Natalie J. Reddy

As this is flooded with the typical very positive high rating reviews you find on most new releases I think I have to be the voice of reason and be honest about this.

This book is unoriginal illogical and shallow. Its only appeal is teenage angst and romance drama in full YA fashion at which it does a good job.

In short:
Psi are the classic UF supernaturals. Vampires, werewolves, witches etc. but they are different.
The love interest is dark and brooding.
The MC is stupid and irrational.
Common sense and logic are not much more than vague suggestions.

Prepare for a rant.

I think my main problem is the stupidity of the MC, not because people have to be good at everything from the start but because she is unable to learn from her mistakes or even reach any sensible conclusions at all.
I have to talk spoilers about the first half of the book or so to explain, otherwise it would just be this vague drivel. But you are really not missing anything imo.
The blurb already takes away much of the book's start and I ended up waiting for it to finally catch up with the blurb so I could actually read about how things will continue from there. It takes over half of the book to finally get to the Psi reveal. And the book is clearly written as if this whole Psi business is this secret meant to create suspense. But the blurb already spoiled the entire thing!


So she gets abducted by those Psi people which are utterly incompetent at keeping her captive. They can literally read her mind but they kept her freakin door open and didn't see it coming that she would try to run after the huge pile of insane crap they told to her just a few hours earlier.
Well, maybe they very rarely keep prisoners and especially not prisoners they want to treat well as they clearly try to.
So, she runs away and almost gets abducted by a different, very obviously very evil other party (how is everyone so utterly incompetent?) but instead of returning to the nice guys that didn't mistreat her and clearly seem to know whats going on, or at least trying to flee the city altogether especially considering that there is almost nothing holding her where she currently lives, she decides to go to her former best and only friend that just cheated on her with his ex to take revenge but is still her best friend of course. (?)
This is already very stupid but honestly, her being so over her head in this mess is a pretty good excuse for her not acting more sensible at this point. The bad guys find her, they kill her friend in front of her, and try to abduct her too.
The not so bad guys come and rescue her from these worse guys and at this point I expected the MC to have gotten the wake-up call. They told her nothing, immediately after they showed up and captured her, another group got wind of her and as a result, her only friend is now dead. But all we get is her crying about him for like a page or so. After that, he immediately becomes a bittersweet memory.
But she never even considers that her initial captors might be responsible for making her a target in the first place. Instead, she develops more and more trust and within a few days, she starts to develop feelings and some sort of budding relationship with the dark and brooding guy (of course). We get the entire program, tingling touches, full-body reactions, irresistible urge to make out that gets interrupted. You know the drill. And not only that but there has to be a love triangle of sorts too of course.
I have read that bs before hundreds of times at this point.
At the same time, they try to bypass her brain's defenses with the excuse that there are magically hidden memories they all want to be unlocked.
But before they actually try this one love interest very clearly and obviously warns her about what it means if someone enters her mind and that they could manipulate or remove memories or even implant compulsions.
In an incredible twist, it turns out they actually want to extract the memories and then wipe them all clean and, idk, send her back to her normal life to die when the bad guys find her again or something?
Oh no! Nobody could've seen that one coming! What a twist!
And then, when she confronts him about this, he is hurt about her not trusting him anymore.
What? What the hell am I reading? Oh, and instead of doing something about it like fight or try to flee or anything she hides in her room (yes, she now lives with her captors voluntarily too). Just wow.
Around a week has passed at this point but she thinks about these people like old friends that might be planning to betray her but she is not sure and now has to weigh the pros and cons against each other.
Do I have to say anymore?


Something else I found annoying was how the characters repeatedly compliment each other on how great they are at different things. It's very obviously meant to convince the reader but it's also a case of the author misunderstanding what "show, don't tell" means. It doesn't matter who is telling the reader. It doesn't become showing just because you make another character tell it. And it leads to very awkward and unnatural dialogue on top of that. Or maybe the author really thinks that people actually talk like that to each other, who knows.

Now onto the romance. Besides being fundamentally out of place because her previous boyfriend and best friend was murdered not two weeks past it's just the clichéed sappy overemotional cheesy cheese full of "FEELING" and "NEED".

