Elaine White's Life in Books

The POV for this story kind of confused me. It began in a storytelling way that didn't make the POV clear until well into the first scene, when I realised it was Titania giving her view of Puck. This is the only time in the entire trilogy that she ever has her POV shown. Later, the POV drifted to dual POV, between Puck and Oberon, while allowing touches of omni-present to enter within brackets. This jarred the reading and made it awkward to follow at times.

I found the beginning confusing. It felt like I'd been thrown into a story well after it began and I was scrambling to catch up.

The MF sex, thankfully, is barely mentioned. However, I do want to point out that the entire trilogy centres around the fact that Oberon is cheating on his wife – however much I was constantly reminded they hate each other and it's a political marriage – with Puck. It lends a twitchiness to my enjoyment of the story, because I hate cheating and there was never any intention to break the marriage.

There is no transition of time or scene between chapters. Chapter 2 ended with Oberon and Puck getting frisky, then I entered Chapter 3 completely disorientated as Oberon was beating Puck for something that wasn't explained until halfway down the page, in a separate scene.

This, unfortunately, was another problem I had with the story. The flagrant call to violence between the pair was brutal and often an overreaction, but it was smoothed away by the author countless times throughout the trilogy as being “normal” for fairies.

The story is predominantly sex, without any show at a plot other than Puck and Oberon progressing towards a Dom/sub lifestyle.

There is also a reference to “Dear William” - William Shakespeare – and how Puck bribed him into writing A Midsummer Night's Dream. It's a little chessy, but I didn't mind it so much.

Unfortunately, for me, the story was nothing more than indulgent sex with no purpose. I prefer some plot with my hot and I didn't get that here. I gave it 3 stars for the fact that I loved Puck and his charm, his flair and his feistiness, but I never really took to Oberon and I was overall left disappointed.

Favourite Quote

“Was he not Puck, renowned for his guile? Had he not told himself, in no uncertain terms, that Oberon was a means to an end, a useful, powerful fool, of the sort he was accustomed to playing with? But how could he have known that Oberon would have a gentle heart, and that he'd let Puck wrap his devious little fingers around it so readily?”