I usually love Sally Thorne and I was expecting this to be a fun, quirky read and this was just not it. I get authors wanting to branch out and write something different but sometimes I wish they would just stick with the old adage, if it isn't broke, don't fix it.

This got to be a little too icky for me. I thought this would be fun and quirky, but it weird to the point of being gross. I guess I thought I was going in to something a bit different than what this actually is. Also, I didn't like the power dynamic between the love interests and the moral implications of the reveal.

Altogether, this was disappointing because I've loved all of Thorne's previous work.

What happens when in order to find the perfect love you have to create him... specifically out of other body parts. The story follows Victor Frankenstein’s younger sister, Angelika. Angelika is spoiled, sheltered, and lives in her fantasies. While she is the assistant of her brother in his work she also dreams about finding the perfect match. Since all other attempts have been futile she has resorted the last option, creating her dream man. When a trip to the morgue leads to the discovery of a beautiful body, Angelika has finally found the one. When she reanimates it, and said corpse comes to life, he has no memory of who he is or where he is and the only thing he is determined to find out is his past life. He does not want to marry her, he does not want to love her. and he just wants to discover who he is. Angelika does not take this well, she has fantasized about their love and is determined to have him fall in love with her while slowly, and reluctantly helping him discover who he is. On this journey there is also another suitor that appears for Angelika’s hand that has her questioning her love for her resurrected beau. Now she will have to figure out which of the two she truly wants. All the while we also get to experience Victor and his love Lizzie and the other reanimated corpse that Victor brings to life. I’m going to be honest, I was so excited to read this, I loved the Hating Game and I am always a fan of Frankenstein retellings, so when I read the premise of this I was hooked. Unfortunately for me, this did not pan out, I found Angelika to be extremely unlikable and the fact that she ***SPOILER**** is constantly determined to end up with the guy she created and ends up with, is just... oh gosh.. is this necromancy??? He is literally hand made from other people’s parts that she put together and he barely has any memories and she keeps pushing her fantasies onto him. All Angelika does is fantasize about him and then complain about being rejected or hurt or the fact that she is constantly falling for guys who don’t love her. Suffice to say, the only reason I was enjoying this book was the little glimpses we get of Victor and Lizzie who I found to be absolutely adorable and fun to read about. While this one didn’t work out for me I definitely think if you go into this not expecting what I was expecting you would have a better time reading it.

*Thanks Netgalley and Avon and Harper Voyager, Avon for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

DiAngelea Millar wrote this review for Lit Shit Podcast blog and received an ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Do not read this book!

I was charmed and interested mainly because I loved the Hating Game (by the same author) and I thought ‘wow a contemporary romance author rethinking Frankenstein and framing it around a female protagonist how odd.’ And the book is VERY ODD but not in a charming way.

If you know the story of Frankenstein you essentially know this book with a few changes. Angelika is Victor’s sister who helps him with his experiments and she helps him make her perfect man and then gushes over this not attractive sounding mismatched body parts man lying to him about what and who he is and why he came back to life. All the while she continues to contemplate how to make him fall in love with her while she pushes her nose into everyone’s business. Somehow she gets another suitor Christopher (who she should have ended up with he is a good balance for her and sounded great) but of course she wants the monster.

When truths start to come out her made man isn’t really angry more confused and she vows to help him find out who he was and what happened to him. The truth is super random and has a lot of religious ties and leanings that also feel really forced and random for the book.

Our heroine Angelika is so absolutely ridiculous that she’s entirely unlikable. Her penchant for drama and for always wanting people who’s re bad for her is so frustrating to read. And her ultimately picking her made man honestly has a lot of ICK factors. Their intimacy is cringe and logically doesn’t make sense.

I really wanted this to be a feminist retelling where the woman would pick the smart and attractive choice not the gross one and where she wouldn’t be told what to do and who she was by every male character in the book. This retelling is a disappointment and should be skipped by any romance reader.

Taking a classic horror novel based heavily on science fiction and turning it into a romance novel is quite a feat but Sally Thorne somehow accomplishes just that. This book was definitely a nod to Mary Shelley, while also becoming something uniquely its own. The storyline of Angelika attempting to create her soulmate alongside Victor creating his monster piqued my interest and I was curious to see just how everything would unfold, especially considering the horror roots of the story.

What an odd little duck of a book.

A jumble of historical romance, a dash of gothic horror (a very light dash, deeming it "horror" is a stretch), love at first sight, amnesia (being brought back to life after a few days will do that to a man), and a love letter/fan fic nod to Mary Shelley makes "Angelika Frankenstein Makes Her Match" tricky to describe and harder to review.

(There's also a pig in love with a man. It's surprisingly charming and that little plot point upped my review by 1/2 star. #teamBelladonna)

There are gaping holes in the story, mostly centered around human biology/anatomy that must simply be ignored because this is a book wherein our plucky heroine literally makes the man of her dreams out of some corpses. Do your best to suspend your disbelief from page one and it will be all the more enjoyable.

This book is a refreshingly different rom-com and for someone looking to shake themselves out of reading doldrums, this might just be the title to do it.