I want to comment on the political agenda pushing here too even though it's really just a very minor complaint compared to all the other issues.
There is a lot of inclusive wokeness going on here.
We have an MC adopted by a gay couple.
But you know what she gets bullied for? A weird scar on her face and her dads are basically a non-issue. I don't think there is anything wrong with a gay couple adopting a child in principle but this is clearly a world full of prejudice so gay parents would for sure be a major target for cruel children. And telling a story about that and how she and her family dealt with that could've been interesting. But instead, the one negative she took away from her childhood is bullying over a scar. Of course. /s

There are a few examples of bizarre inclusive arguments like this one. Calling all Psi "vampires" is wrong because there are lots of different kinds of Psi just like there are lots of differences between humans. This is not a quote but it captures the essence.
But instead of just pointing out that there is more to it than the simple vampire trope, it tries to make this weird inclusiveness argument and that the term vampire is somehow offensive.
It's just such a strange argument that explicitly contradicts itself by implying that calling a human "human" is somehow disrespectful too. Dear author, we call humans human and nothing about that is racist. And the MC clearly knows UF stereotypes and tropes so they must be a thing in this world. So why not use that to explain? Instead, the book tries to use these situations to virtue signal in this really weird and backward way.
But to be fair, this lack of logic is not exclusive to the progressive agenda that is being pushed on the reader here. It just generally lacks basic logic and common sense.
And don't get me wrong, I am not frustrated by this because I disagree with the agenda itself. I always hate it when books do this no matter which kind of agenda it is. Even if I agree with the general notion, this is not the place. You can write a book and have a genuine discussion about political topics as Dune does. But you need to have a discussion. Not this self-congratulatory "look, we are so progressive" almost like asking for approval.

Not a fan, wouldn't recommend not even for a YA audience.… (mere)

"How does that make you feel, love? To know you have the power to undo men."
One night is all it takes to turn Dani's life upside down. And it's not like she had the most stable childhood, spending most of it on the run from the villains in her mom's head. That is until her mom is murdered right in front of her and those villains become real. Dani learns that she has an uncle she never knew, and after her mom's death she goes to live with him hoping to find answers about who she is. In her search for the truth a guy named Peter shows up and makes it his mission to get in her personal space. Dani finds him gorgeous, flirty and infuriating. She suspects he might not be human or even from this world. Dani thinks the things Peter tells her are insane and she doesn't think she can trust him. Magic, pirates and Peter Pan aren't real... Until they are...
So this book had a lot of potential and I enjoyed reading it for the most part. It starts out super engaging and Dani is a really likable and relatable character, for the most part. She has spent her life moving around with her mother and the latest episode of moving is sparked by her mom losing a special pendant. Dani quickly learns that her mother has been protecting her from something she doesn't understand, and now she is left with even more questions, when her mother dies trying to protect her. Dani finds out about an uncle she didn't know existed, who is just as protective as her mom and just as bad about guarding secrets.
In the quest to find answers it isn't long before Peter pops into the picture and let me tell you he comes off way too strong straight out of the gate. He gave me a creep vibe from the minute we met him and I couldn't figure out why. After some reflection it's because this Peter reminds me way too much of Tamlin from ACOTAR. I really enjoyed the parts of the story where Dani is trying to learn about herself, but like the whole middle part of the book with her weird obsession with Peter, really lagged for me and I was glad when we moved onto something else. Let's not forget Neverland, and boy this is not the Neverland I remember. I must say I wish we had more of it and I can't wait to see what the next book brings for Dani. Because holy cliffhanger...… (mere)

First, whyyyy did this have to end on a cliffhanger??? I got so involved in the story (loved it), and I'm dying to read book two. This was an excellent re-imagining of one of my favorite stories - Peter Pan. Dani was an amazing heroine, and it's easy to fall in love with her. Peter was everything I was hoping he'd be - and watching the sparks fly between them was fun. The story moves along pretty quickly - and I have to warn you, make sure you set aside a few hours because you won't want to put this down once you start. I can't wait for book two, I loved this so much!… (mere)

I have read a handful of other Peter Pan spicy romance books. This one was right up there as one to check out. Although, I must admit that in the beginning, I actually struggled a bit with this book. I found myself about twenty percent into the story and still not forming a connection with Dani. Yet, I stuck with the book as it was almost at this point that Dani then found herself in Neverland and meeting Peter. From this point onwards, the story did get better for me, and I formed my connection with Dani.

Peter, I had no problems with an instant connection as he had a cheeky side to him. The steam factor between him and Dani was spicy. I would not say it was Carolina Reaper spicy but still there was heat. There are two other characters that I wanted to mention Kieran and Niko. They helped keep the story entertaining.

Finally, there is the cliff hanger ending. What an ending. I can't wait to read book two. The Heart of Neverland is a magical, spicy read!… (mere)