i had to really stick with this one and let it come to me because at first i just found it confusing, odd and kind of boring. i expected the twists to be predictable. they were not. the book starts out creepy and becomes horrifying and outright bonkers by the end. overall a very weird book (complimentary)

i started off liking this one a lot more than heated rivalry, and then somewhere in the last third or fourth of the book the pacing really started to drag imo. but i felt that the characters were more fleshed out and got to be actual people in this one (especially ilya) and the plot/stakes were more realistic which made me care more about things going well for the characters

ETA [includes spoilers]: i forgot that the whole thing with shane's diet felt very unrealistic to me and kind of took me out of the book. firstly, what pro athlete nutritionist is going to push their clients to not eat carbs??????? the fuck?? i mean i won't say it's never happened, but that's extremely dangerous and irresponsible. carbs are like a super important part of athletic performance and it is literally an athletic nutritionist's job to know that? up until shane mentions his nutritionist i was letting it slide because i'd assumed shane had seen something on tiktok or whatever that made him think he should cut out carbs to stay on top of his game, but then he says his diet was designed by his nutritionist who works with a lot of high-performance athletes which is wildly unbelievable. i actually thought shane's anxiety and need for control being expressed through a crazy restrictive diet could have been a really interesting facet of his character, but it was done in a way that i just could not suspend my disbelief for.