My apologies, Curious One. It’s been a few weeks. I knew going into it that this series would be draining, but man…let’s just say I did not Covet this! There is so much drama and eye-rolling going on in my world because of it!
We are on the third book of Tracy Wolff’s bestselling Crave series, titled, Covet. It’s very interesting to me, that each character when not focused on acts like a very mature adult. Until you get more story told from their point of view and suddenly, they’re just like all the other human teenagers.
Before you read on, if you need a recap, make sure you read the Curiosities on Crave and Crush by Tracy Wolff!
Menu
Let’s Dive into Covet
Who Is in Prison?
Momma Drama
The Connections and Bonds
Who is the Bloodletter
Onto More than just Adventure
Conclusion
Perhaps, I’m struggling with it so much because of the immortality of the creatures. I mean, Jaxon and Hudson are over 200 years old in reality, yet they both act very much like the typical trope-y 16 year-olds in almost every YA novel out there. Now, I love myself a good trope on occasion, but could this series get any more of them crammed into one series? Keep in mind, we are only halfway through the series and it’s been what…6 months in their timeline? Two of which she was spent in stone-state-limbo that we have yet to be revealed and every single other month of her existence in the world of Katmere Academy has been spent foiling plots of death and revenge.
Don’t get me wrong here, I actually really am enjoying the mythology in this world and the uniqueness that Wolff is slowly building for us, but it’s honestly more exhausting to read these books than it is to clean my whole house right now.
I was hoping to get a time jump in Covet but nothing of the sort happened. We were introduced to a few more characters that I think are going to come into play again in the last book(s) but it probably will feel like an eternity spent getting to them.
Let’s Dive into Covet
First off, what is up with the duplicity and trigger-reactive stance of the Dragon Queen? Flint’s mom is like… old… yet all she does is react, even after claiming to have learned her lesson when putting her trust/faith in Cyrus (the brothers’ father) and him subsequently betraying her and the entire dragon shifter species. I can understand her pain and anger towards Hudson for having killed her eldest son, but come on. He was best friends with him prior to that betrayal, and her only other son is now friends with him, along with Grace and the entire clan of people that they’ve built together as a team/faux Circle of power. I just felt the need to state that her actions/words in the book, up till she gives up her dragon heart for Jaxon’s life, makes her no better than Cyrus himself.
Now, I would like to jump ahead and spend a bit of time talking about the prison world here though. I love that it was very loosely inspired by Dante’s version of Hell. A place to throw all hard criminals and their only escape is to mentally accept fault and atone within themselves. It’s an action over words type of scenario, and in a Utopian world, it would be amazing. The only way to get out is to atone within yourself. To truly feel as though you have forgiven/reconciliated/repaired/shown true remorse for your crime/sin is powerful.
Who Is in Prison?
If you cannot accept the truth behind your own actions and why you felt the need to do what you did, then how can you expect those you committed said “crime(s)” against to fully forgive you? It’s genius, really.
I think, of course, it’s entirely a Utopian-based societal answer, which also means that it will fail in the end, but that doesn’t take away from the powerful statement that Covet is making an attempt to convey.
It also isn’t surprising that this prison is a total joke in this world, controlled by Cyrus and the faulty Circle Council. The fact that people who don’t belong there are there and that even when they reach that stage of forgiveness and atonement for their supposed crimes, they then have to buy their way out and fight trolls or ogres or some other terrifying and near-impossible-to-defeat monster to get out. And that’s only if they’ve made the right bargain with the spoiled “mini god” who controls the gate to freedom.
In this prison, we do get introduced to some new and refreshing characters that are clearly young but have matured enough that they don’t seem like naïve teenagers. For now. I’m sure, in classic Wolff, that we will soon be shown a different side to them entirely.
On that particular topic, again, I feel like at some points we are being led to believe that evil characters are good and good characters are evil and then thrown suddenly without predilection or a reason. Or even not having a reason.
Momma Drama
Take Delilah for example. Jaxon and Hudson’s mother. She is evil and has chosen evil by in fact choosing Cyrus and accepting him as her mate (???). But then out of the blue she decides to give her sons a warning and tell them that they need to appear strong when weak and vice versa. What was up with that? Do you have an answer for me on that Curious One? Because throughout Covet and the first two novels, she has been built into this vindictive and torturous b***h that has no love for anyone but herself. Not unlike how Hudson was forcibly portrayed through the entire first and second book. Then was flipped on its head in Covet.
And Jaxon? What in the world…His soul is lost? Gone? Missing? Torn? Eradicated? When Jaxon and Grace’s mating bond was broken, her fractured and shattered soul was wrapped up by Hudson’s (I’ll get more into that later) but since Jaxon’s true mate wasn’t there when the bond was broken, his soul just…disappeared? So now he is evil and soulless and Grace has to give up Hudson’s real bond in order for Jaxon to be saved? What?!?
I’m confused where that plot line even came from, not to mention that the moment you found out about it, he was suddenly and tragically dead, then even more suddenly brought back to life by Flint’s mom, the Dragon Queen, when she carved out her own dragon heart and gave it to him. So now the Dragon Queen cannot turn into a dragon, and they live for centuries. I am clueless as to how this is all going to end up. So much of it seems full of holes and almost like a “fill in the blanks as you get farther into the story” type of writing. Easy to follow, yet it makes little to no sense until suddenly some big answer is just dropped and you’re supposed to accept it like it’s normal.
