Breakup from Hell was absolutely fantastical! Cardinal wrote a story that was so well written I found myself flying through the pages, unable to put the book down, pondering what would happen next. My favorite piece of this entire story was how believable the characters were.

The writing is clear and clean, and very immersive. The book hums along at a good clip, but the pacing makes sure we're given time to breathe between plot-intensifying moments. The story was absolutely engaging and the work that went into the settings was noticeable and superb. I felt absolutely transported and I'm so incredibly glad I was able to read an arc of this story.

2/5

Thank you to the HarperCollins Teen and Netgalley for the access to the ARC in exchange for an honest review. This book was marketed with an emphasis on the relatio ship aspect between our MC (Mica) and the son of Satan, but I feel like this was a flaw in marketing as the book is more about the actual action.

I don't think this is a bad book, but it seems to suffer from not quite knowing where it falls in terms of audience. Due to the themes and age of the characters I assume it's meant for older teens, but the tropes and general lack of theme reads much more like middle grade. I have probably read more middle grade books with stronger messages than this.

As the book is very plot-centric, we unfortunately don't get much organic development of our characters or their relationships with each other. Everything feels very surface level which only meant the romance (that this marketed) fell that much flatter.

I thought it was curious that the author decided to make them very explicitly Catholic. I'm not sure her intentions, but it reads like a statement that Catholicism is THE Christianity. I found it more interesting than anything and would love to know if there was any reasoning behind that. However otherwise, due to misguided marketing and, lacking sense of self for the book's intended audience, and simply not enough time for the characters to develop anything, this book just wasn't for me. However, I do think it could be an extremely entertaining read for someone looking for a simple adventure with secret powers, a dash of forbidden romance, and some Christian mythology.

CW: death of loved one (moderate), gore (M), gaslightinggaslighting

This is fast pacing, entertaining, enjoyable paranormal romance you may finish in one sitting! The characterization is good! The love story is insta and pacing needs a little balance but overall: just like its strikingly beautiful cover, it's worth to dive into and enjoy the full wild ride!

“I’ve broken up with boys before, but none of them made my root beer boil and tried to kill me with a flying stool top”

Ann Dávila Cardinal has one aim- to give her target audience a full rollicking ride and she largely succeeds. Breakup from Hell is not your once in a lifetime book and it doesn’t pretend to be either. This is YA fantasy which seemingly goes on a Twilight path only to swerve and move into supernatural territory.

The protagonist Mica has her life in and around a small town Vermont with friends and grandma. Feeling suffocated, she secretly applies to UCLA but things take a weird turn with the mysterious figure of Sam entering the scene along with an equally creepy sister and friends. With random visions and supernatural encounters following his arrival, Mica starts questioning Sam’s motives and identity. Will she uncover Sam’s truth and in the process decipher her past forms the crux of the story.

Positives first- the relationship between Mica and her grandma is sweet and equally well written is the friendship between Mica and her friends. The only negative is the random shift between romance and supernatural within a span of few chapters and I felt this could have been explored better. Overall a fun ride.

Thank you Harper Collins and Netgalley for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

#NetGalley #BreakupFromHell #AnnDávilaCardinal

God, should I have DNF'd this? Yes, absolutely. I truly don't know how I made it through this book. I guess part of it was that this is a quick and easy read (and also relatively short). I just really did not like this. Let's start with the writing: it was incredibly immature, and juvenile but in a way where it seems like the author hasn't interacted with a teenager since like 2012 at the latest. It was incredibly cringey and painful to read. The main character was also absolutely insufferable. The male lead literally used the words "you're not like other girls" to describe her and she took that as the biggest compliment she'd ever gotten. If that doesn't tell you enough about her than I don't know what else will. Just in case, here is something else about her: she constantly acts superiour to everyone else in this small town because she's tough and loves horror and knows really obscure movies like *rechecks list* The Conjuring. Yeah, feeling cool and edgy and misunderstood for liking extremely mainstream things wasn't cool in 2010 and it still isn't know. She was also incredibly stupid. Oh my god, I haven't read about anyone this plain ol' dumb in quite a while. She missed the most obvious of clues, while also being suspicious of the most normal of behaviours. Blegh, it was insufferable. On top of that the romance was incredibly underdeveloped, insta-lovey, and completely without chemistry as well. The only thing I liked about this book was how intriguing the plot was. It was obvious from the start something was amiss and even though some parts of it where incredibly obvious, I was quite curious about the answers to other questions. However, once we got those they felt incredibly stupid and lame. It literally made my eyes roll. However, I still didn't DNF because at point I was that far already that I just feel like I had to make that suffering worth something. I really wish I could have loved it because the premise sounded so much fun. Incredibly cheesy, yes, but also a whole lot of fun. However, it ended up just being absolute misery and I hate myself for wasting my own time.

