The illustrations were nice and colorful, but the story is a bit convoluted and hard to follow. The characters feel bland and not once did I care for any of them. The colors are a bit distracting as well, it made me confused most of the time about who's who and what is happening in the scene. I wished the dialogues were told better since I really did not feel any ounce of emotions from the characters within their dialogues.

Don’t read the synopsis, go into this story blind. You just need to know that it’s a about a girl who goes to a strange boarding school and falls in love with another student.

The art is what made this book stand out for me. The background is often empty, the focus is on the characters’ faces and their gestures. The drawing style in general is not overly complex, it doesn’t distract the reader from the story. In fact, the art is used to narrate most of the story. There are very few dialogues and a lot of pages in which just a few images express what’s going on.

Overall, the plot revolves around the romance between Sara and Silje. We can see their relationship develop in little moments they share, like snapshots of their time together. I really enjoyed the symbolism of the blossoming flowers and the thread to represent their growing romance. It’s cute and somewhat bittersweet.

Throughout the whole book there is an eerie vibe and a mysterious atmosphere. An older Sara is narrating the book, and even though she gives us some hints of how badly everything will end, we know little to nothing about this weird boarding school called The Rose. What is happening there? What are they actually studying? Magic? What does it mean to be the “key” student? There are so many questions.

My main critique is, actually, that I was left with too many questions. It is not exactly an open ending, but many of the mysteries I was expecting to know more about are left unsolved. I have too many theories about The Rose and not enough concrete answers. If you don’t enjoy feeling slightly confused, this is not your book.

All in all, even though the plot is not memorable nor very well-developed, it was a fun reading experience. I loved the mysterious vibe, the romance and the art style. I will definitely keep reading more Maria Llovet’s books.

Amazing graphic novel with interesting story. The Greek mithology was a good addition and the ending really got me.

Cw: Violence, blood

Sapphics with some Greek mythology thrown in? I was so excited to read and dive into this, but I kept waiting for this to pull me in like I was expecting and well… It never did.

The premise of this really captivated me, but I do feel like the execution wasn’t quite there. Everything felt underdeveloped to the point where often times I felt like I was missing pages or had missed reading something because I didn’t understand what was going on.

Due to being underdeveloped, it did leave the romance to feel a little uncompelling too. This story needed to be longer to really develop the story and the characters to create the compelling story that I feel like this could be.

While I struggled with the story, I loved the art. It really set the mood and tone for the story which made up for the lack of plot to really set it.

Much like "Faithless", Maria Llovet's "Eros/Psyche" is gorgeous to look at. But like the comic it springs from, it suffers similar plot and pacing issues. That said, it remains a beauty to behold while being slightly confused.

Maria Llovet's Eros/Psyche by Maria Llovet
Thanks NetGalley and Diamond Book Distributors, Ablaze for this copy
This grafic novel goes about a strange school and the relationship between 2 girls that attend it.
Love the mitical aspects and the mistical air this story has.My main criticism is that its very brief so i wasn't able to empathize with the characters as much as i'd like.
It remains me of someting alse ive read/watch but I still cant put my finger on it.
3,5/5
Maria Lourdes

The artstyle of this comic is gorgeous. It is spooky and witchy and magical. It was minimalist and the colors were just haunting. I loved the sapphic aspect of this and the romance between the girls was beautiful. My problem with it was that the plot fell really short. It seemed pointless and I honestly just didn't know what was going on.

Fantastic graphic novel with gorgeous artwork and incredibly poetic story.

I wish I knew more about this as I think I may have gone in a little too blind, but from what I saw it was an incredible sapphic story about more than just romance.

I wish I'd gotten to read more about the school itself, but I look forward to deep diving

First things first, the art in this is phenomenal. There's not much text, but the pictures speak for themselves. I bet it would look even better in print and if you're interested, I'd highly suggest getting a print copy.

Unfortunately, the story didn't do it for me. The premise sounded amazing, with a mysterious boarding school for witches and a lesbian romance. But I had a hard time understanding what's going on most of the time. I missed a proper intro, some explanation of how the school works. I guess this was omitted for a reason (to make everything more mysterious), but it didn't work out and left me really confused.

The romance itself was very cute and soft and I enjoyed it, but it couldn't carry the whole book. Lots of things remained unclear until the very end, and even then the explanations were shady.

I'm really sorry to say this, but the art alone doesn't justify a better rating for me. I guess I'd only recommend this if you want something pretty to look at and don't care about well developed characters or an exciting story (which I do, hence the low rating).

When I saw the cover and read the title/description, my greek mythology loving self came out and I had to read it! Sadly, I was a little underwhelmed. It terms of art style, it´s usually my favorite one but I loved it here, so it was definitely one of my two favorite parts of the graphic novel. My other favorite part was the ending, i felt like it wrapped up pretty nicely and the plot was at its strongest point. My problems were that the relationship was under-developed, in my opinion, and that the plot felt confusing at times. Still, I think it is a very solid read, specially if you´re just looking for something enjoyable to read!

While I did think the premise was interesting, and I enjoyed the allusion to greek mythology, a lot of the story felt extremely underdeveloped. The story was often times hard to understand and I found the romance uncompelling. I almost wish the book was drawn out a little more to truly drive the story in better. The whole plot twist at the end left me unsatisfied due to the lack of plot it was built off of. The plot twist was really the only clear understanding of the plot I was given.

