Review of: Better Hate than Never by Chloe Liese

Better Hate than Never by Chloe Liese

Blurb

Childhood enemies discover the fine line between love and loathing in this heartfelt reimagining of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew.

Katerina Wilmot and Christopher Petruchio shared backyards as kids, but as adults they won't even share the same hemisphere. That is, until Kate makes a rare visit home, and their fiery animosity rekindles into a raging inferno.

Despite their friends' and families' pleas for peace, Christopher is unconvinced Kate would willingly douse the flames of their enmity. But when a drunken Kate confesses she's only been hostile because she thought he hated her, Christopher vows to make peace with Kate once and for all. Tempting as it is to be swept away by her nemesis-turned-gentleman, Kate isn't sure she can trust his charming good-guy act.

When Christopher's persistence and Kate’s curiosity lead to an impassioned kiss, they realize "peace" is the last thing that will ever be possible between them. As desire gives way to deeper feelings, Kate and Christopher must decide if it’s truly better to hate than to never risk their hearts—or if they already gave them away long ago.

Rating and Review

Overall Rating: 2-2.5/5 Stars

Just to be clear, when I first finished this book, I gave it 3 stars, but the longer I sat with it (it's been more than a month since I finished the book when I'm writing this, by the way), the more I just thought, "I really don't like this book." It's not 1 star, but it isn't that great either)

Review

Background

This was my first time reading an enemies-to-lovers romance. Before, I'd only watched an anime with an enemies-to-lovers subplot. I thought that was really cute, so I picked up this book, thinking I'd like the trope even more.

Um...that was not the case, lol.

Sometime while I was reading this book, I watched The Hating Game. That movie was much worse than this book, in my opinion, but I didn't like it for some of the same reasons why I didn't like this.

I don't want to say I hate enemies-to-lovers. I think the trope can be extremely well done, but I've encountered some really bad representations. I hope, in the future, I can find a romance novel that writes the trope well.

Also (I don't know if this needs to be mentioned), apparently this book is based on The Taming of the Shrew by Shakespeare. I personally have never watched a Shakespeare play, nor have I read one. So... take that little fact as you will.

What I Didn't Like

The number of ways this book pissed me off is insane. Like my rating suggests, I don't hate this book. I definitely don't. I've read worse. But there were so many things I didn't like about this book. Here it is:
  • the writing, especially in the beginning. there were so many em-dashes. for no fucking reason
  • there was A LOT of repetition. especially when talking about how often he had wet dreams about her. there were soooo many mentions of it, and i got tired of it
  • there were a lot of filter words
  • it didn’t feel like a love story. it felt more like the characters were just closer and closer to having sex. when he started thinking that he loved her, I was confused because they didn’t do much. they just did a lot of foreplay. not much about love
  • it made zero sense to me how they fell in love after hating each other for years
  • following the last point, when christopher said how much he actually liked her, but he wanted her to hate him so he wouldn’t act on his feelings, i lost it. i was like, “bitch what? how? why the hell would you want her to hate you? this don’t make no damn sense.” i’m about to blow a fuse now
  • there was no plot. just a bunch of events happening. like, when we got to paintball, i was like “okay, what is this even for?”
  • the repeated mentions of capitalism and being a good capitalist. what was that even for????
  • a lot of telling and not enough showing
  • how obsessed with her he was. like he was reeeeally obsessed with everything, and i mean EVERYTHING, about her, and it was really weird to me
  • at the end, the author never addressed if kate lives with her family or with christopher since juliet moved back in
  • the story took place in one month


What I Did Like

As with every book I read, there are always a few things that I like. This book didn't have many positives, but at least there were a few. Better than none.
  • the characters communicating
  • the representation of migraines and autism/neurodivergence
  • the cute moments between them
  • there wasn’t a third act break up
  • the book cover
  • the sisterly relationship between the fmc and her sister
  • they didn’t have sex for a while, but did a lot of foreplay
  • the foreplay and sex scenes were well written
  • the nicknames. i know they were cheesy and cringe, but i liked it
  • kate didn’t completely stop traveling after getting together with him. she still does, just not as much as she used to

Final Thoughts

I said this on Goodreads, but I really don’t know how to feel about this book. There were some really good moments, like really good, but then there were some that just really didn’t need to be there (I listed both above). I’m leaving it at 3 stars instead of 2.5 or 2.75 because 3 feels the most accurate. It wasn’t a bad story, but it wasn’t good either. It was just meh. just okay.  At least it wasn’t awful, but I wish it was better. It took me almost two weeks to finish, which seems accurate. I finished the last 30 pages in 1 hour, which equals 2 minutes per page.😭

Updated thoughts: I wrote that review back in May, and this is how I feel about the book now. It's definitely more of a 2-2.5-star book. Something I thought about a few weeks after I read the book was this: Christopher is 6 years older than Kate, and at some point, he says he's always liked her. Even since he was younger. If that's the case, that means that while he was an adult, he liked her, right? If he was 19, she was 13! Gross! I hate that. Hate it, hate it, hate it. The author shouldn't have said Chris always liked Kate because it makes no sense. It's pedophilic.

Thank you for Reading!

Thank you for reading my review! I love you so much, and I hope you stick around for future posts about the other books I've read and will read.

Have you read this book? What did you think of it? Let me know in the comments! Also, let me know of any romance novels or fantasy romance novels you think I should read!

See You Next Week!

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