I really, really wanted to like this. The narrator has a wonderful, comical air about him, and the story itself is very interesting. I will finish it eventually, but this was just too slow moving for me right now.

DNF at 10%

I'm pretty picky with the narration on my books, and there is something about the way this is narrated that my brain is having a herd time with. I think it's the 1st Person narration of an observer, and not of an actual involved character.

I don't like to give star ratings if I DNF a book, but since I'm forced to, this is not an accurate rating of the overall book

⭐️=3.5 | 😘=5 | 🤬=5 | ⚔️=4 | 18+

summary: Good Omens (urban fantasy with quirky omniscient narrator giving fourth wall-breaking commentary) meets Bridgerton (hot people having sex in empire waist dresses) meets A Midsummer Night's Dream (morally suspicious fae thingies messing around with human lives; the narrator claims they gave Shakespeare the idea for AMSND and he stole it without credit, a joke that was funny the first time and tired the fifth). basically, the MC is cursed and she has to find out who and how and why and falls in love with an aloof and Byronic daughter of a duke and there’s a quirky best friend and she breaks the curse woooo

thoughts: convinced that Boyfriend Material was Hall’s magnum opus and nothing else he writes will ever compare. Mortal Follies has the mix of humor, social commentary, and steam typical of Hall’s work, but because of the omniscient narrator, he struggled to keep a consistent tone throughout; like, there’d be an incredibly steamy conversation and then absolute crickets with the romance for like five chapters, because neither of the love interests are narrating!! it’s a random hobgoblin, and all the “haha foolish mortals I care not for their problems I tell this story for my own purposes” got old veeeeeeeery fast.

I still had fun though––like this was genuinely entertaining!! there were some fun quips and curse-solving adventurey moments, but looking at it as a whole, it’s… not great

This is the Bridgertons with fairies!! I loved every page and really wished that there were going to be more books set in this world. The romance, setting, and mythology were all amazing. I can not wait for more.

Maelys Mitchelmore has been cursed. She doesn't know by whom, or why, but she does know that she can't appear in public without humiliating misfortune--a shredded dress, all the food rotting, etc. And the only person who may know how to get to the bottom of things is Lady Georgiana Landrake, the Duke of Annadale--who just so happens to be one of the suspects. And, on top of that, Maelys is drawn to her in a way she's never quite been drawn to anyone else.

Mortal Follies is narrated by a hobgoblin, which makes for some really fun moments. I loved the combination of historical romance and fantasy, of the fae being a part of the everyday world in a genre in which that's not normally the case.

Mortal Follies is a lot of fun, with a great cast of characters, really fun narration, and lots of twists and turns.

I am saddened to say that I could not finish this book. I was very interested in the premise, and the prelude really had me hooked.

Unfortunately, I made it only 1/3 of the way through. By this point, I realized every step was going to unfold in much the same manner: uncover a truth/incident, have quite the discussion about it, make an attempt to correct/deflect, have quite a discussion about it, uncover another truth/incident, etc. In short, there was far too much talking and not enough doing.

I feel as though the narrator was a wasted opportunity. Through the narrator, we could have experienced more description, more world building, and definitely less talking. Maybe this comes up later, but it would have also been great if the narrator was used as an actual plot device in the form of the unreliable narrator. If it does come up, I think I would have enjoyed a some foreshadowing to it in the first 1/3.

All in all, I really felt this one came up short. I wanted to love it. I love curses and regency settings. I do want to know how it unfolds, but unfortunately I do not have attention span to make it to the end. The talking is just too much for me. I want to feel the action. I want to feel the intensity of the moment. Instead, I just have the same level of "Oh no, why is this happening to me?"

Honestly, I wish there was more to the romance too. Lady Georgianna seems like she would have been a wonderfully interesting character, but her scenes are compromised in comparison to Maelys's friend Miss Bickle. And the writing is bogged down by the narrator. I'd have loved less of his opinions too.

I am giving it two stars as I did not finish it, and it absolutely had potential. For the sake of the author, I will not post this to social media.

