Only a Monster

reminded me of YA novels from when I was 14 but in a good way! it was a fun silly goofy read can’t wait for the sequel

Out of all the things that surprised me about this novel, it is perhaps the sense of nostalgia that gripped me the most. Nowadays we write YA differently, with the impact of Wattpad and fanfiction and then also marketing and marketability permeating the sphere. In this context, it feels refreshing to read something that instead channels a lot more of what made YA series like "The Mortal Instruments" (ironically, also a fanfic but the writing was not fanfic-y) incredibly popular and a lot of fun to read.

"Only a Monster" is well written and well paced (perhaps the lack of different POVs here helps to keep it focused); it is creative enough and entirely immersive. The dynamic between Joan and her love interests is good; there is chemistry enough to make tried tropes feel good on page. It truly felt like a throwback, to me, to both "The Mortal Instruments" and the "Rubinrot" series.

(But also funny how, much like "Tokyo Ghoul", it teaches us not to go on nerd dates, they will ruin our lives.)

4. Only a Monster is a unique and captivating start to the Monsters trilogy. It's a story where you are rooting for the monsters over the humans and each chapter you become more invested in the characters and their journey. Joan, a 16 year old half-human girl, is unaware of the secret her family has hidden from her her entire life until an accident occurs where she blacks out, loosing hours of her day. Her gran then acknowledges that, Joan in fact is a monster with the ability to travel through time. However, Joan struggles with this new knowledge as she pines for the date she missed with Nick, the boy she's had a crush. When Joan goes to the historic Holland House, where she volunteers with Nick, to apologize for missing their date, everything changes. The Olivers, a monster family and enemies to the Hunt family, surround the house and intend to kill both her and Nick. However, when Nick strikes back with his team and kills the monsters, Joan realizes that there are far worst things than monsters. Joan pairs up with Aaron, the youngest Oliver, and begins her journey to right what happened at Holland house that night. Along the way, Joan picks up two more allies and the 4 of them (and Frankie, the dog), travel back in time to stop the massacre and rewrite the timeline. How far will Joan go to save her fellow monsters? Will she put herself into harms way to confront the boy she loves? How will she use her secret power? Will she be able to stop the massacre and bring back her family? I loved the world build and character development in this story. I am looking forward to meeting more of the monsters and seeing if Joan gets a happily ever after. I also love that Nick isn't the only love interest and we get a glimpse at a budding romance between Aaron and Joan. The twist at the end was amazing and I definitely did not see it coming.

ive been looking and searching high and low for a good time traveling book and this provided everything i needed i read this in 2 sittings it's been a while since i had this much fun reading a book. im still reeling from the ending like that book had ANGST

Listened on audio

3.5* I LOVED the story it was just the writing which put me off a bit but still good book

Wow. I absolutely loved this. The world building is great, the story is fast paced and I could not put it down. It’s wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey and full of monsters and stories of heroes. I very much want more of the story and the characters.

A YA fantasy with a twist. A hero kills monsters, stealing life is what monsters do. But what happens when the monster and the hero fall in love? An interesting take on many tropes. The kind of morally gray characters I love and the kind of story that makes me NEED to know every aspect of the world it takes place in. As someone who fully understands the pull Joan feels to want to discover more history, the temptation to be able to look first hand at sites and sounds long forgotten. There’s not a single character who is innocent in any capacity. Every character is a potential favorite. Every single one is complex and delightful. The world is well built and vibrant. 💭 8/10 Complex characters Top notch world building A charming second lead that I’m rooting for History and time travel

2.75 The last fifty or so pages was really great. The lead up to those fifty pages was just…fine. The idea of the magic system—stealing time from human lives to use as fuel for time travel—is really cool, but I wish the time travel rules of this universe were more clearly outlined. Paradoxes galore. In fact, confusion is a running theme. I get not wanting to info dump, but at least a crash course in monster history would be nice. The book as a whole is very much plot-driven, and I didn’t connect enough with the characters to truly enjoy the book as much as I wanted to. Joan’s cluelessness about the monster world and blatant disregard for her own safety and the safety of others can get frustrating. At one point, Aaron tells Joan, “You’re so fucking reckless.” And I could not agree more as I watched her repeatedly rush into situations like breaking into the Royal time-traveling monster court with literally no plan. I really loved the interactions between Joan and Nick. The romantic and tragic tension?? *chefs kiss* the best part of the whole book. At the end of the day, this had potential, and I would have liked it a lot more if the characters were more well-developed and the plot had a clearer direction.

