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RedditI finished this series last night so now I’m doing a The Harlequin Crew series review sharing my thoughts on the series by Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti. I did not read the prequel novella, Devil’s Pass, yet though I’m sure I’ll read that along with all the novella’s from Zodiac Academy too.
As usual I try to keep spoilers to a minimum but there may still be a few small spoilers so read with caution.
“We learn to recognize our own, don’t we? The forgotten, broken girls. But we are so much more than that. Embrace it. Own it. Become who you were born to be. Life is too short to spend it accepting your place in the gutter when there are stars just waiting for you to rise up and claim them. And I swear, when you ascend, there will be no man on this earth powerful enough to pull you from the throne you build for yourself.”
Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti, The Harlequin Crew Series
I will not be doing individual reviews of this series in order to avoid spoilers, instead I will be talking about the series as a whole.
This series is a dark romance reverse harem that may cause anxiety and emotional damage. There are several triggers so you will want to check my trigger list below along with the triggers that the authors give in the books.
Trigger Warnings
Since we don’t always get trigger warnings on books I like to give trigger warnings in my reviews. This can help people avoid certain triggers that could hurt their mental well being.
Possible Triggers in this book are:
- Abusive Relationship
- Alcohol
- Alcoholism
- Animal Abuse (not by an MC’s)
- Anxiety
- Assault
- Attempted Murder
- Attempted Rape
- Blood
- Bones
- Branding
- Car Accident
- Child Abuse
- Death
- Depression
- Drugs
- Emotional Abuse
- Fire
- Gore
- Gun Violence
- Hallucinations
- Kidnapping
- Misogyny
- Murder
- Physical Abuse
- Poisoning
- Profanity
- Prostitution
- PTSD
- Rape
- Sexual Abuse
- Sexual Assault
- Sexual Harrassment
- Sexually Explicit Scenes
- Slut Shaming
- Snakes
- Stalking
- Suicide (Mention)
- Torture
- Violence
For a list of the triggers I look for you can check out this link here. This may or may not be a complete list of triggers for this book, I do my best to make sure I mark anything that could be a potential trigger but I may accidentally miss triggers.
Let it be known that the Sexual Assault triggers are all involving the bad guy. Additionally, most of the sexual assault triggers are in one book in the series and it’s not dwelled upon for long.
If you are hyper sensitive to some of these triggers please read with caution, or feel free to leave a comment or message me. I will gladly try to answer questions without giving away spoilers.
The Harlequin Crew Reading Order
This series needs to be read in order and there are 5 books in the series with a prequel novella that can be read too. I personally save all novellas for last. The novella is Devil’s Pass. The entire series is on Kindle Unlimited and I highly recommend paying for the subscription service if you read a lot.
The Harlequin Crew Series Review
Ten years ago Rogue was cast out of Sunset Cove by the boys who promised to love her forever. After a brush with death she finds herself right back in Sunset Cove. Since she’s back she decides she’ll make them pay for breaking her heart.
As per usual I’m only giving the synopsis for the first book in order to avoid spoilers. While this might be the start it’s not at all where the series ends up because the Twisted Sisters know how to take us for a wild ride.
This series is filled with betrayal, love, acceptance of the past, forgiveness, and learning to love again. There is action, suspense, thrills, and a lot of moments where you will likely shout at the characters for one reason or another.
I really loved how this series brought in characters from Kings of Quarantine and Dead Man Walking Duet. I miss those characters a lot and it was good to see how they could interact with the Harlequin Crew.
That being said, the world building, character development, and the emotional roller coaster that comes with this series is fantastic. Not quite as heartbreaking as some of their other series but absolutely wonderful. Once again Caroline and Susanne made the emotional damage hurt so good.
The Harlequin Crew Characters
Rogue is our female main character and I absolutely love her. She’s a badass, takes no shit, never the damsel, and incredibly strong. There is only one part in the entire series in which she annoyed me but I won’t give any spoilers. I absolutely fell in love with Rogue from the beginning and loved reading her story.
