Have you Met Sally

I just want to start by talking about the hold that Ana Huang’s books have on me?? Insane. Emotional rollercoasters. As a typical fluff reader I never seem to expect some of the dark moments that get put into these books. The casual violence works well, somehow. I’ve genuinely enjoyed diving into her novels because the world is so easy to get into and develop more connections with the characters as they overlap so much.

Anyways, I was really excited for this book. I’ve legit binged the King of Sins series so far as well as the Twisted series (did I read the two series in order of release, no and that kinda threw me off when I realized they were connected but that’s besides the point). Going into this book I was sort of worried because I didn’t see much of a character out of Sloane in the first three novels. Even throughout some of the book she seemed to lack personality by being tagged as cold via character trait for so long. I get the whole New York socialite thing, but it never fails to throw me off a bit, to be honest.

For such a long book, I expected a bit more action to happen. Like many books that exist in the world, the ending felt drawn out and the ending rushed. I expected more to happen in Spain in the beginning? Or even just opening up the characters a bit more. It felt very domestic for a lot of the novel which is fine but for Xavier being a party animal, I expected a bit more chaos. Also for all of the alcohol these people drink, there is no way they all compose themselves so well all the time, right? Or is that just a light-weight me thing? Maybe even Xavier getting involved with more drama during the book. No way he just completely pulled a 180 on his personality and lifestyle after ASSUMING Sloane is into him even though he’s spent how long wanting her? Just my thoughts. I think it would have made it more dramatic to see how much Sloane would actually want to commit to him during these moments. Or people trying to hit on Xavier more since he is shown up to be some guy everyone wants. It makes sense with the party ban they agree to, but I expected to see more of Luca and some of his other party friends more often.

Overall, I did enjoy the book even though it felt sort of drawn out. These books seem to be getting longer and longer and to be honest I do live for it. I spent too much time enjoying how much effort Xavier put into trying for Sloane. Truly an if he wanted to he would moment. I did mention it earlier how I enjoyed how easy it was to get into the series and dive into the world that is built. That’s one of my favourite things about reading and I always find myself thinking a lot about the books I’m reading when I’m not actively reading them. Although this book does not reach the level that the other three books in this series so far do, Sloane and Xavier’s relationship definitely is cute.

Writing this, I really wish I had more good things to say about this book. I rated it a three stars on Goodreads, and the more I think about it the less I enjoyed the little personal bits in the story. Some of the family drama hits home as well as Sloane’s personality as not being able to cry, but at some points they seemed too similar. Unless it just happens to be a coincidence that both of them have mommy and daddy issues. I want to continue to be optimistic that Ana’s next book with be able to redeem this one, especially with the seeming change up in characters not being a part of the same friend group.

xo Sally 🙂