I finished Speak by Ruby M. Darling yesterday. Wow, what a hot mess and I do mean that as a compliment, mostly. This is a dark academia why-choose romance that deals with trauma, healing and mental health representation among other things. It's also downright unhinged and the writing left something to be desired. Despite all the grammar errors, syntax flaws and the non-existent plot in between all the gratuitous sex scenes in the first half of the book, once the three relationships get established the book really pulls itself together and I genuinely enjoyed it. I'm already 10% through the second book, Stutter, now. The main character, Raven, goes to Rayne-Moore university in Massachusetts. She is brutally attacked and left for dead stuffed inside a locker. She spends the next couple of years in an asylum being treated by Dr. Damon Archer. The attack left her mute. Dr. Archer believes her voice may come back if she finds herself in the correct environment again. Raven has made enough progress that she's able to leave the institution and she decides to go back to Rayne-Moore to get answers. Dr. Archer, who has become obsessed with her, leaves his job and gets one at Rayne-Moore to keep following her progress. When she gets to RMU she meets Jonas one of the star football players and one of the professors Maverick Harrington, former FBI agent turned history professor. All the students at RMU are filthy rich elites, including Raven. She immediately begins searching for answers to why she was attacked that night and starts discovering a secret society that goes much deeper than just RMU, she also winds up in a relationship with Jonas, then also Damon and eventually Maverick as well. I would define this book as true smut. The plot was hanging on for dear life in the first half of this book. There were some pretty glaring things I got hung up on here and there and as I said the grammar errors are quite immense. It's mostly missing words, or inappropriate similar words in sentences. I can usually gloss over minor errors, but these were a significant amount, at least one on each page. It could use some serious professional editing. I can't say the second book is any better so far either. All that being said, I still enjoyed this book, in some twisted way. Not sure what that says about me exactly, but I'm not going to dwell. Being a mood reader, I was falling out with the book I was reading. I like Hunted in the Shadows, don't get me wrong, but its proving to be a sloooooow slow burn and there has been no spice what so ever. I may have overcorrected a little with Speak, but it scratched whatever itch my brain had at the time. I will be going back to Hunted in the Shadows eventually.
In other reading news I got physical copies of the Ever Seas trilogy for Christmas. So I now own The Ever King, The Ever Queen and The Mist Thief. I plan to read these three once I finish Stutter. I believe there is a third book in this series but I'm not sure if its out yet. If it is I'll probably read it then move onto the Ever Seas. I'm going to do a big 2025 reading wrap up here soon. All the Bookstagram influencers are doing them and I want to as well. Goodreads also did a personalized graphic reading wrap up so I'll be sharing some of that and my Storygraph December wrap up as well. Stay tuned.
-Q
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