Honour Bound (Highland Magic, #2) in SOS: Serious Overload of Series

Sep 12, 2020 Katyana rated it it was ok

Shelves: doormat-heroine, tstl, uf, alpha-hole, book-full-of-stupid-assholes, fantasy, fae, kindle-unlimited

I really do want to like this book - the kind of "Goblet of Fire" stuff going on here was fun, and I like the world the author has created. I want to find out what's behind the mysteries.

But it has a couple serious flaws that I think have killed the series for me.

First, Integrity. I'll be honest: I don't really want to read about a pacifist heroine dealing with people trying to hurt, kill, or in one memorable scene, gang-rape her. She's determined not to fight, not to defend herself, not to hurt I really do want to like this book - the kind of "Goblet of Fire" stuff going on here was fun, and I like the world the author has created. I want to find out what's behind the mysteries.

But it has a couple serious flaws that I think have killed the series for me.

First, Integrity. I'll be honest: I don't really want to read about a pacifist heroine dealing with people trying to hurt, kill, or in one memorable scene, gang-rape her. She's determined not to fight, not to defend herself, not to hurt anyone. There are a couple points where someone trying to hurt her accidentally hurts themselves, and she bends over backwards to help them. I just ... I can't. It makes her a doormat of the very worst kind.

She's dealing with a society that abused her from infancy until age 10, when she ran away. Then manipulated her back in because they needed to use her, but now they want to kick her to the curb again. There's an absolute twat in this series - Tipsania - who was an abusive bully when Tegs was a child and remains one now ... and yet she just takes it. And takes Byron repeatedly telling her that Tipsania isn't so bad, blah blah blah. But I'm not going to get into Byron yet. That's coming.

Anyway. Integrity/Tegs is determined to just eat every bit of shit the Sidhe clans throw in her face. She lets them treat her like utter shit and think the worst of her about everything, and yet she's still constantly helping them. In the games, with that ring (hell would have frozen the fuck over before I gave it to that fucking bitch MacBain after what she said and did), when Byron-the-dickhead (view spoiler). Because she's a "pacifist". Blah blah, she's scheming, but it amounts to a toddler raging at a tornado. In the end, she's getting some attention from society, but she doesn't use that to make public some of the shit they've been pulling. Just keeps rolling with it.

Worst of all, she continues to moon after Byron. I'm sorry, but I loathe him. His head is so far up his own ass that he is clueless about stuff that's so fucking obvious she is figuring it out after just a teeny bit of time being there. Face it, Byron doesn't see it because he doesn't WANT to see it, and I have no patience for that. He's a spoiled, condescending little princeling who likes to pretend that he has all this moral integrity when he's been just as bad as every other Sidhe. He sits on top because of his father's evil, and he doesn't want to see the truth. But he's oh-so-happy to condescend to Tegs about her being a thief, and not really one of them, but he'll bend down and offer her a hand sometimes because look how gracious he is! Fuck him. (view spoiler) But he's not decent, he's a pig.

But she moons after him, has inner monologues about him being better than her, blah blah stupid bullshit.

Also, she doesn't punch him in the throat for acting like he owns her. And that's what he's doing when he snarls about her getting attention from any guy. Meanwhile, he's "engaged"-ish, publicly displaying his relationship with the abusive cunt Tipsania. I'm honestly not even a little impressed by all the fucking around on everyone he does. It underscores his narcissitic entitled bullshit.

I want to know what's behind the mysteries - what happened with her father, what is up with the Fomori, what the prophecy is (though I wince a little about the cliche). But I don't know if I'm going to go on, because I can't even with these two stupid assholes. ...more

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