Other than the story, the art was fantastic. The style really matched the feeling of the story and was an informed choice for this particular setting, The art did manage to keep me interested in the book, even if the plot itself was somewhat lackluster.

The art style is usually not my cup of tea. The background is often empty, the characters themselves look pretty flat and almost always the same. I'm glad that this comic is released as a coloured version, because the original black and white one I wouldn't have liked at all.
But I must admit 'Eros/Psyche' has a very particular aesthetic, which I was drawn to. Though I would've liked to see more of the school and more world building overall, the ending paid of for me and I enjoyed some of the inner monologue. The extras, like character designs and alternate covers, are nice, too.
3,5 stars.

'I came to think that my only link with the earth was her. The only thing that grounded me and held me down from flying away.'

I got an ARC of this book.

What really caught my attention was the clearly sapphic cover in a dark color scheme. That is exactly the sort of thing I want to read. I am here for this.

Then the story started. It was weird. It made me think of Looking for Alaska. It felt like it was dark for dark sake at times and that there was not enough holding up the plot. It was a very loose and mild plot of attending a boarding school, but it appears that it is less than ten girls total. Those are the only people shown. Everything is done by letters and uniforms. There isn’t a lot to go by. There were punishments that were implied to be so horrifying and psychologically scaring that they changed the girls for life, but nothing was really explained. Why would they go to a school like this?

The magic was unclear. It was done at night and wasn’t really explored. Was it schools sanctioned? Is that why the school could get away with such harsh punishments?

The romance was something that made more sense, but it was still very mild and not really explored. Add in the huge secret that was being carried in that relationship and I should have been all over it. I love little intense details, but it just fell flat. Why was the scarf so important. It just felt like it came out of nowhere. Since so much about the school was unexplained, it made the relationship weaker as well.

The only thing I am not let down by is the art. The art was gorgeous through the whole book. It was what got me through it. I wanted to love this and I partially enjoyed reading it. As soon as I put any thought to the book though it falls apart.

I read this twice, two separate times and even right away when I've finished it, I struggle to find words to describe this book. It feels like a dream. When I reach out to grab something solid about this book I find myself coming back with nothing.

While this lack of solid memory of this book is weird, it honestly plays into the intrigue and mystery this book presents quite well.

I also can proclaim: It's Gay and IT SLAPs!

thank you netgalley for providing me with an arc in exchange for an honest review. this book was alright, but it could have been better. i give it 3/5 stars.

I was very excited to read this but unfortunately was not able to open it on any of my devices. I will definitely be looking for it in the future to read and enjoy!

Sapphic goings-on at a weird school. Sara is the new girl, having passed the entry test – a coded letter, and a public vote. She's hooked up with the alpha female as well, the girl to have been at the place the longest. But boy is it the weirdest place – seemingly no tutors bar coded text books, exile for the lowest-scoring at exams, and rules enforced remotely, with a very severe form of punishment promised. Life there is so weird it allows for copious wordless frames, of budding foliage, pills, and of course Sara and her flame passing by classical statuary and being – well, themselves?

Well, if not themselves, the epitome of Caspar David Friedrich paintings, and if not that then a variant on themselves as designed by this nutjob, oddball institution. The blurb says witchcraft and spell-casting is involved in the school, whereas the reader is just supposed to accept the boxing up of certain things, the collection of birds' eggs, and the floating downstream of small dolls in their dozens on rafts. Some people will definitely find all this too bizarre and unexplained, and equally a valid response at times is the feeling that the book has only now, and suddenly, discovered that girls might snog.

But I think I was able to get over such hurdles. I think it might have caught me in an easy mood, when I was not seeking relevance and a helping-hand through it all, as I might have needed elsewhen. For all its serious wackiness it's not doing anything exceedingly different – Florence Pugh fans will find a lot of this rather familiar from her film career – but it's not doing what it's doing badly at all.

This story wasn’t what I expected yet it grabbed me from page one. The story starts wih Sara reminiscing about her school days in the past and we see the entire story being told from her narrative. Sara does not focus too much on a story but rather her feelings and the people who were important to her in school. The eerie athmosphere comes from the fact that the school seems to be some kind of elite school that teaches girls magic and secret languages. Since this isn’t Sara’s focus we are left in the dark about the purpose of the school for a long time. She talks about her feelings for Silje, the so called Key Student at the Rose. Their relationship just like most of the story is mostly told in athmospheric montages focusing more on the feelings rather words, The illustrations and the pacing does most of the storytelling. Despite this the romance feels natural and well-built before the girls address their feelings. There is a lot of symbolism in the story as well, just like the blooming rose portraying their feelings for each other. I like that the story of Eros and Psyche was mentioned and explained in the story, since I wasn’t familiar with it. The ending feels bittersweet and a bit confusing - even though some of our questions are answered I have so much more. I would love another volume where we can dive deeper into the mystery and the purpose of the school and see how the girls’ story continues.

Lesbians? Boarding school? MAGIC? Maria Llovet? Okay... I am sold! I have no clue what was going on. I am here for the lesbian / witchcraft / dark magic school thing though. Also, its by Maria Llove who is my favorite artist.

This graphic novel was mysterious and unsettling from the beginning. I was drawn in by the character designs and wanted to find out what was going on with the magic rituals the characters were doing. The sparse illustration style added to the grim and beautiful atmosphere of the story, but sometimes the writing seemed a little choppy. Definitely an interesting graphic novel that I read in one sitting, but I'm not sure it was as successful as it could have been.