<b>Title:</b> Mortal Follies
<b> Series:</b> N/A
<b> Author(s):</b> Alexis Hall
<b> Genre:</b> LGBT, Romance, Fantasy, Historical Fiction
<b>Date Published:</b> June 06, 2023
<b>Date Read:</b> May 16-19, 2023
<b>Format:</b> eBook
<b>Free?:</b> ARC via NetGalley

<b>Overall Rating:</b> ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️.5 / 5

<b>Spice Rating:</b> 🔥 / 5
<b>Fluff Rating:</b> 🩷🩷/ 5
<b>Tear Rating:</b> 💧/ 5
<b>Humor Rating:</b> 😆😆😆 / 5

<i>”The question is not how much longer I have lived, dear heart, but how much more I have lived.”</i>

<b>The perfect blend between history and myth</b>, Mortal Follies takes us through a magical 19th-century England. The story is told by our narrator, a mischievous hobgoblin with a flair for the absurd, following a cast of hilarious characters as they navigate being cursed by Greek goddesses and the social drama of the ton.

When I first started reading this book, I wasn’t sure I would enjoy it. The style of the narrator took some getting used to, and initially, it felt unnecessary. However, as the story progressed, I found the narrator’s presence more interesting, as this invisible sprite became the supernatural influence causing someone to feel a chill on the back of their neck or their shoe to go missing, or even the answer of “how did they know to be there!”. By the end, I was laughing out loud and enjoying the banter and silliness of our dear narrator.

<b>The plot</b> was enjoyable to say the least. I was surprised to have such a big climactic moment to the story at the halfway point, wondering what the author could possibly throw at us in the second half. <b>I fear that the second half, however, didn’t have as much intrigue as the first, with the ending feeling slightly rushed.</b> It could be said, though, that this was keeping with the style of our hobgoblin narrator, who cares not for the dull moments of humans such as “happily ever afters”.

My favorite point of the entire book though was a supporting character, Miss Lysistrata (Lizzie) Bickle. Lizzie is an eccentric, free-spirited dreamer, who is either a genius or completely insane. Some of the most humorous moments in the book came from Lizzie’s character, with my favorite exchange including:
<blockquote>
”But don’t worry, when you <i>are</i> murdered, I have simply <i>hundreds</i> of plans for vengeance.”
“Hundreds?”
“Oh yes. The first involves scorpions.”
“And the second?”
“Also scorpions.”
</blockquote>

The spice was fairly tame, with the bulk of the scenes (I believe only 2 of them) being conversation between the two. Again, this could probably be attributed to keeping with the narrator’s disdain for human emotions and interactions that don’t make them laugh or further their storytelling ventures.

Overall, <b>I would definitely recommend this book</b> to others. It was a fun read, an interesting concept, and <b>I laughed until the end.</b> If you’re looking for a lighthearted and funny <i>Bridgerton</i> meets <i>The Odyssey</i> story with a sprinkling of LGBT romance, then this is for you.

Thank you for Netgalley providing me this book for an honest review.

I first took notice of this book and author due to the cover. The words and pink cover were just such total opposites from each other I had to read and see what the story was like. I was pleasantly surprised by the research and depth that went into making this 19th century English setting book in a fae/old god infused world all mixed together. I loved seeing the friendship between Lysistrata (Lizzie) and Maelys Mitchelmore, our protagonist. The narrator, a rather chaotic fae named Robin, was also a delight as he related the story to the reader, or rather, more for his master, who time and again he mentioned he had to make or find something interesting in the lives of the character to share and write about, least his lord find it boring and he out of a job. The Duke of Annadale, also known as Lady Georgiana, was a nice contrast to Maelys naivety and innocence of the world around her, also brooding and rarely showing her most intimate thoughts and even fears. To be honest, after the major incident involving Maelys very life was resolved, I thought the story would be over and she'd get her happy ending with Georgiana. But there was more to be added concerning some of the older 'magics', for lack of a better word, for the Duke and what prevented her from being true to herself and her relationship with Maelys. Through so many tricks and turns the characters had to go through to achieve their goals (or escape the goals others had in mind for them) was a delight and the narrator Robin made it all the more enjoyable with his sarcastic and even sometimes malicious joys in the humans joys and discomforts. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who likes Regency style novels and a very funny narrator.

