Darling Venom: An Enemies-to-Lovers Romance

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Darling Venom is a book I didn’t know that I needed. It’s a true masterpiece from beginning to end. It's heavy and intense, I wouldn’t change one iota. This book will forever have a special place in my heart. It’s my top read of 2021. No matter what I write in my review, I hope to do this book some justice. So here it goes, and I may be all over the place. PS: Will never understand the cover choices of some authors. The tumblr boy on the cover had me expecting a raunchy age-gap romance, not a full on cry fest☠

I like how the grief was handled in this book on Tate’s side. There was so much regret and self hate that I rlly felt bad for him. So many miscommunication and missed opportunities between these brothers. Tate only wanted the best for Kellan and protect him from his dad, but showed it in the worse way and their relationship is the true tragedy of Darling Venom. But before I combust and write something really mean (don't even get me started on another Kellan's book and his dadda's plagiarism 🌚), let's just discuss the whole "revelation" plotline that made exactly zero sense. *sighs deeply in Spanish/English/Russian and even Italian (yes, I'm making progress with my Italian, btw, thanks for not asking)* not to sound oxymoronic)THE LOVE STORY BETWEEN CHARLOTTE AND HER DEAD EMO (BOY)FRIEND'S OLDER BROTHER TATE✨ the story before the big revelation about Kellan's suicide letter and manuscript (if he were real he'd bitch slap me from Hell for not saying "final letter" instead).He ran up to Charlie to give her an umbrella so her stupid ass doesn’t get pneumonia because of the rain. (He should have let her walk away so she could learn her lesson) In most cases, I despise heroines who act clingy, a bit too desperate and do most of the pulling. Yet, this book became a nice exception for me because Charlotte wasn't the only one who had left the last shred of her dignity on Tate's door threshold.

yes, i know i sound like a broken record but i did love each and every character in this book. tate was suffering. a young man himself when his good for nothing dead beat, alcoholic father dumped his teenage son on a fresh out of med school tate, so he could run off with his too-young gold-digging girlfriend. struggling with balancing his job and a rebellious brother who he struggled to connect with, kellan's death affected him so much, that tate never forgave himself. I absolutely completely loved this book. It had me on a complete emotional rollercoaster. I loved all the characters literally (aside from the characters at Kellen and Charlotte's school but they're not in a big chunk of this story so it's fine) even the ones you think you'll hate in the beginning by the end of the book you love them, flaws and everything. I literally could not stop reading this since I started it aside from the necessary things like eating. Charlie and Kellan’s friendship was suppose to be impactful and therefore made such a impact on Charlie when he committed suicide, but I thought it wasn’t well executed, since Kellan and Charlie only meet once a year on that rooftop, where both of them wanted to commit suicide, and they only meet a handful of times and it was all shown through time-jumps. It made me feel impossible to connect to these characters and their supposedly amazing friendship This book is more of a 4.5 star read, but I’m giving it more because it’s put me in a reading/reviewing slump and I can’t remember the last time I was in one.

Publication Order of The Five Syndicates Books

Maybe if Bastiano knew who she was, he would’ve just stayed away. He would’ve stayed loyal to his family, his life, his duty. But he didn’t. So he fell in love with Ariana De Luca. The help. A De Luca. A woman that is as talented a spy as she is in bed. A twisted beautiful traitor with a tongue that’s sharper than whips. She is the daughter of the mafia boss for the De Luca crime syndicate. And he’s Romano royalty.