I loved this book!  Wintersong was one of the books I was looking forward to reading, but I'm just now getting around to it.  

I was reminded of a few books when I was reading Wintersong.  If you like the Iron Fey series, this is the book for you!  It has a similar feel to the Iron Fey series, so they're pretty good read-alikes for each other.  I'd describe it as Hades & Persphone meets The Iron Fey meets Caraval (which I read after Wintersong but I'm still going with it because this review is obviously being written after reading both books).

I felt very much like I was in a fairy-tale, particularly a German fairy-tale.  I loved the idea of the Goblin King, and how people ended up in the Underground.  It's such a vivid book and I really felt like I was in their world.  I really didn't want the book to come to an end, because it meant leaving Liesl's world, and I didn't want to do that.  At least there's a sequel, so there will be more to this story.  Which is good, considering the way Wintersong ended.  It's going to be a long wait until the sequel comes out.  

Liesl is such a great character- she is more courageous than she knows, and she would do anything for her sister- even agreeing to marry the Goblin King to keep her sister safe.  I think being Underground and around the Goblin King ended up being a good thing for her- she learns a lot about herself, and I feel like she becomes more confident in herself as she worked on her music.  She's a character I can really relate to- taking care of everyone, and feeling like she isn't good enough, even though she is, and she just needs to believe in herself.  

There's something very dreamlike about this book, and it's very magical.  There's something dark and...nostalgic isn't necessarily the word I'm looking for, but...maybe lament and looking for something lost and/or forgotten?  This book is downright beautiful and poetic, and if you haven't read it, trust me when I say that you really need to read it!

My Rating: 5 stars.  I'm so glad it lived up to my expectations and the hype!  This book is dark and beautiful and amazing!

DNF. I really wanted to finish this but I was just really bored throughout. It was also due.

Essentially, I am disappointed with this novel. I didn't care enough about the characters so reading felt like a duty not an investment. The language was clunky; I understand the tone the writer was trying to achieve but it just left me cold.

It had so much promise but it didn't deliver.

There is so much fan art in my head right now just waiting to be painted. This was even darker and sexier than I expected. Poetic, dramatic, hallucinatory. S. Jae-Jones manipulates time masterfully. Oh and the music oh my glob I could actually hear the music! The reason I took off a star is because there really is A LOT of description, some of it repetitive. And Leisel's attraction to the Goblin King could had been a bit more, um, nuanced. But those things aside, I truly loved it.

The characters. The story. The chemistry. So beautifully orchestrated together to create a never ending piece.

I actually woke up with eyes swollen after crying my eyes out last night. this was beautiful but painful, man.

so much pain!

3.5 stars
I might write a longer review for Wintersong later if I get the time to but at the moment, I'll just say that I enjoyed it a lot. Such vivid, lovely prose and I enjoyed the character development and the plot though I wouldn't have minded a slightly more fast-paced story. Overall however, there are a lot of good things to this book. If you enjoy gorgeous writing and enchanting retellings, definitely check this one out!

“You are the monster I claim, mein Herr.”

Oh well. What a ride! What should I say; 45% of this book was boring and draggy.

Spoiler

At some point I was wondering if the Gobling King has a split personality because of his sudden mood swings and changes. I prefered his "cold" persona over the "lovable" one. The cold one worked more with me.

Engrossing, yet a certain repetitiveness in descriptive passages and the heroine's ambivalence pulled me out of the narrative more than once. When it's rolling, though, the romance and the horror merge in intriguing ways.

ETA 15/06/20: I obviously rated this still high on the hype and my love for the Goblin King because I was just rereading my kindle highlights and notes and NOPE.

I'll start this by admitting that Labyrinth is one of my obsessions - I saw it for the first time when I was a kid, and even then I thought that Sarah was an idiot for not staying with the Goblin King. So when I read the blurb for this book I thought I had died and gone to nerdy heaven :)) This is like the adult version of the movie, and makes no effort to try to disguise it.

If I had to describe this book with one word it would be sensual. The first part is absolutely perfect, the story is well-paced and the sexual tension between Elisabeth and the Goblin King reached Mulder/Scully levels. But then Elisabeth makes her vow and things get duller, sometimes confusing and even more frustrating.

I didn't always like Elisabeth, which made her more interesting in my eyes. She is selfish and selfless, she's petty and vengeful, she's no damsel in distress but no self-sacrificing hero either. And even the Goblin King admits she's plain-looking, not 'beautiful in her own way' or some other nonsense - it's her strength and passion he loves. Elisabeth yearns for recognition of her musical talent, and the way her father dismisses her work because she is a woman plays an important role in the book.

The Goblin King is everything I expected him to be: beautiful, charming, cruel, dangerous and so, so appealing. You know this is someone you shouldn't love, shouldn't even like, but you really can't help yourself (at least I couldn't!!). Then in the second half of the book he's more human, more tortured and while I still loved him, I missed my trickster terribly.

The plot is exactly like the movie - the Goblin King has kidnapped Elisabeth's sister and she has to enter the Underground to save her,

Spoiler

but to do so here she finally accepts to become the Goblin King's bride.

This was the half I loved. The second half is about Elisabeth finding out who she really is. I would have liked to know more about the other Goblin Kings and the past of the current one, but I suppose we will learn about that in the second book,

Spoiler

since I assume it will be about Elisabeth trying to rescue him from the Underground.

Their relationship is all about sensuality and longing and I truly loved it. Another fundamental thing in their relationship and the book is music, and while it was cool to see their feelings expressed through their music, the technical talk got boring after a while.

The writing was good, subtle and sometimes lyrical. My only complain is that some expressions were repeated so much that I was getting really annoyed (the austere young man, anyone? >_<)

In the end I decided to rate it 3.5 stars because, although the first half was almost a 5 for me, the second dragged too much, and evil-Goblin King was so much better than tortured-Goblin King :P