DNF @ 80%

I was intrigued by the concept of this book, but it did not live up in any respect. I really was interested in reading about a witch-based matriarchal society, but this novel failed in basically every way that matters. 

1. The writing is incomprehensible. For most of this book, I had almost zero clue of what was going on, where these characters were, how long they had been there, what the power structure in this world is, who has what powers and why, etc. The world building is impossible to grasp with any sort of certainty. Witches can die, but they aren't really dead-dead, they just take on a different form of themselves? They can be demon-dead, but that is never really explained.
2. This world is supposed to be a matriarchal society, where female witches are at the heart of all magic and males are born with, essentially, an innate desire to serve worthy females. Instead, we got a society where all magically-gifted men have been enslaved into sexual slavery (which includes constant rapings and physical/psychological torture), even going so far as to be castrated for the female witch's entertainment. This isn't a society based around women, it's a society based around sexual sadism. It's very unclear to me why, if this matriachal society was relatively peaceful before, why would the witches decide to enslave the men? The men were already subservient and it's inherent in their natures to want to serve the women? there's literally no reason to enslave them??  It felt like a cheap writing technique the author used to justify why the women witches are the bad guys in this matriarchal society. 
3. Even though the text explicitly states that women are at the heart of magic, every single woman in this story is weaker than the main male characters (very cleverly (/s) named Saetan, Daemon, and Lucivar) except for the child chosen-one Witch, Jaenelle. 
4. The magic ranking system (using stones to represent levels of power) is dumb as fuck. Every one of the main characters is gray or black (the two strongest levels out of like ~15 different gems), which skews the power levels of everyone in the story.  There are only two grays and only three blacks in this world and *all* of them are named characters that participate in the story. Not a single page goes by without one of these supposedly very rare people popping up on page. 
5. The characterization is just awful. All three of the male main characters are essentially indistinguishable from one another in terms of personality. Aside from being told that Daemon is the cold one, and Lucivar is like summer, and Saetan is old and wise, they all have basically the exact same personality and characterization. 
6. I was interested in the idea of an all-powerful FMC having to learn how to control her uncontrollable power from a young age, but Jaenelle doesn't get any POV chapters in this book (her story is told completely from the mens' perspectives) and she basically can do anything she wants whenever she wants. 
7. This book has the harshest undertones of pedophilia that I've read in any fiction book. It's not subtle at all. And it's not some bad guy being a pedophile; it's literally most of the characters in the book, including the main male characters we are supposed to be rooting for, that straight up have pedophilia.  Daemon's cousin is a proud child rapist who takes pleasure in "breaking" his victims and justifying it because the women of this world are such horrible slave masters. Daemon straight up is creeping on Jaenelle for the last half of this book. He has sexual thoughts about her (keep in mind, she starts this book at like age 6 and ends it at age 12!!!) and repeatedly thinks about how he will have her in his bed as soon as she's "old enough". He justifies that this is okay because he physically cannot get hard (due to his enslavement cock ring, the obedience ring), therefore he's not a pedophile. Yet the book hints at him getting hard when he brushes by Jaenelle and they have skin contact, or when he lifts her to sit in his lap! It is beyond gross! And Daemon is the character with the most POV chapters, next to Saetan, so we spend a ton of time in his head with his gross pedophile thoughts.

I just can't finish this book.  I wanted a dark, creepy, matriarchal witch society and I did not get that at all.  Instead I got a 1500 year old pedophile lusting after a 12 year old girl, meandering prose, incomprehensible worldbuilding, a plot that moves at a snail's pace, and a violent slave society masquerading as a matriarchy.

This is, hands down, my favorite series of books. The characters are realistically flawed in their own ways, but portrayed in a way that their flaws serve as strengths as much as weaknesses. The world-building is top-notch, and the stories that link together the still-growing series is captivating.

This book is giant sick pedo fest. I can't rate it. I don't know what to rate it on. 

I'd goosebumps reading half of the time and the other half I can't even go through a sentence. 

I want everyone in this book to just drop dead except for the sweet, sweet Jenelle and all those innocent children. 

I wish every sick fuck die a horrible death in the next book.


╰➝ 3rd person pov
╰➝ Poorly constructed world 
╰➝ No time set/  language set
╰➝ Pedophilia, Rape, Slavery

CANNOT in good consciousness rate this anything higher than 1 star. Dont read this 💔

Book crossed the line of pedophilia and called it “testing womanhood”. Absolutely not.

I don't give a shit, page 10 and reading, I'm hooked!
Too much on the sex part but masterly woven regarding as I am not an adept of the genre.
Merde, the action was mildly entertaining.