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Jul 10, 2017miraellie rated this title 0.5 out of 5 stars
90% sex, 10% actual good content. I've read romance novels less concerned about sex than this book was. I'm uncertain if McGinnis meant to do a study of rape culture in a fantasy setting, but if she did, Given to the Sea fails miserably. The truly annoying part, however, is that the world is just interesting enough and the stakes are high enough to be engaging, but the rushed pay off did not make it worth sticking with 300+ pages of "omg he/she is so pretty I wanna have all the sex with them but oh no I can't because of... reasons!!!!" Seriously, this book was way too focused on what/who everyone's genitals were doing and not the fact that their world is literally ending. The thing was, I would have accepted the focus on the sex/desire if any of these characters had any interactions that made me believe they saw each other as human beings and not pretty people they want to sleep with. Donil is immediately attracted to Khosa, and she to him; Dara has supposedly been in love with Vincent for a while, but from the way she acts around him, you wouldn't know it. Vincent and Khosa had more development than any of the others, and yet I'm supposed to believe two interactions with Donil makes it unbearable for Khosa to consider saving her own life and running? No. What a waste of a pretty solid concept.