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My Review:Title: Three Wishes
Author: Kristen Ashley
Published by: Indie
Release Date: April 8, 2011
Format: Kindle Book
Pages: 430
Genres: Romance, Contemporary Fantasy
Potential Triggers: View Spoiler »
Reading Challenges: Lenoreo's 2023 Backlist Reader Challenge, Lenoreo's 2023 Bookish Resolutions DTTH, Lenoreo's 2023 COYER Chapter 1
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My rating:
Blurb:When Lily Jacobs was born, she inherited Fazire – a genie. Her family had three wishes and they’d only ever used one so Fazire was stuck in the human world. This worked since he’d become a member of the family anyway.
Even with a genie, Lily's young life wasn’t perfect. To escape the kids making her miserable at school, Lily buried herself in romance novels. One day, when the teasing was just too much, she used one of her wishes. She told Fazire she wanted to find a man like in her books and she made the most complicated wish Fazire had ever heard. Her wished-for man had to be impossibly handsome, virile, fierce, rugged and ruthless (amongst a dozen other things).
He also had to think she was beautiful and he had to love her more than anything in the world.
Nathaniel McAllister wasn’t born to a life where there were such things as genies granting wishes. His life was filled with drugs, crime and neglect. He was running errands for a gangster before he was in his teens and, even though life and hard work led him to wealth and respectability, he always knew, deep down, he was dirty. When Nate met Lily he knew he was no good for her but as virile, fierce, rugged and ruthless as he was, Nate was no match for the pull of sweet, innocent Lily.
Unfortunately, Lily’s wish included that she and her hero go through trials and tribulations to test their love. And Fazire wasn’t only a good genie, he loved Lily – so he gave her exactly what she wanted.
3.5 stars — This was a strangely compelling book, despite some things that really pushed my buttons. The funny thing is, I kind of expected not to enjoy this book, and so it surprised me in many ways.
I wasn’t expecting the way the story started, and the way the story was told through so many points of view. But it worked, so I’m not going to complain!
In so many ways this book reminded me of my early days of romance reading, in both good and bad ways. There are so many things that I just accepted, particularly from heroes, in my early venturing into romance, and Nate definitely encompassed a lot of those things. And not necessarily good things…or rather, things that now Lenore finds very problematic. And yet, the story was really compelling. I really enjoyed the good moments in this book, and I wanted more and more.
I’ll state this right now, I am NOT an alphahole lover. For a long time, that was just the norm in so many ways, and so that’s what I read. But nowadays, I prefer less toxicity. Nate wasn’t quite as toxic as I expected him to be, but he wasn’t immune from it either. I’m not a fan of domineering, nor am I a fan of possessive, and Nate had those elements. He also fell into the trap of “knowing better” and making stupid decisions based on that. *sigh* BUT, he was also very broken from his youth, and I could understand some of what was behind his actions. I did find myself aching for him, wanting him to grow, and feeling like he mostly did grow towards the end.
And I will admit I have a weakness for a certain kind of oblivious, low self-esteem, kind heroine. And Lily definitely had that. I appreciated that she also had some spunk to her, and even though she didn’t always stand up for herself, when she did I cheered for her.
I adored their initial courtship. Sure, the whole thing moved super fast, and there were secrets, and there were some bad decisions…but I just felt a connection, and I loved Lily’s innocent exuberance.
I was more hesitant on their initial second courtship. In my opinion there was a lot of dubious consent going on here, and that’s not my jam…I was not impressed. Especially because it wasn’t just once. I know there’s a fantasy element that others love, but it’s not for me.
My other button issue is that Fazire, in his desire to give Lily humility, didn’t let her grow into her beauty until later in life. And how was she described as ugly? Fat. Of course. *sigh* I get that societally that’s the way it is, but I am so fucking done with that. I glossed over it at the beginning (even though I wanted to rage quit) because it was only a page. It does come back a bit at the end, and it made me mad then too.
There was also a lot of violence and rage that was easily glossed over and forgiven. Again, I just expect more in my books nowadays, so I was bummed.
And yet I still rounded up. Part of me doesn’t want to, but I truly was compelled reading this book, so whatever…I can be a conundrum, it is what it is.
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