<i>She wouldn’t understand, and he couldn’t explain. How bad it felt to be a shock. To be an idea people had to get used to. To be a moment of hesitation. A flinch when someone touched you. A wariness in their eyes. </i>

Every time I read a new book in the Alexis Hall’s Spires series I think it might just be my favourite and Pansies is no exception.

<i> Alfie Bell is . . . fine. He’s got a six-figure salary, a penthouse in Canary Wharf, the car he swore he’d buy when he was eighteen, and a bunch of fancy London friends.
It’s rough, though, going back to South Shields now that they all know he’s a fully paid-up pansy. It’s the last place he’s expecting to pull. But Fen’s gorgeous, with his pink-tipped hair and hipster glasses, full of the sort of courage Alfie’s never had. It should be a one-night thing, but Alfie’s never met anyone like Fen before.
Except he has. At school, when Alfie was everything he was supposed to be, and Fen was the stubborn little gay boy who wouldn’t keep his head down. And now it’s a proper mess: Fen might have slept with Alfie, but he’ll probably never forgive him, and Fen’s got all this other stuff going on anyway, with his mam and her flower shop and the life he left down south.
Alfie just wants to make it right. But how can he, when all they’ve got in common is the nowhere town they both ran away from.</i>

With Pansies, Hall takes notions of who we are, who others expect us to be, who others are and who we expect them to be, and throws them in a giant pot. He throws in internalised homophobia, grief, and childhood bullying. He gathers great handfuls of home, of growth, and of desire and stirs them in with a generous pinch of sea salt.

<i> If he kissed Fen in London, would he still taste of the sea?<i>

And it’s magic.

Every Spires book has hit me hard, has made me think, has dug itself under my skin, but Pansies? Pansies grabbed me by the balls, dragged me to a mirror and made me take a good hard look at myself. I saw so much of myself in Alfie Bell; of what it means to be human, of how we fuck up, of how we make amends. And on the flip side, I couldn’t figure out if I was him, if I wanted to be him, or if I just really fucking wanted him, so I guess I could relate to Fen also. Alfie is kind and kinda stupid. He is earnest and honest, he wants so much to do right by people, and he is just so bloody romantic I can’t even. And I should want to even, but alas, even tho chivalry is a bad thing now, because of tumblr or something, He falls hard and fast for Fen, and in his forthright, no nonsense, get thing done (or try to) kind of way, he just wants to take care of him.

But Fen? Fen is a hot mess. He’s sassy and proud. He’s grieving and full of guilt. He is lost, and broken, and unsettled by the way he feels about Alfie, and what that says about him, given all they’ve been through. Hall doesn’t shy away from big feelings, and even though we only get small snippets of Fen’s internal point of view in Pansies, this book delivers Big Feelings by the bowlful.

This new edition of Pansies contains a bunch of extras, including a foreword from the author, annotations, Alfie Bell’s Hashtag Eggplant Wednesday Lasagne Recipe, and Floriography: The Language of Flowers.

Thanks NetGalley and Sourcebooks for this eARC.

11/10 recommend.

3.5 stars. I have read several books by Alexis Hall and I find that my likes and dislikes for each of them are very similar. My likes; the friendships and romances are grittier; the character are more realistic and realistically flawed; up until the three quarters mark, I always root for the characters to be together. My only dislike: why is there always some angsty, unbelievable piece of drama that keeps the two character apart towards the end. It always makes me so stressed out. In this book, especially, there were enough obstacles throughout that the final drama was unnecessary. That said, I keep reading what this author writes so…there you go. I received a digital ARC from the publisher via Net Galley.

This will be an easy read for those who are fans of Alexis Hall.

Unfortunately it just didn't hit right for me. DNF.

Always an absolute fave author of mine writing just another phenomenal story that I just couldn't put down! I just ate this one up and instantly wanted to re-read the second I was finished. Everything I need and want from start to finish.

Alfie Bell is, in his heart, a Northern lad. After returning to his hometown of South Shields for the wedding of his childhood best friend, Alfie finds himself involved with an old school-”mate,” Fenimore O’Donaghue, the receiver of a younger-Alfie’s relentless bullying. Pansies follows Alfie and Fen as they, individually and collectively, navigate identity, grief, the past, and the ever-shifting dynamics of family, friendship, and relationships in adulthood.

As a preliminary matter, this book hit three of my least favorite technical writing choices: 3rd person limited POV , written dialect (though Hall - as per usual- nails authenticity), and POVs via written letters. None of these choices factor into the review, but are included here only to make the point that if you are like me and finds these things slightly irksome, please endure. It will be worth it.