To be Featured in a Recent Reads on Youtube - First week of June
Imgur Link goes to Instagram graphic scheduled for June 27th
Blog post scheduled to go Live for June 27th

Mortal Follies is another excellent example of how Alexis Hall’s writing range is just damn impressive to me. After reading A Lady for a Duke and expecting another somber, emotional historical I was incredibly surprised at how jovial, magical, and unique Mortal Follies is.

The story is told to us through the narration of Robin - a fairy who has fallen out of favor with the courts and is sending a story to his Lord (take a guess who he might be). We get this story told in a first person POV as Robin follows around the characters in his story, his thoughts and feelings so much that he is a character all his own and I love him. The rest of the cast are equally as fantastic, some more than others. Our main two lady lovers are interesting and I felt for them and did cheer for them, however my favorite character by far was a side-character named Lizzie. I wonder if perhaps another future book may feature her as I got the feeling that Alexis Hall also enjoyed writing her.

The style is unique and the situations absurd as well. The setting is a Regency/Victorian feeling era, but mixed with fantasy as ‘Old Gods’ (pagan gods) and the Fairy are acknowledged and chased about from time to time. In fact our plot revolves around someone placing a curse upon one of Lady Lovers and their pursuit of clearing it. That made for an interestingly tense story at times, but always undercut with the humor and absurdity that really sold this for me.

I know a lot of people don’t enjoy a lot of humor or silliness in their stories - this would be one to avoid if you are that reader. However, if you enjoy the sly and some times childish humor of Fairy narrator then this is a must read. It’s hilarious at times and keeps it’s pace throughout. A big recommendation from me.

Mortal Follies was an absolutely delightful fantasy romance! For me, the absolute best part was the narrator, Robin, a Shakespearean-esque imp from the court of Titiana and Oberon who is narrating the follies of human romance he has witnessed over the years in order to pay his bills. (His narration really reminds me of Bartimaeus from the Bartimaues Trilogy by Jonathan Stroud besides the fact that these books are aimed at completely different audiences.) Due to the narration, this book felt quite different from anything else I’ve read by Alexis Hall, but it was equally as charming!

The romance itself is a sapphic, historical romance in the style of Bridgerton with an age gap and a slight dom-sub dynamic. The plot equally focuses on the characters’ romantic relationship and their fantastical adventure while Miss Mitchelmore desperately tries to rid herself of a curse.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for giving me an arc in exchange for an honest review!

I got through 45% of this book and could not get into it.

It’s definitely not the writer. I’ve read other things by this author and loved them. I just don’t think I liked her writing this genre.

So sad I had to DNF.

In theory, Mortal Follies is everything I've been currently dreaming of in one book. Sapphic Victorian romance in a world of gods and fae? An ordinary girl who's been cursed and so must work with a suspected witch to shake her curse? Yes, please! But, in practice, this particular book and I did not exactly mesh, and the main reason is the narrator.

Because...there's a narrator. And it's not the MC or her love interest. It's Puck, also referred to throughout as "Robin," who has been cursed to become a mortal storyteller, which is a clever idea, I'll give Alexis Hall credit for that. But possibly not the best choice for a romance.

Very early on, it becomes apparent that we're never going to be able to shake Puck and that all of the interactions between Maelys and Lady Georgiana are going to be subject to Puck's commentary. This might work for some readers (I've heard plenty of people call Puck "charming"), but I am one of those readers who just found the whole thing a little voyeuristic -- and a little wordy! So much time is spent describing the various objects that Puck turns themself into in order to spy on the main cast, and I would have appreciated that time spent developing the relationship between Maelys and Georgiana.

Because of the Puck thing, I didn't feel that closeness to the characters that I usually do in a good romance and so I found it hard to root for the main couple, which is a shame, because I really did like Georgiana as a love interest. She's dark and brooding -- very Byronic! -- and her banter with Maelys is top-notch.