While all of the characters had a lot of growth I really enjoyed Fox’s growth. He went from overbearing to finding his happy medium in being able to give up control and learn how to be a better friend.
Maverick also had some amazing growth in learning to forgive and dealing with his past trauma. I enjoyed his brand of crazy and loved how he was always the tough guy but has this heart of gold. He’s a fantastic character.
I don’t pick favorites but if I was going to JJ is it for me. He reads spicy books, is liberated and supports liberation, he’s funny, but he’s also this amazing caring guy who just tugs at your heartstrings. I love JJ.
Chase will likely be on your shit list for a while but he won’t stay there for long in the series. His redemption arc is brutal. I adore Chase for a lot of reasons especially for what he does in Paradise Lagoon.
Mutt is my favorite character in the entire series. He’s hilarious, expressive, protective, and scared of nothing. Best character of all time.
Some bad guys get redemption, some bad guys get what’s coming to them, some people make appearances and enhance the story. All the characters are written well and I really enjoyed all of them.
The Harlequin Crew Reading Experience
I did not find this series to be as emotionally taxing as other books the Twisted Sisters have written, but it was still an emotional roller coaster. I cried, I got angry, and I laughed a lot. I love series like this that take you for a ride.
While there are absolutely moments that leave you screaming in anger there are more moments of laughter and cheering. I really enjoyed the happy medium between emotional damage and happy moments.
The entire series took me about six days to read where I did mostly reading with a few breaks for normal life things.
- Sinners Playground is 625 pages.
- Dead Man’s Isle is 594 pages.
- Carnival Hill is 449 pages.
- Paradise Lagoon is 632 pages.
- Gallows Bridge is 660 pages.
I did force myself to take a short most of a day break between Carnival Hill and Paradise Lagoon because I did not care for decisions the characters made at the end of Carnival Hill and I knew I was going to be pissed through at least the first quarter of Paradise Lagoon.
I personally needed that break for a minute to think through what the authors would end up doing. I happened to be correct in my predictions but there were still a lot of twists that made it interesting despite my own correct prediction.
Star Rating
Before I rate this book I want to give you a bit of background about what my rankings mean. I typically read books that I check out through the Libby app with my local library or through Kindle Unlimited.
I rarely buy ebooks unless they are cheaply priced or on sale. I also very rarely buy physical copies of books. I’m a bit of a minimalist so I have to absolutely adore a book to buy a physical copy that will be proudly displayed in my home.
So my ranking system is as follows:
- 5 Stars equals I am buying a physical copy of this book. I will read this book at least 10 more times, it is the best ever.
- 4 stars equals a great book. I might buy an ebook version when it’s on sale so that I can re-read it at least one more time.
- 3 stars equals a good book. I likely won’t read again but I appreciate the story.
- 2 stars equals “Meh.” I will not read this book again, it had a lot of problems and I did not care for it.
- 1 star equals a bad book. I barely finished this book and I will never recommend anyone waste valuable book reading time on this book.
- 0 stars is a did not finish book. I will never finish that book and it is banished.
The Harlequin Crew series gets 5 stars, 3 peppers, and 2 tissues. I was thankful that I wasn’t brought to ugly crying with this series though I absolutely had moments of distress. It was a fun read that was filled with action and twists without leaving me with a book hangover. I appreciated this a lot.
Final Thoughts on The Harlequin Crew Series
I really enjoyed this series and will likely revisit it in the future. I loved the references to other books and at the end of the series I believe there is an easter egg for a future series that the Twisted Sisters are working on, at least I hope so.
One of my favorite parts about reading books by Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti is that there are often references to their other series. Sometimes we even get things that could give us a look into what’s to come for those series. One day soon I will go through and create a list of all the quotes from their books that talk about their other series.
Other Reviews of Twisted Sisters Books:
- Ruthless Boys of the Zodiac Series Review
- Forget Me Not Bombshell Book Review
- Kings of Quarantine Series Review
- Dead Men Walking Duet
Have you read The Harlequin Crew series? What are your thoughts? Let me know in the comments below. Follow me on Tik Tok and Pinterest for more like this and pin this to your favorite book boards.
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