When We Caught Fire by Anna Godbersen: My Least Favorite Book of the Year

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I was so excited for this book. It has everything I love... it's a historical fiction novel that takes place in Chicago (my home "town") high society before and during the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. It follows a girl named Emmeline and her best friend and lady's maid, Fiona. Emmeline is engaged to marry the most eligible bachelor in Chicago, but she starts to have doubts when she remembers the life she had planned with a boy named Anders, who is now a hotshot boxer, before she and her father became rich. The only issue is, Fiona is also in love with Anders.

This book was terrible. There's really no other way to put it. The only thing I liked about this book was the historical high society setting, and the little newspaper and book excerpts at the beginning of each chapter. But I HATED the characters, especially Emmeline. I hated the romance; it was so bad. I hated how Anders went back and forth between Emmeline and Fiona; one moment he was in love with one girl, and wanted to run away with her, and the next he was in love with the other girl and was about to run away with her. This book was also just so, so boring. And it had the potential to be so, so interesting. The setting was so unique, and I haven't read any books that were remotely similar to the setting of When We Caught Fire.

I do not recommend this book at all. While a lot of people hate it, I'm the kind of person who enjoys reading about high society and fancy people. And yet I hated this book. It was a massive disappointment.

Rating: 1/5 stars

XOXO,

Isabella

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