ONLY A MONSTER turned out to be a very different book than what I was expecting. Reading the synopsis and knowing there were monsters, I imagined a darker story, with a more pronounced gray morality and more emphasis on the enemies-to-lovers element. Readers who go into this book with those expectations might be left a little disappointed, but personally I still ended up enjoying the story quite a lot, and find it to be one of the most engaging YA stories that I’ve read in recent history. The time travel element and the many twists and turns made it difficult to stick to a read-along schedule, and the mystery kept me wanting to continue reading and formulate theories for what was to come. Despite the characters not being quite as dark as I’d imagined, Joan’s status as not quite human but not quite monster made her the perfect character to highlight the gray areas of her world. Humans and monsters are more alike than they are different, and both are capable of good and evil. The characters were really enjoyable, and I especially enjoyed the found family dynamic in Joan’s inner circle. The only reason I’m decking a star is the love triangle—but probably not for the reasons one would expect. The love triangle between Joan, Nick and Aaron is one I easily enjoyed, but from which I also wanted more. I feel like both relationships could have been fleshed out more, especially the one with Joan and Nick. Big words are used to define their bond, but the execution didn’t live up to the potential. We see very little of them together, and not nearly enough for me to feel invested. Ultimately, I ended up enjoying the banter between Joan and Aaron a lot more! They had more scenes together, and while there’s still a lot to unpack, their forced cooperation throughout the book changes and challenges them. Their relationship has a lot more room for growth and surprises, and I think after the ending of the book, the future promises exactly that. Very much looking forward to the sequel!

** spoiler alert ** 3.25 Okay so i really loved the concept of this book, the idea is lovely and really cool I must say However I feel that something is missing in the story. Because I feel like I should feel sad with that ending, sas about Joan and Nick but I can't tbh. I didn't get attached to them, didn't live their relationship only Joan point of view that he liked him but they didn't had that many interactions so I can't be sad about losing something that I neved had. To something to be tragic first I should care about it, and their relationship was not something that I cane to care because the story wasn't focused on it. And I get it and I still liked how the story went but I didn't felt anything with what Joan did and I think that's really sad. I wish i could care about their relationship but I can't. It something that bothers me bcs it was a really good plot but for me there's something missing right there I even liked more Joan with Aaron bcs I got to see more of their interactions, with Nick there was implied they just liked each other and I get the "it was another timeline" but we didn't see any of it. Just little pieces but not something sustancial about their relationship to care about Joan having to sacrifice Nick to save everyone else. It should be tragic but for me it didn't felt like it. However this, I like the plot, the world and everything in it. I still have a lot of questions that are unanswered, who was that blond lady? What happened to Aaron? And to Aaron's mother? What is Joan? What family is Joan from? Did Joan really end everything? etc. So I hope there's a sequel to this (I think there's gonna be one?) bcs even tho there were things that didn't click to me and I really didn't connect with the characters. I'm curious and I want to know more about what's happening and the world, and I want answers that we didn't get in this book. Overall it was really a great story, hope that we get a second book and get more of this fantastic world