There is plenty in Pansies that is so well-done and effortlessly makes you laugh, and hurt, and cry with Alfie Bell & Fen (shout out to Greg for also being fantastic). The Do-not-do-it-yourself, Lasagna cooking, Go-Kart scenes and basically the entirety of chapter 23 are among the moments in Pansies that had me smiling irrationally (and in the case of ch. 23 - both smiling and wanting to punch Alfie Bell (though I hasten to add I do not condone violence, even if it is towards fictional men)). As usual, Hall excels in painting gorgeous imagery, detailed world building, and granting a platform for queer struggle. Indeed, where I think Pansies excels the most is in painting the many difficulties one faces post-coming-out, whether that be from the never ending coming-out to others (including friends and family), the reality of the “after,” and wrestling with one's identity in relationship to society and self-identity. All this framed in gold (a side note - this word is severely overused in this story - “gold” or “golden” is mentioned 45 times (I am not usually this persnickety but it was glaring at me this time)), with lines such as:

“She wouldn’t understand, and he couldn’t explain. How bad it felt to be a shock. To be an idea people had to get used to. To be a moment of hesitation. A flinch when someone touched you. A wariness in their eyes. How much it fucking hurt.”

Hall’s ability to make readers feel remains unparalleled. I have yet to walk away from any read written by Hall and not feel dazzled and transported, wistful and enlightened. In a way that is all Hall’s own, Hall makes one be human. I am always left with this twisted thing of wistfulness and nostalgia that is unique to Hall’s writing in a way that is truly indescribable. The closest I can come, is this bit of a letter written by Frederic Chopin:

“I keep your letters, as if they were ribbons from a beloved one. I have the ribbon; write to me, and in a week I will enjoy myself chattering to you again.”

This slight tangent is all to say: these characters and stories Hall produces are invaluable, cherished by many, and equally as invoking of emotion with each re-read.

All this aside, Pansies took me a bit longer to get into and left me a little less wonder-lusted. I suspect, unfortunately this has to do with how Alfie Bell was written, especially in the beginning - a bit bumbling or perhaps in a way that suggests he is more brute and less brain when we know he has a brain. To give Hall credit where credit is due, his technical choices with Alfie Bell do portray what he is trying to very well: Aflie is a bit repressed, confused with his identity and place, and northern-boy at heart and as the story progresses you feel his progress. His narration shifts from a bit short and short-sighted to a little more run-on, flowery, and emotional. This is brilliantly done.

Pansies is sweet and honest, somewhat clunky, a bit a mess, but hey - so is life and relationships, right? I think actually Fen and Nora summarize Pansies best:

“Um, what are weeds, then?” “Flowers where you don’t expect them.”

All in all, Pansies is worth the spot on your bookshelf and/or e-reader. If you have read Glitterland, For Real, and Chasing the Light, you will appreciate the subtle and not-so-subtle nods. The author annotations add, as always, an added level of depth and platonic parasocial-ity. It is always wonderful to see the delightfully obscure factoids, well-thought out lines and events, and personality that goes into a work.

Pansies was a victory, even if (personally) it was a harder fought one than I normally experience with Hall. This should not disway others from falling in love effortlessly with Alfie and Fen, as I am sure many have and many more will.

Honest review - ARC copy - Net Galley. Thank you Sourcebooks Casablanca for this opportunity!

Alexis Hall never ever disappointed. I read so much of his work and this is another fantastic romance. I love the characters and it is always so much fun to read Hall's book and watch the romances unfold before me. It was another great addition to his catalog of books

I think the big problem for me with this novel was that I didn't like either of the main characters. However, for all of that, I loved the commentary, from both sides, on heteronormativity, sexism and homophobia. I think I would have been a bit happier with all that had it not been for the main speaker against heteronormativity decided to change his mind and vote on the side of it by the end of the book.

Still, interesting thoughts were brought up in the process of this novel.

Alfie is the character through which we get the whole story. He's out of the closet, but continues to hold onto a lot of values that, as other characters point out more than once, went out of date in previous centuries. I'm generally okay with characters who hold onto values that are important to them, but there was just something about this character who rubbed me the wrong way.

He once was one of the men who bullied Fen way back when they went to high school. For this reason, Fen's character acts quite strangely when they first come back into contact with each other. However, we don't understand that this is why he's acting oddly until later on. Fen's character was the one of these two who improved on further acquaintance, but I still just wasn't engaged by them and their romance together by the end. Not an outright terrible book, just not one of my favourites by this author.

Just like the other books in the Spires series, I had already read Pansies before getting my hands on the ARC for this rerelease. The first time through, I enjoyed it a lot, though I didn’t connect with it as deeply as I did with some of the other books in the series. I’m not sure if it was because I had just finished For Real—which is one of my all-time favorite reads—or if I wasn’t quite in the right place to relate to the themes back then. Whatever the reason, I’m so glad I gave it another read because this time around, I absolutely adored it.

