Candice

First and foremost, finally a romance with a 40 year old FMC. We love to see it. And she’s on the curvier side. Love it!

Vera Stein has always kind of been in the back seat of her own life. When things finally come to a breaking point, she finds herself needing to crash on her retired scream-queen grandmothers couch in a retirement community. And uh oh, her college, drunk one night in Vegas ex-husband is the community doctor. Eli is the yearning-est of yearning men and I was here for it.

Why not 5⭐️? There are random dividers that are supposed to be posters. I don’t know if it was super unclear of what the point was because this was an arc or if it really didn’t serve a ton of purpose. I also don’t love the random screenplay excerpts throughout. They didn’t really add anything to the story and just broke up the flow. And the picky one - Vera is 40. Why is she not at least experiencing some sort of perimenopause symptoms. So much of that mid-life experience is in there (caring for ailing parents, career challenges, raising a family) but not this. Again. - picky thing.

But all in all a really solid romance.

This book picks up right where we left off in Arcana Academy. Clara is even more well known and wanted. Kaelis is still scheming for the world and everything is changing. While most of the story still occurs in the academy itself, it’s less focus on academy business and more on how all paths lead to the academy. The Worldkeepers take a much bigger role in this book but we also lose some old friends. If you loved the first book, this one will be a great ride too. It’s all moderately paced and then the last few chapters it goes into high gear. The cliff hanger ending wasn’t quite as dramatic as Arcana Academy, but you’ll still not see it coming.

This book says it’s under 300 pages but it’s a dense, heavy less than 300 page book. The story follows past and present day, Eunha as she navigates being the daughter of a crime family in Hong Kong.

The chapters aren’t a 1:1 present day: flash back cadence. Some chapters follow a section of story before a change. However I will say sometimes it’d be present day and there would still be some flashbacks which was a bit confusing - you’re already doing full flashback chapters. Keep them separated. But I digress. There were never any massive a-ha moments but the story is laid out well and you feel the ebb and flow of Eunha’s life as she figures out how to be her father’s daughter, a wife, a mother and the owner of her own destiny.

I will start by saying I love Shea Ernshaw’s writing. So right out of the gate I know I’m going to at a minimum really enjoy the book.

For this one specifically it starts out as a time bending fantasy - a girl loving on the coast sees a fabled floating island and decides to check it out. She meeting a man. When he ushers her back to her boat to go home after mere hours, turns out on land she’d been gone days. Fast forward, that time greatly shaped her life and when the opportunity to go back to the island (to make sure it wasn’t all a dream) presents itself, Ellie takes it. But now she’s in her 30s. An adult. And the man - he’s the same. Hasn’t really aged at all in all the years Ellie has spent growing up, getting a career, and a fiancee.

Ellie’s return to the island is the bulk of the book. Then we hit like the last 1/4 and time as continued to move forward and unbeknownst to Ellie and Clay, it’s now a post apocalyptic world. So the last of the novel really dives into the post apocalyptic landscape and how they will choose to end their lives together.

Yes there’s romance but not so much that I’d call it a romance forward book. It’s more focused on Ellie’s growth and the feelings she goes through while trying to determine what the “right” path for her life is.

One thing you can anyways count on with Stacey McEwan is an action filled book, yearning and then screaming and wanting to throw the book across the room because HOW DARE YOU. A Forsaken Prophecy picks right up where A Forbidden Alchemy left off. Nina and Patrick have been taken back to the capitol because Alchemist + Earth Charmer are the only way to find the last seam of idium. Families are reunited and then torn apart. I’m still convinced Patrick freaking Colson is god-tier book boyfriend. If book three makes me regret this statement for the first two books, me and Stacey are going to have words. And never thought I’d really cheer for someone getting killed off… but here we are (and he sooooo deserved it). When you get there, you’ll understand.

I really liked getting quite a few chapters from Donny’s POV. Theo is still a wild card. But at the end of the day, we get more Patrick Colson and all is good in the world.