Playing the Palace

I remember absolutely nothing from my 10th grade Chemistry class, but I do know, for a fact, that this book has way less chemistry in it then my brain does.

I thought I was trash for the American fallz in love with a prince trope. I've seen that fucking Netflix Christmas movie with the girl from that one Power Rangers season like 10 times. I don't know what I'm trash for anymore.

The characters were annoying. There feelings developed put of nothing. It tried to be funny, but the jokes missed everytime. I couldn't tell the side characters apart. I think I hate myself more for not DNFing this.

This was a wildly hyper, fun, Loud, happy book. The MC is super excited the whole time.

I think I'm too asexual to appreciate the pacing in the first 1/4th of the book. Also had to suspend logic a bit. But I have no problem reading books that require suspended logic.

It felt like it would have made more sense as a musical then a book tbh.

Thank you to Berkley Books for the ARC of Playing the Palace by Paul Rudnick.

First things first. Toward the end, there are some unfinished words at the end of paragraphs, a lack of punctuation at the end of some sentences, and paragraphs are accidentally split up.

That being said: Whilst this is not as good as Red, White & Royal Blue, it is still delightful fun. It's a bit more episodic and not terribly deep, and Carter and Edgar are a weird, abrupt couple. BUT it's awfully cute and hilarious. I had a laughing fit whilst my wife was on the Switch Light playing a farm game with a friend. They were quite confused. But I have a crass sense of humor, so the scene in question just killed me. This book is all about being light and feel good and fun. And it succeeds. The characters are fairly precious, although kinda quirky in that rom-com tropey way. But they're all so likeable. Except Callum. And Carter really needs to figure himself out, because everyone (almost) adores him.

I sped through this book happily. I enjoyed it immensely. It isn't perfect, and it's very like RW&RB; but if you want an HEA with lots of humor and adorability, this is a great read. I laughed A LOT.