This book was a gift from my friend Jessy for my last birthday, and it was really fun! I’m glad she gave it to me, because I don’t know if I’d have ever gotten around to it on my own. For all you CBR romance addicts, this is definitely a fun book to check out, because it’s obviously written by two women who love and know the genre very well.
Going in, I was expecting a straight romance that you could take different paths through, but this is much more of a tongue-in-cheek play on the genre, even a satire at points it goes so far. It is also very silly, and in points I laughed out loud from sheer delight. It’s been months since I last picked it up, so I don’t remember as many details, but I had a fun couple of hours with it. I didn’t explore all the various paths, but I got a fair amount of them, and some hidden little easter eggs you can really only find if you do the thing properly.
They poke fun at every trope they can think of and it is hilariously overwritten. The sex scenes! And you are a nameless bisexual orphan by the way. The prose is the purpliest of purple, and I very much believe that was on purpose. It’s so over the top, it’s obvious the authors know and that’s exactly what they were going for. Examples:
“Do you think us wicked?” he asks, after having succumbed to climax in your mouth, sex, and crook of elbow.
“I think us lucky.”
You watch his member rise as a gentleman does when a lady enters a room.
“We are lucky, indeed,” he says, before filling your mouth with his tongue.
and:
He listens to your every moan, attends every catch of your breath, and when the time is right and neither of you can resist creating the perfect union that your love, like this foal, was born to witness, he slips his dirk into your sheath.
Together, you play the most beautiful song on the bagpipes of your joined bodies.. Together, you reach love’s most exuberant pinnacle, screaming louder than the stable full of horses as you do.
Mac is the best, most purehearted, surprisingly nimble, and not surprisingly well-endowed man you have ever known.
and:
The next thing you know, you are tearing at each other’s clothes, making feverish love among the mummies. It doesn’t matter. They are dead, but your loins are alive.
Truly, there is something here for everybody. We’ve got brooding gothic heroes, Scottish lairds, a wealthy lady traveling the world, even a villain or two! And the best part about it is that you can keep coming back to it and playing it different every time. And unlike a lot of these books meant to evoke the nostalgia of the Choose Your Own Adventure books, the writing is incredibly entertaining. Just a fun time.