Is this Catholic propaganda? Potentially. Did I have a blast with it? Absolutely! This book doesn't really do anything new or groundbreaking, but it is a fun little romp. The characters are funny and despite the catastrophe lurking in the background, it manages to stay pretty lighthearted.

So many YA books are heavy hitting these days that it's always fun to read a more silly story.

DNF'd @ 25%

I liked the idea of Breakup From Hell by Ann Dávila Cardinal, but it just wasn't for me. The concept sounded pretty fun, but the execution of it was lacking primarily in the pacing and the characters. I don't know if these elements improved over the course of the novel, but I lost all interest in bothering with continuing on with it.

So this one started a little slow for me but I have to say I ended up loving the story line and all the characters.

Miquela has lived in this same little town with the same friends with her grandmother for as long as she can remember. Nothing new ever happens here, so now is her chance to move on after graduation and head to UCLA, even if it is the last thing her grandmother wants her to do.

Then one day Miquela's life is turned upside down by the presence of Sam, a new boy visiting the town. There is just something about Sam that makes Miquela feel different, he is changing her, or she may just be changing. Miquela is discovering "gifts" she never knew she had. The weird thing is so are her close group of friends. Then she and her friends discover something that makes her realize Sam is not who she thinks he is at all.

Wow, like I said this one was a little slow for me at the start but then it picked up and I blew thru the last half. It was quite entertaining.

Breakup from Hell by Ann Davila Cardinal is such a great book! Very creative and brilliantly written.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and HarperCollins for sending me a DRC of this book. It's great to see some of my wishes, like this book, coming true. As a YA romance reader, I enjoyed reading the perspective where the audience sees the devil boyfriend from an antagonistic way since it's hardly shown in the publishing industry. That being said, I personally still love Sam but the author did a great job at having the audience hate him (I mean he is the devil's son I guess so that shines through). I also enjoyed reading the religious undertones, which the audience sees through the demons and celestial lineage, without it being too religious for those who don't want it to be. I do have to say I felt the book was very similar to TWILIGHT and maybe even VAMPIRE DIARIES since they both take place in a small town and a bad boy comes to town and changes that. I would say that was one of my critiques I have of the novel since it didn't feel original but Ann Davila Cardinal makes up in originality with the family and friend dynamics since I felt their love shine through.

I wouldn't recommend this novel if you're one for a heavy action or romance packed novel since BREAUP FROM HELL focuses more of friendships, families, and identity. If you want a lighthearted read that's intriguing, then you should read this book.

I liked it well enough, but the pacing was kind of off for me, I do get the insta love at the beginning as these are teenagers and Mica kinds of want to rebel from her strict grandma but then slows down a lot and doesn’t pick up until like 70% in when what we were all suspecting is revealed to Mica.

I will be withholding my review until the Harper Collins strike is resolved and the workers have better rights.

🔥🗡New Release🗡🔥

I’m still processing this one! Can’t get it out of my head, and not ready to start a new book because of it!

Give me a bad boy with wings and I’m all up on it…

Give me a badass Latina that wields a SWORD, and I’m going to hold it up like I just found treasure!

Powers, visions, mystery… just sooo much to devour!

I would definitely read this again! It gives so much action!

So thankful I was able to get this through NetGalley!