Pansies focuses mostly on character growth and the relationship between Fen and Alfie. It’s mostly made up of heartfelt conversations as the two men navigate their evolving roles in each other’s lives and confront their personal expectations. Alfie struggles with his traditional upbringing/values and how they fit with being gay, while Fen is dealing with his mother's passing and his past with Alfie. Watching their relationship develop was truly moving.

At first, I found Alfie’s traditional values a bit frustrating (yes, I understand it’s a product of his upbringing, and it’s not necessarily a bad thing, it's just so not me). But as the story progressed, I couldn’t help but warm up to him and his kind heart. I think the moment I really started to like him was when he said he'd wait for Fen, and actually did. (I do wonder how things would have played out if he’d had to wait for years, but I like to think he would have stuck it out.)

Overall, Pansies is a wonderful story. It’s a heartfelt, authentic read that I highly recommend.

I absolutely would not trust many people to write a book like this aside from Alexis Hall. This book was hard to read, yet I didn’t put it down because it still had everything I love about Alexis Hall books: humor, great characters, great storytelling, great discussions.

A perfect book for a rainy day, so logically, it deserves a place on my for-a-rainy-day shelf on Goodreads. This book really made me laugh, despite it being serious as well: about not being labelled, or feeling disconnected from being average, or mainstream, or... you name it. Whatever it is that makes others uncomfortable, but thankfully not all. This book reminds me it is okay to be you, no matter how you identify, either sexually, or the way you dress, you cut your hair, your hobbies, do the things you love! And yes, in this demanding and deafening world we need reminders like that, well.., I do and I am guessing I am not the only one.

I enjoyed most of the women especially, Kitty, Gothshelley, and Leyla and am hoping one of them will be in the next book in this series - which I honestly can't wait for :)

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for a copy of the book.

I'm updating this review for the new edition coming November 2024 since that one's either eluding me really thoroughly or isn't on Goodreads yet. So here goes...

Pansies has held the title of my favorite romance novel since its debut in by brain I'm not sure how many years ago and I don't know why. It probably has a lot of something to do with the trifecta of Alexis Hall's writing, the themes of death of identity and other kinds of loss and what's found on the other side, and probably very much just the non-people people that Alfie and Fen are and how their personal disasters and ultimate growth go together in some way that makes my heart thump with joy. The new Pansies and the old Pansies are much the same but different and I enjoyed all but one of the differences. I'm not going to talk about that because one, who cares what I think, and two, the new Pansies is still the pinnacle (so far, yay for new stories coming!) of the Spires series for me and everything in the review below still stands.

********************

I've been meaning to review this book forever but I'm scared to. I don't know how to do it justice without writing an entire essay, which I'm not going to do. People have. You can Google them.

I first fell in love with Alexis Hall's writing through Boyfriend Material. I loved it enough to do the thing where you hoover up the backlist kind of all at once. So after Luc and Oliver, I picked up Glitterland. And loved Ash and Darien even more. So, I thought, might as well go in for the Spires series because Glitterland was the best romance I'd as of yet read. Picked up Pansies and never really put it down again. I love it like cheese on bread or Cadbury mini eggs, but more depending on the time and place. I've just finished reading it for the nth time. These boys have my heart. It's a fine treatment of the bully/bullied to lovers concept wrought plausible by Alfie's earnestness and Fen's anger. Together they just have that certain unknowable chemistry (the characterizations gods smile on Alexis Hall) that hits the swoon bullseye.

I'm a writer of love stories and there's a lot that I could go on about just picking apart the craft elements and every little thing that works so nicely to make this my favorite contemporary romance novel, but I'm not going to. I'm just going to list some bullets:
* Alexis Hall shines very bright in contemporary romance, and I feel like the Spires series is somehow either very personal, or just extremely heartfelt. There's heart and soul all over these stories, but not in a gross, bloody way. They're so touching, and I just find Pansies the touchingest of all. The vulnerability of these two men, done in Hall's signature voice, which for all its sardonic consistency still spits out characters delightfully different from each other, across all books, is chef's kiss.
* That's it. I recommend this book hugely

Although admittedly the premise of this book is not something I would seek out by myself, I would read Alexis Hall's grocery list and consider it a five stars. Though there were some moments that felt like a hit or miss, overall the exploration of family, of grief, and of course, of love, weighed out any grievances I could air. Just an overall fantastic read.

