If we all band together we can put the book Silence out of its misery, together

☆☆☆☆☆

(0 stars)

Silence (Hush, Hush #3) by Becca Fitzpatrick.

It’s been two years since I read Crescendo, book two of the Hush, Hush quartet. I’ve gotten through a lot of YA para-ro angel books, it’s kinda my special topic. But Hush Hush is notably the worst. The notion I’ve vaguely seen of it having a resurgence is mind boggling. It’s always been one of the most boring, irritating, hateful, drivel-driving books from the time and holy crow why did I read book three.

Here’s the thing about Silence: it is nothing. It’s over 400 pages, and for about half of that, the main character has amnesia and has forgotten the first two books. The writing is repetitive, the eating-disorder jokes and slut-shaming continues, the love interest is still a creep, and half the action is resolved off screen.

It’s the same as before, such a slump that would have been better suited to being a quarter of a book, even a few chapters. Silence is a pointless endeavour in the Twilight-led compulsion to have a quartet; it is heartless and charmless.

There’s not even any funny jokes to be made really.

Except the sudden bear shapeshifting.

Crescendo built to nothing but my own hatred of this series

☆☆☆☆☆

(0 stars)

When I accidentally began my paranormal romance binge focused on angel books focused on about 2010 era, I did not know how much pain I would be walking into. There were laughs in Sweet Evil, stupidly bad as that was. There were highs in Fallen, which had a couple good ideas. And then there’s Hush, Hush, a series so mindbogglingly bad it does nothing but frustrate and taunt me. There’s barely even humor to be found in the poor writing and horrendous world-building, plot, and characters. It’s just a slop you have to wade through for over 400 pages.

This book features pointless breakups, never seen new antagonists, more confusing angel lore, the world’s longest series of semi-breakups and reunions over the course of non stop, short lived teen parties, even worse girl-hate, slut shaming, and so much more.

Can Hush, Hush please be quiet?

☆☆☆☆☆

(0 stars)

Obviously, I’ve been on an angel reading spree this summer- yet if you’d asked me before to place my bets, I wouldn’t have thought Hush, Hush to be the worst of them all. I’ve been eyeing para-ro angel books since they were first published, but my dislike of the genre has always outweighed my interest in angels- so coming into them now is fairly interesting.

Anyways, Hush is atrociously bad. This is ‘you would not believe’ levels of bad going on here. Folks, we have headscratching angel mythos, smart-as-stone heroines, girl-hate, abusive love interests, and a villain who is one hundred percent correct. Settle on down to this boat of terror and place your arms under the bar- it’s a real doozy.

In a past life, maybe Rapture was an okay standalone novel

★★☆☆☆

(2 stars)

Rapture actually has a lot of things going for it: lovely descriptions, vivid images of international locations, interesting angel lore, neat magical concepts, and a few raised and slightly discussed deeper themes. The problem is that all of these positives are beaten over the head with the fact this is book four, and the final book in a quartet, of an extremely uneven series.

The Fallen quartet is perhaps the most diverse series I’ve read in that every book is decidedly a different genre and story-type to the next, as if the author had a checklist of things she wanted to try and decided to use the same paper thin characters to act each one out.

So, while I enjoyed some aspects of this too-long book, it was always hampered down by the fact it was the last book, and thus needed to provide a conclusion and tie-in to the ones before it. The treasure hunt for ancient angelic relics to solve a mystery about the fall is a fine idea and easily could have been the plot of a different, better novel, which didn’t also have to weave in a whole ton of characters, revelations, and confusing reincarnation gimmicks in as well.