#breakupfromhell #anndavilacardinal #newrelease #latinx #latinxbooks #ya #yabooks #netgalley #ebook #readingreyna

Thoughts

This book is an unfortunate case of a good concept, bad execution. I loved the idea of an ensemble cast with superpowers coming together to fight a demon ex-boyfriend, but the overall product wasn't well put together. Overall, this was a disappointing start to 2023.


Pros
Casual Spanish: Code-switching is a natural part of the Latinx experience, and so it’s great to see that switch between English, Spanish, and something in between so casually included here in this book. The Latina main character uses Spanish when natural, like when talking to her Abuela, And this book doesn’t make a big deal out of that. It’s the current convention to include words spoken in foreign languages in italics, but that’s a convention that I don’t like--especially when the language employed isn't "foreign" to the main character. This book does not employ italics to include Spanish, because Spanish is just a natural part of the life of our protagonist, and I appreciate that.

No Solo: So many romances-gone-supernaturally-wrong have a “strong, independent” female lead, which ends up being to her detriment when she finds herself in danger with no friends or support group around here. That is not at all the case here. Mika has a great friend group around her, friends who are constantly concerned about her and involved in her business. They’re not overbearing. They are just friends. And I love that she’s got this great group of people who are involved in her life. It’s much more healthy that way.

Religious Main: It’s so rare to see a religious protagonist in contemporary fiction that is not meant to be, explicitly, religious fiction. Our main character here was raised Catholic, and she is still actively attending mass and Catholic school. While it remains unclear whether she herself prescribes to this belief system, it is so nice to see the representation of a religious main character and a religious family.


Cons
Too Suspicious: This book is promoted as a romance gone wrong, and so there needs to be at least a little bit of chemistry here. However, Mika was almost immediately suspicious of her love interest. That suspicion never abated, and so I found it very hard to believe that they were actually interested in each other at all. She never seemed to be fully invested in a relationship with him, so I never bought it.

Secrets: Sure, it can feel like parental figures are keeping secrets from us when we are teenagers, but I don’t think that’s generally true. And I especially don’t like books that play into that trope as though parents really are keeping secrets from their children. Maybe Abuela really does want to keep their heritage a secret from her granddaughter, but when it is actively affecting their lives, how stupid would she have to be to keep it a secret still? It made no sense to continue keeping this secret. The cat was already out of the bag. It was really hard for me to sink into the world when the little pieces weren't clicking.

Lacking Cohesion: This story really never stops to tie all the pieces together. There is a lot going on , and it doesn’t make one cohesive picture. A lot of the parts are good. I loved the ideas and concepts woven into this book! But we never really settle down. We really needed one main plot to latch onto, but instead, I just got a bunch of mysteries. They were demons and super powers, family struggles and family secrets, religious mysteries and more. Everything was very on-the-surface, and there was nothing underneath tying the worlds together. It was too much.


Rating
⭐⭐⭐⭐
4/10

Fans of Tori Bovalino's The Devil Makes Three will enjoy this devilish new contemporary tale. Those who loved Adam Silvera's Infinity Son will love this new cast of superpowered teens.

there will be no review for this title until harper collins meets the union at the bargaining table in good faith.

Overall I was a let down by this. It sounded fun and different, but instead it just fell flat and I think it was mainly due to the main character. I was not a fan of the main character Mica so it was hard to root for her in any real capacity (I mean besides the devil not winning the world overall...) and I did not connect to her emotional issues. There was a love triangle in the story but it was so over the top there was no question as to what was going to happen and some things that I wanted more about were glossed over like with cliffnote versions. On the plus side there was a great female friendship and some great random one liners I had to laugh at as well as some super well done creepy moments. The book wrapped up so I believe this is a standalone. I was not a big fan but if you like battles of good versus evil, made families, angsty girls and battles then give this a try.

I would love to write a review once HarperCollins decides to come to the table and negotiate with the HC Union.

Fun, delightful, easy to read book that was both fast paced and entertaining. I received an Advanced review copy from NetGalley.

Thank you to Netgalley and Harper Collins for the e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.
I am withholding reviews of HarperCollins titles due to the HarperCollins strike.

This was SUCH. A. GREAT. READ! but with the HC strike again no review until something gets resolved.