Review: This Will Be Fun: A Novel

This Will Be Fun: A Novel by E.B. Asher
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Well, this book certainly did not live up to its title! I admit, though, that it follows loosely, vaguely "The Princess Bride," and those parts were interesting to figure out. (I loved the movie!). I have to say that adding a modern twist to this sort of novel was intriguing and kept me on my toes. For instance, having an ancient type of Uber or Lyft, using a tapestry as a cell phone, and various other technological/magical instances of modern meets magic.

Now comes the complaining part - If you don't mind that over 50% of the book is the three main characters bemoaning about how they hate themselves or angsting about their love lives or lack thereof, then jump right in. Even when a couple of them do finally get together for some nookie, they are still miserable. And that "quest" that the Queen asks them to go on seemed to be just haphazardly thrown in to keep us reading. Although, in the end, the fighting and the magic bits were quite interesting.

I would have given up on this very frustrating and, dare I say, sometimes boring novel if it wasn't for a hint I got in another reviewer's spoiler.

It is interesting to note that E.B. Asher is really three different author's, and it does show.

*ARC was supplied by the publisher Avon/HarperCollins, the author, and NetGalley. My thanks to all.

View all my reviews

SYNOPSIS: "

The Princess Bride meets People We Meet on Vacation in this cozy romantasy about a group of friends who once saved their magical land together but haven’t spoken in ten years, reuniting to attend a royal wedding then ending up on a new quest to defend the realm, for readers of Legends and Lattes and lovers of Shrek.

Ten years ago, they saved the realm. It ruined their lives.

In the magical realm of Mythria, everyone remembers how best friends Beatrice and Elowen, ex-bandit Clare, and their heroic leader Galwell the Great defended the queendom from darkness. Ten years later, the former heroes have never recovered from what their famous quest cost them—including the life of Galwell. None ever planned on speaking to the others again. Until, that is, they receive an invitation they cannot ignore—the wedding of the Queen of Mythria, whose life they saved when she was princess.

Reunited on the road, retracing their original heroic quest, is no fun whatsoever for Beatrice and Clare—Clare not over the one-night-stand in their past, Beatrice unable to forget the man who once had her heart—nor for Elowen, unprepared for the return of her former flame, the charming and cunning Vandra. While reuniting with ex-friends and ex-lovers is challenging enough, their new journey grows perilous when the kidnapping of the groom reveals the resurgence of the dark forces from the heroes’ past, plotting domination only Mythria’s onetime defenders could maybe—just maybe—defeat.

Dusting off old weapons and old instincts, they face undead nemeses, unquenchable passions, crystal caves, coffee shops, enchanted swords, games of magical Truth or Dare—and hardest of all, their past, rife with wounds never healed and romances never forgotten.

With companions like theirs, every love story is a quest for happily ever after."