I really enjoyed Sally Thorne’s other books (The Hating Game, 99% Mine, and Second First Impressions) so I said I would try out her newest book, Angelika Frankenstein, even though I knew it would be different. Unfortunately, I was not quite prepared for how different it would in fact be. The book opens up with animated houses and young adults sawing apart corpses which wasn’t really the rom com vibe I was looking for. I fully take responsibility for this, because I knew I may not like the sci-fi, creepy aspect of the story, and I didn’t. If you think the book description sounds interesting, I encourage you to pick this one up. If you’re looking to read it because you enjoyed The Hating Game, I don’t recommend it. I am glad I went out of my comfort zone and picked this one up though.

What’s that line from The Hating Game? I want to juice your head like a lemon? Well, that’s how I feel about Sally Thorne. Each of her books are so wildly different and yet her distinctive voice shines through and Angelika Frankenstein Makes Her Match is no exception.

At twenty-four, Angelika fears she is staring down the barrel of spinsterhood (Twenty-four!!!!! This thirty-five year old reviewer weeps into her latte). Angelika is desperate to find love and since no one in the village is biting, she utilizes the family trade and creates a man of her dreams. Far from simply being her brother Victor’s sidekick, Angelika’s skills are crucial to the success of their creatures. It’s confident Angelika’s skilled hands that stitch them together after all.

When Angelika’s dream man wakes up with pieces of his memory intact, this story goes from love story to a sort of Miss Marple as Angelika looks for clues to unlock the history of her perfect match and hopefully, win his heart at the same time.

The story is unique and inventive—I mean who would have thought of making romcom Frankenstein fanfic besides Sally Thorne? The banter is A+ and I continue to be in awe of the way Sally uses words. Parts of the romance didn’t quite work for me but they are too spoilery to go into detail here and they didn’t detract from my overall enjoyment of the book. This book is a fun delight to read and can’t wait to see what Sally comes up with next.

Many thanks to Avon and Harper Voyager and Netgalley for the ARC.

I will absolutely love anything Sally writes. I'd read her grocery list, and I hope one day she does a Masterclass because I love the way her brain works. What a spooky and fun story! I love that it is loosely based on her dollhouse and her doll was already named Angeklia. Proof Sally's mind is fantastic!

This book was really really weird. I will say the main positive I have for the book was that I enjoyed the romance since I like a bit of an insta-love trope but there were many things I disliked about this book.

I don’t like the implications of how the characters were “bad” when they didn’t believe in god and when they did all of a sudden they were “good” people. There is a huge theme of Christianity in this book and honestly I didn’t like it.

I also didn’t like how in multiple instance Angelika and her brother Victor are discussing cocks for angelika, I’d be disgusted talking about stuff like that with my brother so it was very very uncomfortable to read. This book overall is fine but I didn’t love it nearly as much I as liked the hating game.

Angelika Frankenstein Makes her Match by Sally Thorne
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

This book tells the story of Victor Frankenstein’s sister, Angelika. As the story goes, Angelika was Victor’s laboratory assistant who aided him in all of his creations. This time, Angelika creates a man she hopes will awaken and fall desperately in love with her. She does not expect the inner turmoil he will have about finding out who he was.

This book was so entertaining. I definitely have to describe myself as skeptical and hesitant of this book based off of the title and synopsis. I have no interest in Frankenstein at all - but I have loved Sally Thorne’s previous books, so I HAD to read this one. And I’m so glad I did!

This was a very odd combination of regency romance + 1800s setting + a stretch of the imagination and it all worked together in such a surprising way. I honestly did not expect to enjoy this as much as I did.

I loved the characters and how they were written. They were so easy to love and had me by the heart strings at the end. Thorne does an excellent job of creative dialogue and witty banter.

The story of character growth; head-over-heels, whole-hearted love, and a little bit of *scientific-magic* was so fun to read! I adored the ending.

Thank you for this advanced review copy of Angelika Frankenstein Makes her Match!

This book was…wow. There were moments I found it boring, others I got frustrated, others I was sad, but overall it was such a fun romance read, and, as it’s supposed to release in September, the Frankenstein retelling element was the perfect spooky halloween touch! Sally Thorne has done it again, and anyone who loved the Hating Game should definitely give this book a chance!! Rounded up the 3.5 stars to 5.

This book is so strange, and I write that with a healthy dose of admiration. What an unusual romance novel, and so inventive and eccentric. I can say that I've never read a historical/sci-fi/fantasy/comedic romance quite like it.

On the same night that Victor Frankenstein first animates his Creature, Angelika Frankenstein--his partner in scientific and engineering endeavors--also animates who she hopes will be her perfect mate. A little long in the tooth at 24, no prospects for marriage in sight, and a keen awareness that she will have no real place of her own once her brother marries, Angelika hopes that her sewn-together suitor will awaken and fall in love with her. He does awaken, and he does fall in lust...but their road to love is complicated by amnesia, a potential love rival, a missing Creature, and the failing body of Angelika's potential lover.

