Review: Witches of the Wheel

Witches of the Wheel by Lindsay Merbaum
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

Narrated by Rylie Jackson
Presented by Dreamscape Media

Honestly this was a horrendous, weird lil lesbian orgy from start to finish and I spent most of it waiting for an actual plot of any kind while generally feeling uncomfortable.

Also there's just, like, an unnecessarily high frequency of the word 'butch' and other various stereotype terms. So much cringe.

The story begins with our protagonist copping abuse and being used by her mother, and is generally horrible. Gold tends to go along with it because what else can she do? But this book also has dumb moments like multiple references to 'reading' people (i.e. psychically) and then our main character being like, 'huh? why is she asking about what books I read?' BRUH.

So we're not dealing with a smart book here.

Gold finds herself at an underground lesbian bar, and from there it just gets weirder and nastier while moving no further.

I won't go into details - safe to say it was not my cup of tea.

There didn't seem to be a lot of plot beyond multiple love interests and some weak ideas around powerful goddesses. Honestly? I tuned out a lot because there's so much vulgarity. But most of the book takes place at or around the bar so there's not a lot of variety here at all.

I could forgive the book if it had a strong story, or some powerful women doing impressive things, but this is mediocre people and weak characters being used as an excuse to go into smutty details of sexual debauchery.

Not for me, folks, and not one I can really recommend, though queer readers might appreciate it a little more than I did.

With thanks to NetGalley for an audio ARC

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Review: Monstera

Monstera by Delilah S. Dawson
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Narrated by Laura English
Presented by Tantor Media

Not quite the horror story I was expecting - mostly two lonely girls with secrets pasts getting to know each other.

I was hoping for some creeping vines, plants taking over, some kind of eerie botanical horror, but this really is more about the budding romance between Lucy and Saskia. I didn't mind it, but it wasn't what I came for.

There's some 'horror' in the sleazy landlord and his behaviour, but it's so commonplace for women to experience this that it wasn't horrific so much as a sad fact of womanhood. Beyond that, there's a seed here and there but not much more.

I did enjoy the conclusion, but there wasn't enough substance to the rest of the story to leave me feeling satisfied. I think fans of F/F romance might enjoy this slightly creepier contemporary love story, but horror fans might be disappointed.

With thanks to NetGalley for an audio ARC

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