It was disappointing to see how a character trait that could have potentially resulted in a meaningful and eye-opening conversation between characters was just snipped halfway through the story and tossed aside.

What happened to Helen? There was a lot of foreshadowing about her and her involvement with Triad. And then nothing? Who did she meet at the sex club? Where did she go? What was the point of her involvement with Triad? How did her involvement add anything to the plot? Someone tell me about Helen! I really loved the first two books in these series. The world building and mixing of old with new is an intriguing concept. However I had a few beefs with this book surrounding plot: I did find Hades to be sidelined quite a bit throughout this—and the romance between the two has been pretty stagnant since the end of the first book. The sex scenes between them aren’t any different than what we see in the previous two books, and now read as repetitive and bland. Scarlett does try to spice it up a bit here and there, but I didn’t sense any thrill in the characters or the writing during these moments, which left them reading as dull. At the end of the second book, Persephone is sexually assaulted by a character named Pirithous, and is almost raped, before Hades shows up to rescue her. During this book, it's frequently said that she has nightmares of her traumatic experience.Now, do I appreciate the semblance of spice this chapter brought to one of the blandest books I've ever read? Absolutely. Do I think that it was completely necessary, however? Absolutely not, and the only reason I say that is because there's a side-series that goes with these books, and is basically just the whole story being told over again from Hades' perspective. If you're listening to these for the plot just go to chapter 30 and listen from there because the other 29 chapters are just sex

Scarlett St. Clair is a horror, paranormal, and young adult novelist from Oklahoma best known for the “Hades & Persephone” series of novels. As a teenager, St. Clair went to the University of Oklahoma, where she graduated with an undergraduate degree in English Writing. She also has a masters in Information Services and Library Science from the same institution. St Clair has always been obsessed with the after life, Greek mythology, love stories and murder mysteries. As such it was not surprising that she made her debut with Greek retelling work “When Stars Come Out” that she published in 2018. She has since then gone on to publish several other bestselling works in different genres. As for her influences, she has cited “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy which is the inspiration for her settings in her Greek mythology retellings. As for authors, some of her favorites include Sarah MacLean, Tessa Dare and Leigh Bardugo. Hades decides to bring in Hypnos, the god of sleep, to see if he can create a draught that can help Persephone sleep. After speaking with her, however, Hypnos only comes to the conclusion that Persephone needs to confront her experience if she wishes for the nightmares to go away. My biggest problem with the writing seems to be how certain parts read like they were never edited??? I'm not going to include any direct quotes to spare all of you, but I genuinely think that some passages sorely needed to be proofread.Unfortunately for us, character development takes even less precedence in this book than the plot does, which is well and truly saying something. While I used to find Persephone whiney and downright exasperating, I'm glad to say that I no longer hold those types of feelings for her. During the Quest to build the Ruinous Effigy, a transmission excerpt from Eris states that the Touch of Malice was used as a blueprint for the Ruinous Effigy. She comments that, while the Touch of Malice was "crude, vicious", the Ruinous Effigy "is a thing of beauty". To be honest, I think part of this is my own fault here. I started this series knowing that it was going to be pretty trashy, but at least in the beginning, it was enjoyable trash. The first book, in particular, wasn't very plot-based, and instead placed some emphasis on Persephone and Hades' relationship. The second book similarly so. She was a wARRIOR IN CHARGE OF PROTECTING PERSEPHONE??? SHE'S LITERALLY HANDLED WORSE BEFORE??? IN WHAT UNIVERSE COULD SHE JUST DROP DEAD??? NOT TO MENTION THE FACT THAT SHE'S A PRETTY IMPORTANT CHARACTER AND PROBABLY DESERVED BETTER???

Here am I, with the power to craft from my enemy's darkest secrets a weapon that could wound them at their core! It didn't really matter to me if the conflict was even resolved in this book, just as long as we got some answers. That being said, there were some silver linings: ✧ Hecate: She's honestly my favorite character, even if she was sidelined during the book.As you might already know, A Touch of Ruin, the second book in this series, ended on a serious cliffhanger: just as Hades proposes marriage to Persephone, Demeter screws with the weather, making it start to snow, bringing about the promise of war.