I grocery shop as normal. I peruse the fruits aisle for oranges. I quite like oranges, though they're incredibly out of season now: the white blooms of the trees have died, and they'll only turn into fruit in around September, or October around here. The heat doesn't affect the leaves – though it kills everything else. They're expensive, too. August will come soon, and every produce in the store will look dead with the heat. The air conditioner can't keep up with summer, noon's sun or water shortages. Everything will look dead soon. Dead and expensive.
Dead and expensive. I chuckle, putting a bag of oranges back in its place. To my left, pomegranates – terribly out of season too. My life has been unmistakenly affected by this book, my outlook, my moral code, my very being affected by it. I seem unchanged, outside. Inside, however… Who am I? I barely recognize myself. Who have I become, after reading a rich dom daddy x teensy weensy lil uwu virgin girlboss erotica? How can these people pass by me, not knowing I have been unmade, altered, destroyed and made anew! I am dead, and living is expensive.
I remember that in Touch of Darkness, by Scarlett St. Clair, the goddess Persephone spends the great part of the book unable to access her goddessy-y powers – everything she touches is doomed to die. She considers getting gloves to prevent from this.
Are thus gloves not more worthy of offerings, respect and admiration, for a simple article of clothing can stop such divine prowess?
I go to the milk aisle. It is also expensive. I find myself bored – bored and thinking how in Touch of Darkness, a book so adamantly sincere in its quest to be about female empowerment, both moments are triggered by –
Hold on, let me check my grocery list.
BANANA DOUBLE CREAM PIE INGREDIENTS:
BANANA
MILK
CREAM (lots)
SUGAR
FLOUR
EGGS
I lose my desire to bake. I move on to the next aisle. I pass through the meat section so you won't have to hear a bottom of the barrel joke about meat and erotica. I pass by the fish section silently so I am not called upon on comparing its stink to the lowkey misogyny in this book.
Cans aisle. I grab beans. What beauty there is in canned foods. Easily made, simple, processed beyond imagination, to the point there's nary a flavor. But cheap, easily acessible. Much like the prose in this book.
I remember that one quote of the book that gave me such a headache I had to go and purchase tylenol. "Persephone took a coffee to go and then headed to the Library of Artemis. There were several beautiful reading rooms named after the Nine Greek Muses. Persephone liked all of them, but she had always been drawn to the Melponeme Room, which she entered now. Persephone wasn't sure why it was named after the Muse of Tragedy, except that a statue of the goddess stood at the center of the oval room."
I put the beans back in the shelf.
I look around. Everyone is buying stuff. Why can't I bring myself to buy too? Am I missing out on the fun? Do I just not get it? Do I need toilet paper? Do I really sh*t that much?
I buy merely one thing before I leave. I ring it up on self checkout. I cannot wait to leave.
The mosquito spray will surely work in killing what's been bugging me. Thus, I end my grocery shopping, and this review. My words are the medicated spray that will keep the Thought BugsTM away from me.
To whom I reccomend this book:
I actually say this with no hate in my heart and genuinely hoping someone might get this book and actually enjoy it, but I reccomend this book to people who are ok with safe and predictable plots, clichés and characters who are very clearly trying to fulfill a fantasy or role. If you don't like thinking about a book very much (and sometimes we need something like that) and are satisfied with Just Ok sex scenes, this might be for you.
(With some hate in my heart, I reccomend this book to people who love hate-reading.)
Personally, 0 out of 10. I am never picking up a work by this author ever again. I have learned my lesson. I have persevered the fires of Hell itself, but I have come out singed. I have, as I intended, been vaccinated against Bad BooksTM, but I have also learned an important lesson: trust your gut feeling and never ever ever EVER leave your comfort zone. Change is scary, but most importantly, it can be boring and dissapointing and even slightly rage inducing.
TL;DR: Booktok erotica book sacrifices everything (prose, story, pacing, style, theme, character development, charisma, uniqueness, nerve, talent) for smut, and even the "spice" scenes are as pleasant and tasteful as water mixed with flour drank whilst one has Covid (or whatever other condition that causes loss of taste, idk).
PS: Do not take my review seriously, I think you can see I am a deeply unserious person. I am a silly and whimsical hater but a passing conglomerate of words in the World Wide Web and shall cease to be of importance in three or so words.
by PrincipleOfNegation