Twisted Heathens

I had pretty mixed feelings about Twisted Heathens by J. Rose.The book was very easy to get into and the pacing is fast, which made it a quick read. I also personally didn’t find it as disturbing as some people describe it. Yes, it’s graphic and dark, but for me it never crossed into “too much”.Character wise, Eli and Hudson were definitely the standouts. They felt the most developed and interesting in this first book. Phoenix was entertaining and funny, but still feels a bit shallow since we haven’t really explored his trauma yet. Kade, on the other hand, annoyed me quite a lot throughout the story.Unfortunately, Brooklyn was my biggest struggle in this book. A lot of her chapters revolve around self pity and suicidal thoughts, and after a while that started to feel repetitive and frustrating to read.For most of the story I also struggled to really follow the plot. The structure often felt like Brooklyn waking up, doing something, sometimes spice happens, then suddenly we jump forward in time again. Because of that, around 80% of the book felt a bit slow or unfocused for me. That said, I do understand that this book is mostly setting up the world and the background of Blackwood.One thing that did work really well for me was the found family dynamic between the characters. That aspect of the story felt strong and is definitely something I want to see explored more in the next books.The ending is where things finally start to unravel and become more interesting. I actually wasn’t planning on continuing the series at first, but the ending made me curious enough to pick up the next book.Overall, this first installment leaned more towards spice than plot for me, but it laid enough groundwork to make me interested in seeing where the story goes next.