This book entered my Goodreads Want to Read list the moment C.S. Pacat tweeted about it. Flash forward to last month with Fairyloot’s absolutely stunning edition, and it climbed my TBR really fast. I’m happy to say I enjoyed it a lot! Only a Monster was one of the most surprising YA reads of the year. It was fresh, fast paced, with enjoyable characters and a love triangle that didn’t frustrate me. Both Aaron and Nick had the potential to make me ship, and indeed there were several scenes with both of them that had me squealing. As far as the romance is concerned, I’m very excited for the second book because I have the feeling that the drama is only going to increase, and I’m all here for it! The time travel was also a very nice touch that made the book fun and interesting. The author explained the rules without info-dumps, so I had no trouble understanding. (Aaron, Ruth and Tom are amazing monster teachers.) I thought the book would be a little darker based on the mentions of monsters. Mainly, I was expecting the characters to be more morally gray, but the protagonist was the classic good heroine, and the other monsters weren’t seen doing anything too monstrous besides stealing time from humans. This is the only reason I’m giving this book 4 stars and not 5. It was a very fun read and I will definitely continue the series because I’m invested and want more!

so ??? gimme more aaron tho ?? LOL

Literally amazing… no word The plot was so intriguing and made me what to turn page after page after page which led to me finishing this book in less than a week. The reveals as we went along weren’t entirely unpredictable but still kept me on my toes and the characters were so well written i couldn’t help but fall in love. The magic system was new and something I have never seen before. Let’s just say I will be foaming at the mouth until the next book come out. Dude that ending OMG!! Also Blonds named Aaron>>>>>>>>>

im having a hard time deciding on what to rate this but I settled on the 3.5⭐️ on one hand, this was an enjoyable reading experience overall. the pacing is fast, the concept is unique and interesting, and I loved the dark vibes and the time travel aspect. on the other hand, nothing feels like it lives up to its promise/potential. the romance is a big part of the marketing pitch and it ends up being very underdeveloped, even tho I loved the characters, every relationship just felt very shallow. and the climax and action scenes happened without much detail and the suspense wasnt there, I got the answers I wanted as soon as I had the doubt, making me not as excited as I wanted to be. I did enjoy it, I enjoyed the characters (plus no book has ever made me not be able to choose between the love interests, and for this one even tho I tried really hard I just couldn't choose) and the world. it was a quick and fun read, so im gonna go ahead and round up.

funny thing is earlier today i was thinking how stupid it is to care about the romance between the characters more when you're reading a fantasy book. and then i finished this book can't stop thinking abt joan and nick and aaron LMFAOOOO not very proud of myself! now actually, i care more about the idea of soulmates in this book than the romance or relationship itself. ok maybe a little bit of that in the end. but like the entire thing of relationship being doomed again and again because the timeline wants you to always be together but you can't? that's kinda insane... i dig it. the whole monster thing is soooo interesting too! unfortunately this book has so many gaps, i'm not sure if it was intended like all the informations are gonna be lay out in the next books, because it's a trilogy... which personally i find it to be a bummer, i really liked that ending. as many other people said, joan isn't a likeable mc. obnoxious, too stubborn, doesn't stop to listen. and mind you, she knows nothing of her world. and yet she somehow always gets to be right! like things will go exactly as she wanted to (not a very monster luck if i may say) it's so frustrating i'm hoping for less fortune to her in the next books. and more aaron. he's a very interesting character along with nick... i'm so curious about their backstories.

This book was amazingly heartbreaking. Joan is half human, half monster. Monsters have the ability of taking time from humans in order to be able to travel. She doesn’t know she’s a monster until she accidentally travels when she’s suppose to be on a date with Nick. The kicker is, Nick is a monster slayer. I couldn’t put this down. There are no slow parts, I mean from the beginning to the very end it’s just constant action. The writing is easy to follow, and keeps you hooked. The world building was done in such an excellent way. There was no pages of explanation, or information dumping. Joan doesn’t know anything about the world, so we find out alongside her. The author spaces it out so it feels real, and like we are apart of the story. The CHARACTERS. Ruth, Nick, Aaron, Tom — even all the small ones you meet along the way. They’ll all stick with you. The story is so so sad. I just want Joan to be happy, and get the timeline she deserves. The ending, ugh i wanted to throw my kindle across the room. I recommend this 100% and think it’s going to be a fantastic trilogy. I already can’t wait for #2. ••• I was provided an e-arc of this book in exchange for an honest review. all thoughts are mine.

I just didn’t care about what was happening at all.