ARC Book Review: Soulmatch by Rebecca Danzenbaker

July 28, 2025 GoodeyReadsLeave a comment

Rating: ★★★
Audience: YA Dystopian Romance
Length: 496 pages
Author: Rebecca Danzenbaker
Publisher: Simon Teen
Release Date: July 29th, 2025
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

Two-hundred years after World War III, the world is at peace, all thanks to the soul-identification system. Every 18-year-old must report to the government to learn about their past lives, a terrifying process known as kirling. Good souls leave the institute with their inheritance, a career path, and if they’re lucky, a soulmate. Bad souls leave in handcuffs.

It’s a nerve-wracking ordeal for Sivon, who, given her uncanny ability to win every chess match, already suspects her soul isn’t normal. Turns out, she was right to worry. Sivon’s results stun not only her, but the entire world, making her the object of public scrutiny and anonymous threats.

Saddled with an infuriating and off-limits bodyguard, Sivon is thrust into a high-stakes game where souls are pawns and rules don’t exist. As deaths mount, Sivon must decipher friend from foe while protecting her heart against impossible odds. One wrong move could destroy the future lives of everyone Sivon loves, and she can’t let that happen, even if they’ll never love her back.

Thank you Simon Audio for the audiobook and Simon Teen for the ARC (gifted).

IT WAS OKAY?

I don’t know quite what to do with this one. I think if young adult dystopian is your jam then you should definitely try this. That’s a genre I’ve always been mixed on so this was leaned towards a miss for me. It wasn’t all bad, just missed a few marks.

There were many hallmark moments of the nostalgic dystopian favorites throughout. Competition and power checks and a romance woven in too. The audiobook was solid and I do recommend that format as well. I liked the growth for Sivon and how she started to learn who she was and stand up for herself as the plot kept mounting with intensity.

I wish I had felt more entranced by this book, but I think I would try another by this author.

Overall audience notes:

YA Dystopian Romance
Language: mild
Romance: kisses
Violence: moderate
Content warnings: death, loss of loved ones, su!icide, grief

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ARC/ALC Book Review: Steel & Spellfire by Laura E. Weymouth

July 22, 2025July 19, 2025 GoodeyReadsLeave a comment

Rating: ★★★
Audience: YA Fantasy Romance
Length: 368 pages
Author: Laura E. Weymouth
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books
Release Date: July 22nd, 2025
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

A devastatingly gifted mage with clandestine romantic connections to a Royal Guard joins the court social season in an attempt to undo past wrongs, only to fall under suspicion when a creature with powers shockingly like her own begins slaughtering her fellow debutantes.

Pandora Small has two ruling objectives: first, to keep the prodigious extent of her power secret, in a world where mages are feared and governed by suffocating laws. Second, to find her wealthy and noble-born patron, a shadowy figure bound to Pandora by magic, who stole her childhood and grew her power until she became a weapon rather than a girl. To that end, she’s posing as an Ingenue, a privileged and petted young woman of strictly limited abilities, who is allowed access to the royal court’s social season in order to find a husband and patron to control her magic.

But on Pandora’s arrival at court, Kit Beacon, one of the most promising members of the Royal Guard, inadvertently learns the true scope of her power. Privately sympathetic towards mages and the difficulties they face, Beacon decides to keep Pandora’s secret. But when someone or something with powers terribly like Pandora’s own begins slaughtering her fellow Ingenues, Beacon’s resolve to keep what he knows about her private is put to the test.

Tasked with protecting all the girls in the palace, not just one, Beacon will have to decide whether Pandora is a suspect or an ally, while to win his trust, Pandora will have to let him know more of her still—the worst of who she is and what she’s done. Because only unity between them during the social whirlwind to come will enable Pan to find her patron and Beacon the killer, and ensure they both see justice meted out.

Thank you Simon Audio for the audiobook and Simon Teen for the ARC (gifted).

WELL.

I think this was trying to do too much in a standalone. Maybe spread out across a duology would have been better? The ideas and framework were interesting and I don’t think there was anything inherently wrong with the writing style. I just kept waiting for everything to truly come together or for me to feel invested, and I never got to that stage.

I liked the characters. It is young adult appropriate which I know can be hard to find, but with kisses only and no excess language I think a younger audience would like this.