Anyway, when I finally was able to just skim the Puck parts and focus on the story, I really enjoyed the supporting cast (especially Maelys's bestie Miss Bickle), and I felt that the tone matched the time period perfectly. I'd definitely read another Alexis Hall book, especially if he set it in Victorian times or made it sapphic. But if only someone had just gotten rid of that narrator...

Thank you to NetGalley, Alexis Hall, and Random House Publishing Group for providing an advanced free digital copy of this book in exchange for my honest thoughts.

I’m a big fan of Alexis Hall and couldn’t wait to dive into this historical fantasy! I was captivated by this world of magic, fairies, and enchanted clothing, where our leading ladies find themselves in some absurd, albeit humorous, situations and must use their wit and creative thinking to break the curses of a vengeful viscount and an angry deity.

While I really enjoyed the story, I struggled getting through the book because of the pacing, which can be attributed to the conflict, romance, and narrator. The first being how the major conflict was resolved 54% in, which truthfully, made the second half of the book sort of drag. Then there was the romance… and this slow burn was perhaps *too* slow. It’s all talk of romantic desires and entanglements until the 70ish% mark, which seemed too late in the story. Finally, the narrator was funny at first, but then their commentary became superfluous and made the story lag and the book feel much longer than its 416 pages.

I truly loved the gorgeous cover, the quirky dialogue, and the outlandish situations these colorful characters found themselves in, but I do wish it had been about 50-100 pages shorter to help with the disjointed events and odd pacing.

I love fairies, Robyn Goodfellow, the regency era, and books with LGBT plus rep. I went into this book fully expecting to love it, but it wasn’t for me. I needed clarification on the world building. Also, I read lots of books with adult language, and I’m 200 percent fine with cursing in books I read. The use of adult language felt kind of awkward. I felt lost and adrift while reading. I think more scaffolding with the old god system towards the start of the book would have helped.

The LGBT plus rep was amazing and was the best part of the book. I enjoyed the Duke’s character.

The most important thing to know before starting is that Mortal Follies takes place in the world of A Midsummer Night's Dream, and that the book immediately assumes that you know the characters in it. If you haven't yet read it or watched an adaptation, you don't HAVE to go out and do so before reading this, but it'd definitely help in appreciating the humor and the characters presented here. Just know that characters from the play like Oberon and Titania are mentioned, and the themes of gods, witches and fairies are too.

With that said, the worldbuilding that we do get for this particular tale is still pretty nice in the sense that we get told most of the information through our lovely narrator, Puck, Oberon's jester and also a fairy. This feels more like a historical fiction (sometimes even a parody) sprinkled in with the fantasy elements both in the foreground and background which that adds a sort of magical realism feel to it. There are definitely magical things that are up-front, particularly with the curses and the presence of goddesses and witches, and we follow all of the events through an almonst omniscent narrator who isn't quite involved in the action but knows all about the magic. He's super sarcastic and sassy (and at times utterly bored), and it was fun to follow him as he observes our main cast.

The characters are also either vaguely or entirely aware of certain magical things going on in the world, particularly Lady Georgiana and hilariously Miss Bickle (in which we see Puck confirm or deny whether things are real or not) that it made it fun to see the ladies and gents try to figure out how to solve Mae's predicaments with the currses. And quite honestly, ALL of Miss Bickle's lines were hilarious to me and her comedy relief completely worked for me. The book is also kind of split into two different threads that make it feel like a two-act play in a way too, which can kind of throw you off, but it still worked for me.

The only thing I didn't quite connect with was, honestly, the romance between Mae and Lady Georgiana, which I know is unfortunate to not entirely click with as that's kind of the main focus. While I did like the banter between the two, I felt the build-up didn't work for me. I don't mind insta-attraction being a part of their dynamic, but it still felt a little forced -- I think mostly because I didn't particularly click with Mae in the first place. 😅 Part of me wonders if it's because we have the tale told from Puck himself rather than Mae, but I'm not sure that's quite it either. I think it's just that she personally seemed kind of solely focused in her desire for Lady Georgiana, and I wanted some more depth. That said, I LOVED Lady Georgiana's dialogue to Mae when they do talk about their dynamics and I felt Alexis did a great job there.

