the only reason why I'm giving it a 2.75-stars. I was thinking of being kind and giving it a 3, but man, the descent of 60% and onwards was just plainstakingly hideous. I wanted to dnf every couple of pages and i practically skimmed the last 10%
And I'm more mad I already started 17 days into the new year, it took fucking 17 DAYS-until I reached an almost 1 star book. ALMOST!...more
“The most important day in hockey is tomorrow. Tomorrow, you tackle what went wrong today. Tomorrow, you improve. Every day, every tomorrow, y
“The most important day in hockey is tomorrow. Tomorrow, you tackle what went wrong today. Tomorrow, you improve. Every day, every tomorrow, you get better.”
Looking at the aftermath of this book, feeling everything this book did to me... I feel raw and untethered and honestly, half broken.
Rating: 4.5-stars⭐✨✨, but I might change it when I reread it.
This book is really one of the worst books I've ever read, and yet, one of the most profound things I've ever read. To be alive, to feel life and love course through me as I read this, it's a special kind of luck.
“Never,” I said. “There’s never been any place like this.” My eyes found his. “I’ll make you proud, Morgan.” “I know you will, Darlin’.”
I don't know how to describe this book, how to tell you the story of how my world spun on the axis of this book, spun so fast and shin so brightly, I don't think I had ever felt such exhilarating happiness until it was ripped out underneath me.
Tal Bauer fed us. He fed us with this book.
Not without making us work for it, that sadistic bastard.
“You said you wanted to give me the world.” “I will.” My response was automatic. My desire to leap out of the plane and get to work even more so. Where to start? Did I dig up the foundations of the earth, or did I try to harness the moon? Gather treasures and pile them at his feet? I didn’t know what to do, didn’t even have a shred of a clue. All I had was my hockey stick and my two hands, but, by God, I was going to—
Man, did he make me pine. Did he make me long and ache and fucking peel of my own skin at how I wanted the world to just spin right for Morgan and Shea. I just wanted to make Morgan leap into air and Shea to just hold on, to never give up, never loose hope and never loose that love.
“I don’t want the world.” Shea slipped his hand into mine, wove our fingers together. “I want you, Morgan. I just want you.” That was far more terrifying.
And when I got it? When I felt the wings making me soar so high up in the sky?
It. Was. The. Most. Exhilarating. Experience.
I was happy (and I was so fucking scared that I was happy) and it was truly a indescribable feeling in the world.
It was indescribable. Every heartbeat seemed too big, every breath too small. I didn’t know how to hold all this happiness inside me. The intensity of each day. Colors were too sharp, sounds too full. The saturation of reality had been turned up to eleven. My bones were burning, my heart was a nuclear reactor, and my soul was strapped to a rocket. One look from Shea, and I was blasting off to Mars. A smile, and I was a dead goner.
When Tal Bauer makes you happy... You ought to get your heart ready cus the pain is gonna hurt SO. FUCKING. MUCH. but beyond that, for just a moment, bask in the happiness, the glow and the LOVE we received. This family, 20 broken men who are made whole when they are together, they all shine brighter and glow like the most enchanting kind of treasure, when they're together.
If I could describe Morgan in one word, it would without a doubt be the most simplest and bravest word to ever exist. Devotion. He is devotion. He is love and strenght, bravery and kindness, shy and timid, but so full of love. He is a man I look up to, a man I have so much to learn from. I have a feeling he and Ethan Reichenbach are gonna be good friends.
How could I possibly explain everything to Shea? How I felt when I was around him, or even when I was just thinking about him, because it didn’t matter if we were together or apart, the fact that he was in my life had changed it all, turned the whole world upside down. How he’d changed me, down to each neuron and electron, and the man I was now was someone I liked, someone I was proud of, and that was all because of him. Because he’d made me hope and believe and reach for something and someone better inside of me when his blue eyes found mine, that first day, the next day, and every day after.
If you guys have seen my 2022 reading year in review, you'd have seen my favorite author of 2022, and it was Tal (I'm not sure if it's a mistake at this point). My excitement for this book was through the roof, but having this book release right into final weeks was just another way Tal Bauer continues to fuck with me.
and how reality was fickle, shifting and twirling and spinning away, until you realized the trick was what was real was only ever what you decided it was.
So many books of Tal hold different and elegant meaning to me, but this book reminded me a lot of The Night Of and Never Stay Gone.
If you've read The Night Of, you'd have felt the palpable friendship of Jonathan and Steven's. It was one of the most heartbreaking friendships I've ever read. Of course I connected it to Shea and Brody. In a way, their bond, the way Shea held Brody together through nothing else but the strongest kind of ironclad stubbornness, reminded me of Ethan and Scott. (that's ridiculous high praise because Ethan and Scott's friendship is beyond and integral to my being).
And Never Stay Gone, which is funny because two books couldn't have been more polar opposites against each other. I think you're wrong. Tal talked about how setting and atmosphere are and should be their own characters. Their own identity. The setting in NSG is one of the most palpable places Tal has created yet. (aside from horsepower, lol) and that kind of craft, that kind of magic translated into this book, through the setting and the adventure Morgan, Shea and the team goes through.
“My love for you has no end.”
We were pure and utter fools for each other.
And the mountains. Gods. Chapter 24 to Chapter 26. Bookmark them because I don't have to say anything about them. Read them and reread them again and you'll get your own words. Nothing but silence for the beauty of just how heart shattering a heart beat can be. Because this book is exactly that. A heartbeat.
God, he was beautiful, like fine art given a heartbeat and let loose on the world.
One second. One moment. A choice. The hard ones, the right ones. Never give up, never stop showing up, never stop being there. Never stop lifting. Day by day, moment by moment, together. That. This. All of this was the heart line of this book. The beat of this story. It was more than a love story. It was a story about broken men finding each other and loving each other, through thick and thin. Blood couldn't be the most fabricated thing in the world because what these men shared and confided in each other? Even a family couldn't hold that kind of honor. They were each other's lifeline, each other's angels.
“I don’t know what you did down there, Moogs, but whatever it was, keep doing it. Goddamn.” “I showed up,” I said. You showed up, Morgan, when you didn’t have to. That’s the finest thing a man can do in this life: be there for someone.
Initial reaction: I Hate Tal Bauer For What He Did To Me With This Book....more
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