The Words by Ashely Jade
- Published on
- Shalini
- in Book Posts, Book Reviews, Digital Reads Media, Digital Reads PR, Digital Reads Reviews, Fiction
Publication Date: January 2022
Book Links
Blurb
He was the talented bad boy everyone wanted.
I was the irrelevant geek everyone hated.
He was the sun…drawing all of us in.
I was a black hole…taking up space.
He was destined to be a star.
I was destined to remain an insignificant no one.
Until he made me believe I was special…
And then he destroyed me.
I never thought I’d see Phoenix Walker again after he broke my heart, but fate had other plans.
One tour. Eight weeks. Forty shows.
Countless opportunities to make him pay.
The world thought he was a God…
But I knew the truth.
My Review
What was it all about
The Words by Ashley Jude was a dark romance that highlighted the friends-to-enemies-to lovers trope. Lennon and Phoenix were high school friends, but Phoenix’s betrayal paid a high price.
Years later, when Phoenix was the famous rockstar, Lennon was hired to be his sober-companion. Their chemistry skyrocketed, but Lennon wanted her pound of flesh. The revenge for the betrayal.
But that’s the thing about love. It made you forget, at least for sometime, until you couldn’t.
How it made me feel - The Good
A dark romance that thrilled me in the first part where I could feel the genuine bonds of friendship budding between Lennon and Phoenix.
The writing, its words, kept me in its thrall, wanting to more about their friendship and how the relationship would progress was the best thing.
I loved that despite certain scenes of blatant sexual stuff happening because of groupies surrounding rockstars, the clear emotion of love still sang true.
I liked how the darkness of a broken rockstar was balanced by the goodness of his high school friend.
The characters were developed slowly over the pages, and I absolutely adored Lennon. I loved her genuineness and her need to be true to herself. She was brilliant.
Few things about Phoenix did niggle at me, but overall, I liked him, but wouldn’t want him to be my boyfriend. Like ever.
The Bad
At 600+ pages, it was too long. And I felt some of the scenes dragged on. The need to show Phoenix’s goodness went on and on. The emotions didn’t slay me to ribbons.
Using lust to drive a point to the girl felt to be a bit too much. I got that it was a dark romance, but after Lennon got back in his life, a thing that Phoenix most wanted, he still went ahead and had groupies going down on him almost in front of her felt to be too icky for me.
I bet Phoenix wouldn’t have liked it if Lennon had done the same. In fact, I knew he didn’t. He was ready to pulverize the guy whom Lennon barely kissed.
I knew inequality existed in real life, but having it in my books where the guy disrespected the woman he loved so much didn’t feel like a main character I would fall in love with.
The Conclusion
Overall, I had a good time with it. It was just not my favorite love story.
I downloaded the digital version of the book from an online retail, and this is my journey down its pages, straight from the heart. STRICTLY HONEST and UNBIASED.
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