And I did enjoy the regency-esque world. I love fantasy books with that dynamic. There’s some good scenes and I don’t think it was a BAD book, just not for me.

Overall audience notes:

YA Fantasy Romance
Language: none
Romance: kisses
Violence: mild – moderate

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ARC Book Review: The Beautiful Maddening by Shea Ernshaw

May 31, 2025May 25, 2025 GoodeyReadsLeave a comment

Rating: ★★★
Audience: NA Fantasy Romance
Length: 304 pages
Author: Shea Ernshaw
Publisher: Simon Teen
Release Date: June 3rd, 2025
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Shea Ernshaw comes a haunting romantic contemporary fantasy about a teen navigating her family’s love curse that blooms with their enchanted tulips every year.

Seventeen year-old Lark Goode wants only one to escape her small town of Cutwater and the history of her family name. It’s a history that began during the Dutch tulip mania of 1636, when Lark’s ancestor stole the last remaining tulip bulbs and fled to America. But when the tulips bloomed on American soil, madness sprouted from their snowy white petals.

The madness was love.

Now, generations later, the Goodes remain cursed—the unnatural flowers outside their home causing locals to fall helplessly in love with anyone carrying Goode blood in their veins. While her brother embraces the strange power, Lark wants nothing more than to be free from it.

But when she meets a boy who seems unaffected by the family curse, Lark finds herself falling headlong into a feeling she’s spent her whole life trying to avoid. Yet, all curses and magic come with a price, and the town of Cutwater soon sinks into a dangerous sickness tied to Lark and the ill-fated tulips.

To save the town, Lark will need to sacrifice everything—even true love—to break the spell. Because in the Goode family, love has a way of destroying everything.

Thank you Simon Audio for the gifted audiobook and Simon Teen for the ARC.

UTTERLY BORING.

Y’all. If you catch me reading a Shea Ernshaw book from this point on please take it out of my hands and throw it across the room. I have read five book and enjoyed two and those are not good bookish odds in my mind.

I was really bored with this plot line. There wasn’t anything to it. Mysterious flowers, a dark family past, and an attempt at new love that doesn’t even end in what I considered a satisfying way. I struggled to get through the audiobook and it was under nine hours. NOW the narrator was great, no issues there, it was the book.

This is missing an edge of any sort. And better expansion of thoughts and themes.

Overall audience notes:

NA Fantasy Romance
Language: mild – moderate
Romance: vague open door
Violence: mild

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Book Review: Fearless (The Powerless Trilogy #3) by Lauren Roberts

April 16, 2025April 9, 2025 GoodeyReadsLeave a comment

Rating: ★★★★★
Audience: YA Fantasy Romance
Length: 608 pages
Author: Lauren Roberts
Publisher: Simon Teen
Release Date: April 8th, 2025
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

Paedyn and Kai are reunited but face a terrible decision in this thrilling conclusion to the New York Times bestselling romantic fantasy trilogy perfect for fans of Sarah J. Maas and The Red Queen.

Paedyn Gray and Kai Azer return to the Kingdom of Ilya…

And Paedyn has a life-altering choice to make. Whatever she decides will determine her fate—and the fate of those around her—forever.

In the ultimate battle of love and loyalty, who wins?

Thank you to Simon Audio for the audiobook and Simon Teen for the gifted copy.

FANTASTIC CONCLUSION.

Where do I even begin?! I devoured this audiobook in two days (I had a long excursion one day so admittedly that helped) BUT ANYWAYS. I couldn’t put this book down!!! The audio production is amazing and really brings this book to a new level for me. I love listening to these characters.

I was a little worried about some plot points and different pieces but when I finished the book and realized the necessity of the decisions behind the journey, I felt more at peace with what went down.

The romance is once again a JOURNEY. The banter between Kai and Pae is still absolutely everything to me!!! And I might have to read this physically to highlight all of the moments between them. There’s sweet, and heat, and passion, and anger, and fear, and ALL THE EMOTIONS. I love all the emotions.

And I do think it wrapped up in the ways that made the most sense. I loved having a third POV (you’ll see!!!) because that story made me theorize HARD and when my theories were correct I was pleasantly shocked because I don’t think I’ve read that before and I love new to me things.

This book had a little bit of everything and is truly one of the most solid YA trilogies I’ve read in a hot minute. The conclusion I’ve been hoping for delivered.

Overall audience notes: