3.5 stars.
Okay, the good:
this one infuriated me far less than book two, which is good, bc if it had I might have dropped this series. I thought the Dominique/Steph issues and relationship woes made a lot of sense, and I loved how they were handled, in general, that was my fav arc. I also found the Juliette/Claire friendship break up and reunion realistic and resolved well—friends can sometimes hurt you more than romantic relationships. Claire and Margot were (in general) less annoying in this book, and tho I personally didn’t want them back together, the way they did it wasn’t horrible.
The… This Series Has a Lot of Things That Maybe Don’t Jive With Me:
I’m SO ANNOYED that we !! Still!! Don’t get any pov from Dominque! What is the deal with this? Truly? We are following three couples, and everyone has a pov part except for her and it makes absolutely no fucking sense!!
Despite Claire/Margot being less annoying than they were in book two, they are still my least fav couple and I’m not rlly rooting for them, sorry y’all.
Margot and Nadia’s vendettas against Marie felt so asinine to me. The way they tried to paint her out as (basically?) a remorseless predator of sorts felt so off. The woman likes sex and doesn’t want relationships; she’s a flirt, and she maybe pushes boundaries that make her kind of an asshole, but the way these two were hung up on it and spoke abt her was absolutely confounding. Nadia is clearly just full of guilt still abt her affair and cheating on Juliette with her, and Margot is just… a jealous bitch I guess? The way they both reacted to Claire sleeping with her was… idk, she is a grown fucking woman who can do whatever she wants! Was it a shitty move to sleep continually with the woman your best friends wife had an affair with? Yeah sure absolutely, and Juliette’s anger was justified, but Nadia and Margot truly annoyed me with theirs.
They also both annoyed with with the bdsm scenes we got (Margot, more so in book two after taking Nadia’s advice abt spanking Claire in her office) and Nadia in book two, (iirc, maybe it was book one, it’s a theme with her) and also in this one, seems to use spanking scenes as… what feel like, to me, some genuine frustration and punishment? In general, the bdsm in this whole series has rubbed me the wrong way since book one where we see Claire and Margot’s first time. Margot is just like, yeah I’m gonna tie you up, and that’s that, then they get kinky. There is never, in any of these books so far, with either of the consistently kinda kinky couples, any discussion of a safe word, boundaries, aftercare, anything. Nadia and Margot both seem like rlly shitty dommes to me. I will admit, some of this is my basis for disliking spanking and pain play stuff in general, it’s just not my thing, but surrounding it if it’s presented in a better way, then i’d be fine with it.
I’m sure there were a few other things, but overall, I did enjoy this one more than book two, and I’m gonna listen to book four with fingers crossed that some of this shit gets resolved—there are ways to write in relationship conflict that don’t involve constant cheating and lying to your partners, ya know, here’s hoping we finally get some of that.
And I SWEAR TO GODS IF WE DONT GET A DOMINIQUE’s POV IN THE NEXT ONE IM GONNA RIOT, What the actual hell!?