Once Upon a Broken Heart - Once Upon a Broken Heart #1 (Garber)

4/5 Stars

Evangeline had to look down at the damp cobbles to make sure her feet were still on the ground and that she hadn't taken flight, for parts of her were soaring. Stepping into the North didn't just feel like the start of something, it felt like the start of everything.

For whatever reason, I feel like I was trying to talk myself into reading this for WEEKSSSSSS. Which is such a crime. SUCH A CRIME. While it did take me a little bit to actually get my brain into the right mindset (solely just remembering what kind of a world all of this is set in AND getting acclimated to the Great North) once I was able to focus I devoured the rest of this book. I just love that every single one of Garber's books to date have such a deliciously whimsical feel to them while also showing us different pockets of darkness here and there. It's almost like she hands each reader a pair of rose-tinted glasses to read with only for a lens to crack part-way through and have to be taken off. BOOM. The Fates are back and people are dying or being hunted and prophecies are unearthed and seedy deals are being made.

As much as I love reading about the world of Caraval and now the North, I'm not sure I would survive there, lol. I'm way too trusting and in real life take way too much at face value. Evangeline though...I think she'll do just fine. She befriended a Fate or two and was really on her way to taking control of her destiny towards the end of this book. It took me a little bit to figure out if I actually was going to like her at first but...she really isn't all that helpless. No, she's just a normal girl who would do anything for those she loves and that is truly special. I will say I spent the entire book mistrusting Marisol and still am not convinced she's entirely an innocent. Jacks....oh where do I even begin? I think that it's pretty important to, at the very least, re-read all of the scenes he's in from Legendary and Finale (books two and three of her previous series, Caraval). I had ENTIRELY forgotten all of the glimpses we were given of him in those books and they truly make a difference. I forgot how much he DID feel for Tella and how that obviously would have MAJORLY impacted him from the first time he met Evangeline to the next. Poor boy. Lot of little moment that add up between them in this one. I have some theories and hope for book two and I can't wait to see what does and doesn't come true!

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