A Deal with the Elf King (Married to Magic, #1)

Look at this cover art!

3.5 stars. 19 year old heroine, discovers she's 1 in a million magic and has to marry the elf king to keep the world from destruction. Elf king is grumpy, she's stubborn. She wants out of this 3000 year old contract between elves and humans, but also attracted to this jerk elf.

Pretty good story, but there heroine is too dumb to live sometimes. I'd read more books in the series.

so this is the book i chose to get me out of my reading slump and although i did finish it, it really wasn’t all that impressive to me.

i haven’t read a romance novel in forever and i’m also completely new to elise’s writing (although the air awakens series has been on my TBR since forever!!) that said, i thought the writing wasn’t fantastic and in some places, the dialogue felt clunky and juvenile. also they made such a big deal about luella’s true name in the beginning and then it’s never mentioned again lol. the world building is mediocre at best - i would have loved to see more of quinnar and the fae realms! i also thought that the side characters like willow and rinni were too flat and one-dimensional.

and the romance, dear god, the romance. i don’t know about you but arghhhhh i skipped the entire cottage scene bc it just felt like poorly written smut you find on wattpad. it’s great that luella and eldras don’t fall in insta-love but SHE WAS ALREADY LOWKEY ATTRACTED TO HIM WHEN HE CAME TO KIDNAP HER UGHHHHH I CANT DEAL WITH THIS. i was expecting more angst and for eldras to be more closed off and mean (ok sue me, but i love that trope). also, the way she fell out of love with luke so quickly???? like ok, yeah he’s a piece of sht but wasn’t she pining for him since she was twelve???

i guess the good points in this book is luella - she’s smart and brave and i love that she is compassionate. plus, she genuinely cares about her patients and she’s so sassy. but other than that, i would say this had a lot going for it but failed to deliver.

Great love story. Enemy to loves. Persephone and hades vibes but it’s own story. Moderately spicy, good steam.

I'm gonna give this 3.8 out of 5. Good writing, interesting storyline, and magical world building. I do think the world was just okay, and the characters were alright. The plot mostly follows the relationship between the main characters. There is very little action or fight scenes.

This was pretty much what I expected. Light, romantic, straightforward. Some of the scenes were lovely, others had me rolling my eyes and skimming. It was good for passing the time, though, and a fun enough read.

3.5⭐️

Loved this fast paced standalone book.

Luella's a new favourite. Smart, headstrong, her sense of duty above her own feelings reached me. Was a wonderful story to read. With the unravelling story and putting the puzzle pieces together I was hooked and just had to reach the end.

Can not wait for more in this World.