I can see why the author wrote a prequel for Promises and Pomegranates because you do want to find out more about how the physical relationship between Kallum and Elena began once you start the story. But if you were like me and read the prequel first, Sweet Sin does make you want to invest in that book as is evidenced by me having done just that. That being said, I am glad that I did it backwards in having read the subsequently written prequel first. The end of Sweet Sin makes more sense once you start to read Promises and Pomegranates, it becomes clear that Elena was attacked by Mateo and not a victim of a kidnapping just then. Considering that the affianced pair have a history of beating each other, it’s clear that Mateo attacked her and she blacked out from that.
As for what I thought of the book overall, it was pretty high on my personal scale regarding the spice, so I did like it for that. I did have one thing that made me not enjoy it as much as I think I could have. My big ick in the world of tropes is virginity. Something about mixing virginity with dark romance, and some additional genres, just annoys and irritates me. I find that it makes the story less believable if the main character is a virgin who ends up being immediately very open to anything and everything, isn’t shy or unsure, and is the most amazing sexual partner that the other person has ever been with. No one is that good at anything their first try, that is not how it works. I know it’s fiction, but it just doesn’t ever feel even a little bit convincing to me. Elena happens to tick pretty much all of my boxes for the ick. One she is a virgin who is embarrassingly desperate to lose her virginity to Kallum. During their first encounter she has what in my opinion is entirely too much vigor for someone who is being penetrated for the first time, and doesn’t seem to suffer from the pain and muscle soreness that usually follows the act. In fact, they go back to back to back. The only believable part of this, in my opinion, was that after their last round she immediately fell asleep. All of the above mentioned occurred in Sweet Sin, but the irritation continues in Promises and Pomegranates. Elena has been yearning for Kallum ever since the night they had together which was followed with his disappearance. I have a feeling that if he didn’t return then she would have gone years pining after him before finally giving up and moving on. And in my imagination avoiding being intimate with anyone would have fallen under this desperation of waiting to see if the man would come back to her. There is an abhorrently cringe worthy moment in the book when she refers to herself as the ‘virgin archetype’ in which I actually groaned aloud at. So while I was interested in the story and I did enjoy the spice, in the back of my mind I was always thinking about my least favorite, most hated, trope.
Having gone into this series almost blind, I am very curious about the plot of the next book. Do we get more of Kallum and Elena, or does the story focus around another couple? I have a feeling that we have seen the end of Hades and his Persephone and that we will get an entirely new story in book two. I have a feeling that the next book will be a romance between the very briefly mentioned Riley and a new character. Or I could be very wrong and the next book in this series follows characters that have absolutely no relation to anyone from Promises and Pomegranates. I am eager to finish writing this review so that I can find out. If I wasn’t so adamant about writing a review for a finished book before I start a new book then I would have begun Vipers and Virtuosos already. So, I will be abruptly ending my blog here.
Unrelated, I really liked the way the last picture I took turned out. Seeing as this is the book that the prequel was based off of, I decided to just do the exact same thing. I think it looks just as good and this makes me feel pretty pleased with myself! Also, when I was taking the picture for Sweet Sin it was before I had even opened the book. I had no idea that there would be actual black ribbon involved, that was just a happy coincidence.
Nonfiction and Nonsense 