The good: again, this book is so weird that it's charming. Angelika is smart, self-sufficient, and perhaps too headstrong for her own good, and over the course of her budding romance with Will (her reanimated suitor), she becomes kinder and more empathetic. It's got a really subversive sense of humor at play, especially when it comes to the sexual aspects of the book; it's a book that does not take itself or any of the characters too seriously. And the author's Blackthorn Manor--a miniature of which is the start of her Instagram--plays a big role in the plot.

The swing-and-miss: the book didn't quite gel as a romance. Angelika loves him at first sight (when he's a corpse) and unconditionally, so there's not much growth there. Meanwhile, there are strange dynamics that aren't well-addressed about the whole "making your perfect mate": what agency does he have when she's his maker and he's at her mercy with amnesia? It's quite jarring early on when she lacks the empathy she later demonstrates, so at times it feels icky--beyond the general ick factor of wanting to have sex with a body that was a corpse just hours ago...and has a hand-picked penis.

There's a very specific audience that will love this book, although I'm pretty sure that it won't be the readers who adored the author's contemporary romances. This is maybe the romance you gift to the delightful kook with a strange sense of humor. To them, I highly recommend the book. To the rest, pick this book up if you are ready for a truly unique reading experience; in a genre where novels can be formulaic or predictable, this one will keep you guessing.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me the opportunity to read and review this novel. I am rating this book based the stars due to lack of time to leave a full review.

Enjoyed this zany, very original book. So inventive, and very skilled writing. Major points for character development and sheer originality. Can’t wait for more from Sally Thorne. 4/5 stars!

Man, I wanted to like this. Viktor and Angelika Frankenstein live a privileged, odd life (I thought of the Addams Family several times) who lost their parents young and live a ridiculously wealthy life. They are both scientists and work on bringing people back from the dead. Except - Angelika is only interested in bringing back someone who will love her. So she finds her perfect man at the morgue, switches out some parts and voila - Will is brought back to life. What could go wrong? The banter is fun, the relationship between siblings was interesting at times -but I could never get over the fact this is a dead man. And maybe people who love The Nightmare before Christmas will be ALL over this but it wasn't for me.

I adore The Hating Game by this author and had extremely high expectations for this one. A historical romcom/retelling/gothic vibes? Sounded perfect! And I did enjoy it and it even had me giggling a few times, Thorne knows how to write banter!

Super light read, so if that's something people are into or looking for, they would probably love this! I was a bit bored through some of it and thought there was a lot of nothing happening at times. With all that being said, super weird (in a fun way), light hearted story and I think its a perfect fall read for sure!

I don't generally read retellings of literature; either they don't add much to the original, or they go really far off-book and feel too far out there. This book does an ok job, mostly concentrated at the end, of setting up how this story comes to be "inspiration" for the original, and the reasoning for the big difference.

The character of Angelika, her relationship with Victor, and their living situation all feel difficult to believe. Readers do not have to have read the original for this to make sense; a passing familiarity through cultural references is fine.

eARC from Netgalley.

RATING: 2.5/5 STARS

I absolutely loved the premise for this book, but unfortunately felt the execution was... lacking. Aspects of the setup I really enjoyed were the twist on Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, the sibling relationship between Victor and Angelika, and the possibility of a slow-burn love story. However, the romance in this book was odd? and a little bit all over the place? Angelika is instantly in love with Will, based on his appearance, which I found quite superficial. Will also has a physical attraction to Angelika that also feels very insta-lovey. I didn't feel the chemistry between them. A huge aspect of Sally Thorne's writing in the past that has resonated with me was how she writes romance so I'm bummed I didn't click with this one. But I'd definitely try another one of her novels in the future.

⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1/2. Utterly bizarre and occasionally amusing, “Angelika Frankenstein Makes Her Match” is a mash-up of Mary Shelley’s Gothic, proto-science fiction classic and an over-the-top romantic comedy.

The title character is the self-absorbed daughter of the wealthy Frankenstein family. Having driven away suitors with her detailed questionnaires and unconventional manners, Angelika has resorted to helping her eccentric brother Victor with his scientific experiments to alleviate her boredom. Oh, and to make herself a mate. She is anxious, lonely, and… horny. She is very, very horny.

Her fourth attempt at a homemade husband succeeds. Or does it? Her reassembled man comes alive, and he does not have a memory of his previous self. He is kind, humble, intelligent, and… well-built. However, Will—as they start to call him—senses that he cannot marry Angelika. He is conflicted between his… ahem… obvious physical attraction to her and an unshakeable feeling that he is already committed to someone else.

Author Sally Thorne has put her own unique spin on “Frankenstein,” focusing the story on Angelika’s quest to both help Will uncover his true identity and also somehow convince him to marry. There are some side plots with her brother and his own monster, his fiancé, the manor’s household staff, and local townspeople. I feel like the novel started off very strong and promising, but as more characters and sub-plots got added and the longer Angelika and Will’s will-they-or-won’t-they romance stretched, my attention started to wander and I felt less invested. I also did not care for the religious undertones that crept in the last third of the book. However, I do think this would make a fun read for a Halloween book club meeting or an autumn vacation. Just don’t try to take the book too seriously!

Thank you to NetGalley and Avon Books for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review. My review was posted online on June 19, 2022, to Goodreads here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4619356086.