3.5

I recommend this for anyone looking for:
- Enemies to lovers
- A good dose of angst
- Middle-Eastern fantasy
- A sassy protagonist done well

I wish I liked this a little more than I did. I grew to like the romance (me? like romance? who am i becoming??) and overall enjoyed my time. There was a lot of other stuff going on that I didn't really find engaging, but Shahrzad and Khalid's story was pretty compelling. My biggest gripe was with the writing style, but I think a large part of it is probably personal preference. I generally don't like too much description especially of the setting and the author has this weird fixation on describing eyes and their colour repeatedly throughout.

I think in general the book really picks up a bit over a third of the way through and it's pretty quick to get through. Some of the aspects I was more hesitant about, I came around to by the end. I will say that the very end of the book was a little messy and maybe even a tad rushed, but oh well. Not a favourite, but I'm at least considering reading the sequel