House of Marionne by J. Elle

e-Audio, 14:13:32
Narrated by: André Santana & Kate Simses
Release Date: August 29, 2023
Published by: Books on Tape
Read from: August 19-21, 2023
Stand-alone
Source: PRH App (I received an early e-Audio copy of this book from the publisher’s app. This did nothing to influence my review.)
TW: Blood, Murder, Death, Violence, Emotional Abuse, Genocide, Classism
For Readers Interested In: Romance, Fantasy, Magic, Dark Academia, Magic School, YA

     Rich is the blood of the chosen
     17 year-old Quell has lived her entire life on the run. She and her mother have fled from city to city, in order to hide the deadly magic that flows through Quell’s veins.
     Until someone discovers her dark secret.
     To hide from the assassin hunting her, and keep her mother out of harm’s way, Quell reluctantly inducts into a debutante society of magical social elites called the Order that she never knew existed. If she can pass their three rites of membership, mastering their proper form of magic, she’ll be able to secretly bury her forbidden magic forever.
     If caught, she will be killed.
     But becoming the perfect debutante is a lot harder than Quell imagined, especially when there’s more than tutoring happening with Jordan, her brooding mentor and— assassin in training.
     When Quell uncovers the deadly lengths the Order will go to defend its wealth and power, she’s forced to choose: embrace the dark magic she’s been running from her entire life or risk losing everything, and everyone, she’s grown to love.
     Still, she fears the most formidable monster she’ll have to face is the one inside.

*MY THOUGHTS*

I can say with absolute certainty you will either really love this or you’ll really not. If you’re looking for a fantasy story with some romance, you won’t find it. If you’re looking for a romance with some fantasy elements like magic, a magic school, tiaras growing out of people’s heads, etc, that’s what you’ll find. It’s really what you were looking for in it. And good thing for me, I got all that I wanted from it.

I’m not really a fantasy girlie, so the fact that this felt like fantasy light was really good for me. I say “fantasy lite” because there was no world-building. The crown growing out of people’s heads and masks growing out of their faces was uber cool, and all the houses and stuff was uber cool as well, but it just wasn’t in the story. Like I kid you not, it was in like an appendix at the end. That bothered me because why not add it into the story? After the story says The End I usually stop listening. And idk, I think it should have been it’s own novella to read before reading this one instead of this one first? Idk it just bothered me a little because I didn’t know why these schools were there, what they did, and all that. There’s explanations before and after the book, but if you’re anything like me and don’t read that, you were just as confused as me.

The romance part of course I loved. I’m not a fan of enemies to lovers, but this one wasn’t quite that but it also was? I don’t know how to explain what they were. They really disliked the other, but they also were really like flirty. And then the dance scene came and I (and also them) had hearts in my eyes. That scene was when I started liking the idea of them together. Before that I had him pegged as the assassin and I didn’t want to like him at all. And she was doing good…. Until her dark magic showed up…..

The second book is supposed to be more about her dark magic and her learning about it and using it more. I’m excited for it because that ending was like WTF. I’m not even gon hold you, I had to listen to that ending like 4 times to make sure I heard what I thought I did. I can honestly say I was not expecting that ending. I wasn’t sure if that was the direction she was going the whole time writing this or if she was like oh I’m just going to put this here and eff them up. And well J. Elle, you got me.

The narrators were really good too. It was full of emotion too! I remember I was listening to one part and Quell was mad and my husband even stopped to see what I was listening to. It is RARE that he can hear me listening to an audiobook and ask me “what’s that one about?” He normally doesn’t care, so this was new to me.

This won’t be a favorite for everyone, but for me it was definitely a winner. I can’t wait to see when they next one comes out. I’m going to need more info on literally everyone as soon as I can get it too. Because after that ending I can’t imagine that any of them are ok.

Overall, I give this