One for my Enemy, Olivie Blake - Jodie
This book grabbed me by the face, put me in a trance, and broke me into pieces. Being a retelling of Romeo and Juliet - albeit with a good dose of Slavic folklore - you may go in expecting to be heartbroken - yet I still wasn’t prepared for how I felt at the end of this book.
The first few pages felt a little challenging as it begins to lay out exposition; introducing characters and crime families that sit right in-between being New York mobsters and fantasy covens. These are big families - and that means a lot of characters. But becoming familiar with the names and factions becomes easy very quickly however, as the feud reaches its peak in the very first chapter - and you realise that these families quite literally have blades at each other's throats. Blake’s writing is so beautiful, creating dialogue so poetic that you hang on to every word - and truly feel the emotions of this book down to your core.
There is more complexity to this book than a traditional Romeo and Juliet interpretation; as it follows two relationships: the childhood flames that could never be of Masha and Dimitri, and the accidental repeating of their mistakes, Sasha and Lev. With this, it tells a simultaneous story of a young Romeo and Juliet that could, and a grown Romeo and Juliet that wish they had - and the regret that fills both relationships. You feel the yearning and the desire that these characters have for one another - whether they act on that desire or not; all you want as a reader is for these couples to run off into the sunset together. But alas, this is not the story Shakespeare told, nor is it Blake’s.
This is a terrible love story; in a wonderful way. It is a love story that will tear your heart out and leave you gasping for air.
There are enough twists and turns that will keep you reading this; I in fact read 70% of it in one sitting as I could not put it down once I had settled into the story - I simply needed more, even if it was going to break my heart. It usually takes a few books in a series to become so enamoured with a story and its characters to cry; yet as I read the final chapter of this book I could not hold back tears. I was sad to say not only goodbye to the characters but to the story itself.
“Write me a tragedy, Lev Fedorov,” she whispered to him. “Write me a litany of sins. Write me a plague of devastation.”
Jodie (@jodiesdicefarm)
