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YA STANDALONE REVIEWS

REVIEW FOR HEARTLESS BY MARISSA MEYER

4/10/2021

12 Comments

 
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Note: This review is spoiler free (spoilers are all marked and have warnings)!
Book: Heartless
Author: Marissa Meyer
Genre: Fantasy
Age: For readers 12 and up 
Rating: 3/5 Stars

This book started off SO WELL! Unfortunately what pulled me in initially didn’t carry onto the rest of the story. Still, this book wasn’t horrible and I didn’t feel like chucking it at the wall at any point in the story, so I consider that a success. However, considering the fact that the central plot of this book is romance, and it is written by Marissa Meyer (who is a great writer but isn’t that good at writing romance in my opinion), there are obvious reasons why this book fell flat. 

What I didn’t like: 


  1. Catherine: Oh this girl BOILED MY BLOOD. This book should have been titled: “A Whiny Girl Complains”, because that is all she does in this story. (I can see how this is ironic since I'm also a whiny girl who complains about every single book I read on this blog hehe but let's ignore that). Catherine literally just complains in her room all day instead of actively doing anything about her situation. She never defends herself at all and just listens while the people around her insulted her. I can’t believe the King chose to marry Catherine out of everyone. What did he even see in her? And that’s another thing, Catherine was a little rude towards the King. He seemed like a nice enough guy and so the best line of action she should have taken was to tell him in private how she didn’t have feelings for him. Her main issue was disappointing her parents, so she should have talked to the King privately and see if he could call it off without letting the parent’s know it was her idea. But then again... if that happened there would be no story at all. 
Overall, Catherine got on my nerves. I just don’t understand how she went from being very sweet to having severe anger management issues at the end? Especially in the way she treated Mary Ann- it just seemed very sudden when she blamed her for something out of her control (Spoiler: How DARE Catherine prioritize Jest over Mary Ann and be like “Mary Ann should have died and I would have let her be gobbled by the beast if only Jest was alive”. GIRL, Mary Ann has been there for you since you were born. Jest has known you for all of a month or so. And why would you ever wish somebody dead? That too, your best friend?)

Sigh. Why couldn’t the Jabberwock have just eaten Catherine?

2. Catherine and Jest: *YAWN* Ok so you’re meaning to tell me that these two met in the King’s garden and then looked at each other and the first thing that came to their minds was: “I’m in loveeee!”? Catherine at least had some dreams about him so she was curious as to who he was which is more understandable, but why did Jest suddenly fall in love with her after seeing her once? He literally said: “I have wanted to kiss you since I saw you in the King’s gardens”. As a passionate member of the Insta-Love Hate Group, this made me so boreddd when reading about their relationship. I can’t ship them if I don’t understand why they like each other and if I see no chemistry. 
In a book of 400+ pages, they basically met like 5 times in the whole story and we’re supposed to treat them like Romeo and Juliet? Ok that was a bad comparison since Romeo and Juliet suck too and have no chemistry, but you know what I mean. With this forbidden love trope, where was the angst? The passion? 

3. The Ending (SPOILERS SKIP THIS PARAGRAPH): Was the ending supposed to be shocking? First of all I knew from the time that Catherine went to get a pumpkin that Peter was hiding the Jabberwock. Did I know that his wife was the Jabberwock? No. But when I read that Catherine heard scratching noises on the farm and Peter was keeping a huge pumpkin, it was obvious he was hiding the Jabberwock and the pumpkin was probably food (it turned out to be a cage). Then Catherine literally sees a chewed hat belonging to one of the Jabberwock’s victims and she makes no connection. She was like: “Huh a chewed up hat from the person who was eaten last night by the Jabberwock on Peter’s farm? Yah that’s not suspicious at all…”. Plus if any reader paid attention, they would notice how at every event the Jabberwock attacked, there was always pumpkins. At the King’s black and white party there were pumpkins, at the baking contest when Catherine brought pumpkin pie (that’s when the Jabberwock attacked) and at the movie theater, when Peter’s wife brought pumpkin pie. And who sells pumpkins?! PETER. How did no one make this very obvious connection? 
Then there is the fact that Jest’s death is literally written in the book a hundred pages before it happens, so least to say, it was very predictable. Come on, if three weird old sisters give you a prophecy that you’re going to die, then you better be making funeral preparations because they’re telling the truth. Still, I thought I would feel some remorse at his death. Nothing. I think the most I felt was a yawn coming. I didn’t even like Jest anyways. He was such a flat and bland character. 

What I did like:


  1. The Setting: I really felt like I was sitting in Wonderland because of all the characters, the way Marissa Meyer described the setting  and events. I just LOVED the atmosphere. Maybe that's why I’m not giving this book a very low rating? It certainly is a huge factor. I would suggest reading a short version of Alice in Wonderland before reading this book. Otherwise, you would miss on a lot of references on characters, quotes and setting.
  2. The Food: Warning: Do not read this book when you’re hungry. I made that mistake and was searching through my kitchen for anything sugary every two seconds. The descriptions of the food made my stomach grumble from time to time! I love Catherine’s baking because I felt like I could smell the desserts throughout the book!