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The Connections and Bonds in Tracy Wolff’s Covet
Also, the whole mating bond thing seems to not really be a thing? I mean, it’s a choice, yet it’s not, yet you have to choose each other in order to be bonded? So, like I mentioned above, Jaxon’s soul was just ripped up and disappeared when the bond was broken, yet Grace’s soul was wrapped up by Hudson’s soul and is literally being held together by his love and the mating bond. But, Grace believed she was naturally bonded to Jaxon at the time, and at the point of their bond being broken, Hudson was still stuck in her mind and wasn’t brought back to life yet. So, how could she have chosen to be bonded to Hudson and how could her soul have been held together by Hudson when he was dead-ish? I’m not following thoroughly on this train in Covet I suppose.
The Bloodletter fabricated Grace’s bond with Jaxon as payment for her parents and their coven requesting that gargoyles be brought back into existence. The Bloodletter guaranteed that in the end it would be Grace’s choice whether to be bonded to Jaxon or not, because the mating bonds are solidified by choice. But, really, did she honestly choose to be bonded to Jaxon in the first book any more than she chose to be bonded to Hudson in the second? Am I just looking for flaws when I need to accept the holes in this theory?
On top of that, the Bloodletter literally created a mating bond and a gargoyle! What?! That was just glossed over so fast that it was almost nonchalant in it’s revealing chapter! Then, Grace and Hudson didn’t even tell Jaxon? Do we really think that this won’t come to bite them in the butts later, Curious One? Because if Wolff’s writing habits are any indication, it’s gonna make a huge impact on Grace, Hudson and Jaxon’s new truce/friendships and they’re gonna go all sorts of wrong before getting back together and being good again. It’s gonna be exhausting.
Who Is the Bloodletter!
Not to mention, the Bloodletter created a mating bond and a gargoyle like it was nothing and a normal thing for her to do! Am I the only one who thinks that the Bloodletter is connected to one of the original Gods of Creation? The story that we were told kind of out of the blue when they found the city of Giants? Hello, Curious One?! Is the Bloodletter one of those sisters or not?!
The story of creation was surprisingly simple and honestly was one of the best parts of Covet. Personally, I think the Crone that they visited to get the flowers for getting out of the Hell Prison is one of the sisters and the Bloodletter is the other. But, that’s pure speculation at this point. I wouldn’t be surprised if we suddenly out of nowhere find out that Grace and Macy are the sisters reincarnated or something, because of Grace’s special green string that no one will tell her about and that she coincidentally hasn’t touched. Obviously it’s some sort of power or magic, but at this point, it could be literally anything under the sun.
Anyways, I stray from my point. While gathering information from the Crone, out of the blue they’re told the creation story of all creatures (including humans) in the world. Two twin sisters, born to balance the world. One ends up casting the other down to earth due to jealousy, kind of like a fallen angel type of story, unknowing that it would also cast her down as well, because of the balance needed for life. End of story. Like I said, simple, but totally awesome. You get it, you read it…
Onto More than a Sole Adventure
I’m hoping that not every book in the series will focus solely on an adventure. In Covet the entire premise was based off freeing the Unkillable Beast (the Gargoyle from book two) so that he could tell them where to find or to give them the Crown they’re seeking. Originally they wanted this crown to have the power to break Grace and Hudson’s mating bond so Grace and Jaxon could go back to being bonded. Yeah, ridiculous. I know. But whatever. We all know they’re not going to break their bond and that Jaxon is gonna come to terms with what he needs to come to terms with to be mated to Flint. I’m guessing. The “clues” couldn’t be more apparent.
Besides that, they go on this quest to the prison world and free the blacksmith who created the chains trapping the Unkillable Gargoyle Beast. They all get freed, have the key, battle Cyrus and his evil followers when they get back to the island the gargoyle is trapped on, Luca dies (which should have been better if you ask me), they free the imprisoned gargoyle, he makes her promise to give the crown to “her” which Grace does blindly hoping it’s not a bad person since it’s the gargoyle’s mate (maybe), and at that point, the gargoyle (who has now been turned back into a man and is coping with it slowly) passes the crown to Grace (which is in tattoo form on her hand) before sort of running off, but not really leaving because it’s an island and he’s been a stone gargoyle for centuries.
Jaxon was dead for a minute too, he was bitten by his father and his eternal bite, so that was why Flint’s mom carved out her Dragon Heart. So, Jaxon is healed now from his disappeared soul because he was given her dragon soul (I’m thinking). Flint is like, missing part of his leg I think and Everyone is completely spent of all energy.
Conclusion for Covet by Tracy Wolff
In the end, they all head back to Katmere Academy to find that everyone has disappeared. The school nurse is still there, and while they heal her back up, they find out that another group of Cyrus’s followers came and attacked the school, taking every student, teacher, and creature with them. The gargoyle guy who had the crown also went with them at this point.
Hudson and Jaxon have a heart-to-heart as well and kind of get their brotherly bonding back in the works. I’ll be intrigued by how exactly that plays out if the information that everyone has learned so far will eventually be revealed.
I don’t know, Curious One. It’s a lot. And it’s like there’s nothing at the same time. I’m going to push through this series, I promise! I am not losing faith!!!
Sadly, the constant need of the back and forth between Grace and Hudson and Grace and Jaxon and Jaxon and Hudson and Jaxon and Flint… My eyes are going to get stuck in the back of my head with all the severe eye-rolling! Simply said, it takes me away from the cool small details that you can find in her writing.
Wolff has such powerful messages, but they are so minuscule when carelessly shoved between hundreds of pages of unnecessary teenage angst. I’m 100% certain that I have missed some of the more important moments that I loved in Covet because it was so full of such nonsensical and surplus moments between characters. Hopefully, book four will get better!
Until I catch you again…it’s time for another book…
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