Status Updates From If I Stopped Haunting You

"...she reached between them with one hand and gripped the outline pressing against his pants.

'Is this for me?'

'Only for you,' he bit out."

Corny

I need more clarification. What about Neil's Native characters makes them "palatable" to white readers, and what about Pen's Native characters makes them so threatening to white folks? Neil writes horror for Pete's sake, so how accurate is that supposed to be about anyone? Pen and Neil keep bickering about representation, but the details are so lacking that these arguments are happening in a vacuum for me.

"The imagery of all the other vulgar things her tongue could do instead made his cock hard."

A guy falling for the woman that physically hurt him. This truly is a horror novel...

Is he gaslighting himself?? 😬😬

"Just like every fucking reader who decided that one skirmish was enough to cancel me and ruin my life."

Skirmish??? He was bleeding 😬😬😬

I might end up DNF'ing this. The writing is clunky, there's no believable tension between the lead characters since they're just drooling over each other all the time, and there are weird plot elements like "the castle rented for cheap because it's haunted" -- wouldn't a lot of people pay MORE to stay in a place rumoured to be haunted? This would be more fun if I weren't wanting to edit every other sentence.

"Whether or not he deserved to be put in his place, Penelope Skinner suddenly wished he'd be the person she knew he could be. Be the young, excited author he'd been once upon a time. The one she'd look up to. The one who'd been her hero.

But that Neil Storm was gone. And this echo of that boy she'd once admired was left in his place. And it was all her fault."

Yikes 😬😬😬

"Sliding her left foot behind her, she turned and chucked her book at the cocky bastard. She watched gleefully as it smacked in to the side of his temple. Then he flew out of his chair, yelling obscenities. There was a twinge of guilt in her gut as she watched blood trickle down the side of his face."

The vibes are so off 😬😬😬