Overall, I’d say this book isn’t too bad but it can get tedious at some points. But it’s a quick enough read, and it does bring Wonderland magic, so it might be worth a shot!

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Read my Spoiler Free Review for "The Shadows Between Us"
Click Here to Read my ACOSF Review
12 Comments
Selma Dweik
4/17/2021 02:35:18 pm

I love your review, it made me laugh. All your criticisms are completely valid and I can see truth in them all. I personally quite liked Heartless a lot, it really impressed me. I gave the book 5 stars and I’m not someone who gives high ratings very often, it was just really enjoyable to me. The characters, the dialogue, and just the writing in general were all so entertaining. But, I do hold some criticisms myself, I absolutely loathe insta love, I completely agree with you on that, Jest and Cath felt way too fast for my taste. (SPOILER WARNING) and YES Jest’s death was SO underwhelming, I wish it was more emotional and less sudden. Also, the plot was incredibly predictable, totally agree, it was kind of tedious and frustrating in that regard. But, I still feel it deserves 5 stars (I may be biased though since I love Marissa Meyer lol). Anyway, your review was super fun to read. Thank you for sharing your thoughts <3

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Peachy Place (Creator)
4/18/2021 09:14:16 am

Omg thank you so much! It makes me SO happy to hear you liked my review! That’s ok if you gave it five stars! I completely see why! The story was quite enjoyable and Marissa Meyer is a great writer (I love the Lunar Chronicles 😁)! YES totally agree with what you said about the Insta love trope!

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Asmr Bookworm
4/18/2021 10:15:11 am

Omg! Loved this review, I agree with a lot of this as well. “Why couldn’t the jabberwock just have eaten Catherine” 😂 love it

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Peachy Place (Creator)
4/18/2021 05:43:19 pm

THANK YOU! It makes me so happy to hear you liked my review!! HAHA YES!! The book would have been less complicated if the jabberowck had just eaten Catherine 😌😂

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Joke
4/24/2021 05:52:18 am

Lovely review! I completely understand all the points you made. I personally gave this book 4 stars, but now it's been a few weeks since I read it and I think that might have been a too generous rating. A lot of problems could have been solved if Cath just talked instead of making stupid descicions. It also took me a really long time to read this book and at the time I thought it was because of a slump, but now I'm starting to think it had more to do with the book and it's characters. I did like Cath and Jest together, but like you said it also bothered me that it was insta-love, and Jest had no good reason to even love Cath...

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Peachy Place (Creator)
4/24/2021 10:07:35 am

Thank you so much! That’s fine if we have a difference of ratings. Everybody likes books in difference ways! YES, Cath’s decisions did annoy me most of the time and I agree with you about the insta love! Not a fan of that trope!

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Lari
4/26/2021 09:21:59 am

You did such a good job of analyzing every element of this book, I think your ratings were totally fair! I also love the calculation chart, I’ve never seen that before! I think I totally agree with the book being tedious and not all that shocking, I’m biased because I love Marissa Meyer but I completely understand that viewpoint.

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Bookconfessionssecrets (Creator)
4/27/2021 08:23:27 am

Thank you so so much!! That means a lot :)
I got the idea for a calculation chart a few months ago and now incorporate them in every review! Glad you like it! Also, it is perfectly fine to love this book because it is THE Marissa Meyer writing it! It is totally fine to be biased to Marissa Meyer lol! She is amazing!

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Nicole
4/30/2021 12:30:07 pm

Omg we really had completely different views on the book!😂 i loved your review, i do agree with you on some points. However, i think the thing that made Catherine go mad was because of Mary Ann betraying her. She was the only one she trusted and basically planned her whole life with. With Mary Ann betraying her and the love of her life literally being killed in front of her eyes, those factors made her mad. I do agree to some degree that Catherine’s anger management issues came out of nowhere. Also, Catherine does whine a lot!😂😂 i want to reread the book to see if i can pinpoint other places where i can see Catherine having anger management issues.

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Bookconfessionssecrets (Creator)
4/30/2021 02:05:55 pm

That’s ok if we have different perspectives! I totally get why you loved this book because it had such an addicting setting and feel to it! That’s true! Yah I kind of get the Mary Ann thing and her going mad over Jesper. It really is enough trauma to make anyone go mad. Thanks for sharing your thoughts!

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Imzy
8/30/2021 10:47:27 am

Okay, I understand why you didn't like it 😂 Alot of stuff didn't make sense but I loved the book because Marissa Meyer's writing is so good and the vibes and feels I got from the book were everything.

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Bookconfessionssecrets (Creator)
8/31/2021 06:45:24 pm

Totally fine if you like the book! I agree that Marissa Meyer’s writing is amazing! It’s why I kept reading Heartless even when the story didn’t entice me. And you’re right! The vibes of the book was also really nice!

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