Alexis Hall has become a go-to for quirky and sentimental m4m romcoms with a twist. Sometimes the characters are easy to connect to, others they are not. Pansies, the 4th in his Spires series, presents a former school bully and his victim who reconnect years later. One recognizes the other, but not until they sleep together does the second realize who his liaison really is. Fen and Alfie have several rows but find a way to fall for one another, and it's a lovely romance... but there's a lot wrong at the core. Perhaps messy like real relationships? I enjoyed the friends and family members in this one more than the two lovers coming together. But I will eagerly await book 5 and 6 in the series, already committed by the author, revolving around side characters from prior books.

Pansies by Alexis Hall was such a GOOD book. Ugh, I love Alexis Hall's writing. He definitely knows how to make you feel things. I thought the character dynamics for this book was so unique and I could definitely see how it could potentially not work but it worked so well! It's well-written, you feel for the characters and you want things to work out but at the same time, you can't help but wonder HOW can they work out? I loved it. If Alexis Hall writes it, I will read it and most likely rave about. This was no different.

I found the pacing slow and the plot a little uninteresting. I couldn’t feel the spark between Fen and Alfie. I really disliked Fen’s character. He was a little confusing with how he would react one way to Alfie and then immediately change in the next second. The writing does a poor job of setting the environment of the scene. Overall, this book wasn’t for me.

This review will not be posted on my social media.

Alexis hall has a way of telling stories that grips you, and a bully looking for redemption a decade after high school from the man he’s falling in love with is a concept that was at once adorable and tough

When I saw this next instalment of the Spires Stories was available on NetGalley (via Alexis Hall’s account), well, to say I literally jumped to request it was a huge understatement.

The Spires Stories are all stand alone books so you can read any of them in whichever order you like.

Pansies follows the story of Alfie and Fen who have a complicated history as kids thrown together by chance, desire and connection Alfie, at first doesn’t understand. Both dealing with their own problems they find comfort in each other. Can Fen learn to forgive and can Alfie prove he’s not the same boy who made Fen’s life so miserable all those years ago?

A story about love, grief, forgiveness and coming to terms with the person you are, even if that person isn’t who you (and others) thought you should be.

Alexis Hall’s books always make me feel all the emotions, I laugh, felt sad and rooted for these two to get it together until the very end. One of my favourites!

3.5/5

ARC provided by publisher through Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.

PANSIES is an outlier when it comes to Alexis Hall books for me. Typically, I love their books. The Spiers series in particular has had some stand out books for me. The last one, FOR REAL, might be my favorite Hall book hands down. But I also believe that not every author writes for every one of their readers. Different topics appeal to different people and the like. Before this novel, I had never read anything even remotely close to the bully trope. I do think it differs from the enemies to lovers trope tremendously, as I think there is a more equal playing field when it comes to power and animosity. Whereas in a bully romance, the power is usually more one sided. Coming out of this novel I can confidently say I do no like bully romances.

PANSIES features many of the things people loved in Hall’s other books in the series. Two people set adrift in the world and looking for something that they find in each other. It includes Hall’s stellar mastery of the craft of writing and is chock full of emotion and grief and pining. These are all things I enjoyed in the previous novels as well as this one. I have no qualms with the writing.

What I didn’t like was the romance itself (ok that’s a lie I saw the appeal and divorced from the bullying aspect I thought it was sweet). So, what I get from a bully romance is the initial tension between the two romantic interests stems from the animosity the two had for each other. And that’s what seems to be happening here. Alfie never really apologizes for what he did to Fen and Fen reads as though he’s being bowled over by Alfie’s attempts to get with him, smothering any protests he might have had about being with Alfie. The romance doesn’t feel earned? Alfie also seems to be dealing with a healthy dose of internalized homophobia that he slowly works through throughout the novel, and it colors a lot of his interactions with the people around him. I do not blame him for feeling this way but the way he handles some of these out bursts left a bad taste in my mouth. It is also never explicitly said what Alfie did when bullying Fen all those years ago and while that doesn’t matter because bullying is bullying, it matters when Fen is bringing it up and Alfie is constantly downplaying his actions and his involvement. This is my stance on this book and this particular trope, but I loved Hall’s last romance that contained an age gape romance that many people did not like. It is all subjective.

This is all not to say I did not like the characters themselves. I think Alfie does a lot of growing throughout the novel and it’s sweet to see him reconnecting with his parents and his old friends. Fen also grows by accepting help and learning to live with the grief over his mothers passing. I liked the parts of this book that weren’t entirely focused on the romance between Fen and Alfie. The last 30% of the book did pick up but again I kept coming back to the origins of the romance.

This is my favorite of the Spires novels. I loved it years ago when I first read it, and I loved it now rereading it.

A refreshing take on a bully romance, this is a great example of Hall doing what he does best: giving us a lovingly meandering queer romance that deftly navigates realistic ups and downs. Did the third act seem a little thin, reasoning-wise? Sure, but it was still enjoyable.