Definitely a fun read, with great writing, but I can totally understand how some people felt about Puck being a narrator with a lot of quips and comments. I was a fan of it, but can see how others thought it dragged things out -- particularly whenever he's bored by humans. But can you truly blame him when he's from the world of Fairies? 😂

Is there such a thing as an Alexis Hall book I don't love? I don't think so. This was such a decadent, delicious foray into sapphic regency romance, full of glorious writing, sexy intrigue, and wit.

The beginning of this book started out so well. I really liked the way the story was narrated by Robin Goodfellow, which provided some fun commentary on the characters and their actions.

But a little over halfway through the book, after the big mystery surrounding Maelys is solved, the book seems to flounder a bit. It becomes more focused on seduction and less on plot. And then some spicy scenes start to happen. And Robin Goodfellow is still narrating what he is watching. It's no longer charming and fun but creepy.

I tried to push through but finally gave up at the 75% mark. I did enjoy the first half and wish the second half didn't go the way it did.

I love regency romances, sapphic stories, and beautiful covers. Put them all together and it's a NEED for me. I haven't yet read Alexis Hall's other books, but I've heard great things about them.

So, the story is told to us, the readers, from an outside perspective. Because it felt like it broke the fourth wall it took longer than usual for me to fall into the story. The characters almost felt disconnected from me at first. However, once I got past that disjointed feeling, I started to appreciate the tongue-in-cheek commentary of the narrator - especially when the book was unexpectedly dark (and would have been more so without them).

What really makes a book for me though is the characters, and I enjoyed them all! I liked the brooding Lady Georgiana and Maelys' bravery. I even liked all the side characters. I'll definitely be checking out the authors other works, and picking this up in audiobook so I can listen to the knavish sprite and all the latest hot gossip.

Thank you to Netgalley for the E-ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. Sorry it took so long! NOT for lack of interest, but... real life things are rough right now, and the attention span needed to really dive in to this and enjoy it were not happening very often. i was determined to finish this before the publication date though, and here we are!

I LOVED this. the whole idea of using a spirit like Sweetrobin to tell a story, observing the story in various ways, from a wisp of sunlight to a bird in the tree and from a distance of being in the future and recalling 'these are the events as i saw them two hundred years ago.' so we have a potentially unreliable narrator, because he's a trickster spirit AND it's been two centuries. OR we have a very reliable narrator because he states many times that he loves telling stories and wants to get all the details right. ORRRR he's somewhere in-between, possibly embellishing or moving things along when we could have stayed for more of a conversation, but still giving us what we need to understand.

the romance was frustrating but sweet. the fade-to-black type sex scenes were a surprise, since Hall's other books usually go into quite a bit of detail in those scenes, but it makes sense that Robin wouldn't necessarily want to describe all the things mortals get up to.

Maelys, Lizzie, Caesar, and the Duke of Annadale were all strong, well-written, well-rounded people, and even the side characters had depth and quirks.

I loved all the humor, as i always enjoy with Hall's other books. They (he?) know how to write a scene to be serious when it's needed, but still drop a well-timed quip if the character already has that as a nervous trait. the writing style of sounding like a 19th century novel was nice attention to detail, but may have lent a reason it took a while for me to get through this (I famously have a hard time with 'old-timey' styles of writing).

I will definitely be recommending this book to anyone who enjoys queer romance.

Thank you to Random House for providing me this eARC for review. I love this book.

Persons I found the narrator (Puck from a Midnight Summers Dream) hilarious. This was like reading Bridgerton but with more of my favorite fictional elements included. For instance, the Sapphic element to the story was beautiful and was a refreshing change from the compulsory heteronormative nature of historical fiction. In that way it reminds me of a recent read that I adored, The London Seance Society, because both feature a Sapphic pairing in England with paranormal influences.

I also loved this reimagined England where paranormal forces are known and accepted, rather than Christianity being the only option available to the fictional community.

I recommend this to every queer historical romance reader because it was beautiful to see a story such as this gold within the genre, full of magic and diverse representation.