I ended up dnf’ing Mallory Marlowe’s Entities to Lovers a little over the halfway point and I’m feeling a lot of mixed feelings about it. There’s quite a lot I liked about the book, but it was also frustrating. There was enough that I liked that I’ll probably pick up Marlowe’s other books. I might come back to this one later. On the plus side, it’s clever, funny, and has a supernatural take on chronic depression that I’d love to dig into another time.
Rory and Ezra are rival tour guides specializing in haunted Boston tours. Rory can see and communicate with ghosts, and Ezra is a history teacher as a day job. She does seances, tarot readings, and has a malicious ghost negging her in her head. He is a history nerd haunted by the fact that he will never know everything about the past. She finds him an insufferable know-it-all and resents that he is a more popular tour guides. He thinks she’s hot and wishes she liked him, but he is used to being disliked for knowing too much and enjoys tormenting her.
While reluctantly leading a tour together, they get into an argument at a known haunted house and disturb one of the displays. The house ghost, a spooky woman when she was alive, Temperance Talbot, curses them. They have bad luck when apart or arguing, and good luck when together and cooperating. The set up is great for a rivals to lovers story. They have to spend time together and they have to find ways to coexist without antagonizing each other. I enjoyed the way Marlowe was showing the ways they were learning to think differently about each other. I really appreciated that even though Ezra liked Rory, he learns to respect her work when it becomes clear they’ve entered her sphere of influence.
So why did I DNF? The fated mates/twin flames trope irritates me. I’ve definitely read books with that trope that I enjoyed and I don’t think Marlowe was writing it badly, I just don’t want to read it right now. The next question is, why am I reviewing it now? Because my NetGalley queue is stressing me out.
I received this as an advance reader copy from Berkley and NetGalley. My opinions are my own, freely and honestly given.
