A review by slsj_
The Storyteller by Antonia Michaelis

1.0

This book started out so promising. Although I admit the spell Anna was under with Abel was a bit unbelievable at first. Still, I quickly fell into it. I loved the concept of the story within the story that relates to reality, and I get wanting to know someone's soul despite what they show to everyone else on the outside. It was all good for me until the unforgivable. There is no way to justify what he did to her, and Anna actually going back to him and pretending like everything was okay sends the wrong message to the readers. I don't care how fucked up his background is- what he did was not acceptable no matter how far she pushed at first. It quickly went downhill from there. It got confusing, the 'little queen' story was getting boring and the dark sharp turns the book was taking was not something I expected in a YA novel. There were too many strong issues that were not addressed properly I feel.

I have to admit the writing was beautiful but I was too detached from the characters to fully enjoy that. The plot went from unbearably slow to increasingly fast in the last 30 pages and frankly the only things I will remember from this book is how badly some topics were handled and how much I felt like I needed a therapist after.