Arsen by Mia Asher

Available on
Amazon * Amazon.de * Barnes & Noble * Goodreads
Synopsis:

One glance was all it took…

I'm a cheater.

I'm a liar.

My whole life is a mess.

I love a man.

No, I love two men…

I think.

One makes love to me. The other sets me on fire.

One is my rock. The other is my kryptonite.

I'm broken, lost, and disgusted with myself.

But I can't stop. This is my story.

My broken love story.

Review:

I remember when Arsen first came out and everyone was talking about it. I had it on my to-read list, but never got around to it. I remember everyone loving it, but for the life of me I have no idea why. I finally got around to reading it and no. Just no.

*Spoiler alert! There will be spoilers ahead!! Also some angry ranting*

Arsen is one of those books where the main character made me incredibly angry. This is one of those books where I have re-written this review so many times trying to have it not be so ranty. I think this is just as good as it is going to get. This was one of those books where every two seconds I had to put the book aside and yell and rant and write out everything I was feeling. It was not good.

Was I supposed to like Cathy at all? Cause I didn't. Not even a little bit. I didn't even like her in the flashback chapters. I can only imagine they were included to show how awesome Cathy and Ben were together, how everything was great before it fell apart or something. Only it didn't work for me. If anything it made me hate Cathy more. It showed me that she has always been this way. She has never been able to talk to Ben about things so why would that suddenly change now that things are not "perfect". She drove me crazy and in those flashbacks I was just yelling at her the whole time. Not good.

So Ben and Cathy have been married a while, everything was perfect apparently, but Cathy cannot carry a baby to term so she is having a hard time. She tried once to talk to Ben about it, but he didn't want to focus on the negative at the time, he was dealing with the miscarriage as well, and so that means that Cathy can never talk to Ben about anything. *sigh*

Then we have Arsen who comes and works with Cathy. She is not wearing her wedding ring the first time he meets her and he wants her. He is a super player, but he wants Cathy. I really didn't like him. He is WAY too pushy and won't listen to Cathy when she at first tries to set some boundaries. But Cathy is oh so attracted to him as well and....she would have totally just physically cheated on her husband with him sooner in the book, but oh joy! She gets pregnant again! Baby will fix all of the problems with her marriage! Yeah...so she just emotionally cheats on Ben with Arsen while she is pregnant. They just hang out together all the time, she lies to Ben about where she is (and come on. You know hanging out alone at Arsen's place and lying to Ben about it is not the same thing as being alone in your office at work! Come on!). Her constant I am not doing anything wrong while emotionally cheating on Ben thing really got to me. Man Cathy was horrible. I hated her. Hated her so much I wanted her to end up sad and alone, living on the streets with no one and nothing caring about her. Yeah, she was the worst. If the author was trying to get me to sympathize with her since she is struggling to have a child she failed.

So Cathy and Arsen get close, Cathy even kisses him for goodness sake! But it didn't mean anything...and she is so freakin dense it drove me crazy. Ben, her husband, shows up to meet her and Arsen just after she kisses him. Ben walks in on them holding hands on the couch, sitting super close and having an intimate conversation. And yet Cathy cannot understand why Ben gets upset. Why Ben doesn't want her to sit on the couch with Arsen but rather next to him. Why Ben is angry with her at all. I mean she didn't do anything wrong...*bangs head against wall repeatedly* I swear she is always like this. And it drove me crazy. How can you be so dumb? Seriously. I can see lying to yourself, trying to tell yourself you aren't doing anything wrong because you feel guilty, but seriously. She didn't seem like that is what she was doing. Ugh.

So of course *surprise, but not really* Cathy loses the baby. Which means she gets a free pass to cheat on her husband! Hurray! She can finally sleep with Arsen and not feel guilty! And keep lying to her husband. And just becoming an incredibly terrible person. Yey! Although I will say once Ben kicked her to the curb (and yey for all of his yelling at her! I was just like right on! You go Ben!!) I did enjoy the story more. I hated both Arsen and Cathy and it was just gratifying watching them self destruct and fall into this pit of despair. Watch them fall so far and just be so...horrible together. They are not good together, things don't seem very happy, and that made me incredibly happy. And when Arsen kicked her to the curb as well? Oh did I do a happy dance. I was ecstatic! Finally she will be all alone and miserable for the rest of her life!! Hooray!!!

Only of course it doesn't work like that. You have to have some bs happily ever after nonsense. The end...complete bs. I hated it. Even more so than the rest of the book. So what happens you might ask? Well let me tell you. Cathy is all sad and alone, but pregnant again. Really? Really. So this is going to be the magic baby that will fix everything right? Right. Cause babies are known to do that. *eye roll* Cathy is such a mess of a person how is she going to raise a baby by herself? Well by placing all of her happiness on the kid! The kid, Nadia, will be responsible for making sure she is okay. Way to place that on a small child's shoulders...what a great person you are.

"I need to get Nadia. I need to hold her in my arms so she can shield me from the tsunami of pain and memories threatening to sweep me away."

I know if things didn't  magically work out so she gets a happily ever after I would feel horrible for Nadia. Imagine what it would be like to grow up with Cathy as your mom? To grow up knowing that it is on you to make her happy? Not cool. Yes, Cathy is seeing a therapist or something, but she is nowhere near stable. Argh! I hated the magical baby that magically makes everything better with Cathy and the love of her life. Or whatever bs she spouted. So there you go. This book was horrible, but not because of the cheating. In fact when Cathy was cheating for reals I enjoyed the story more. No, the book was horrible because I hated Cathy, and Arsen. Oh one more thing. What was with that chapter at the end from Arsen's point of view? Was I supposed to feel for him or something? I didn't get it. He was just as bad as Cathy. Sorry, but I don't feel anything for you but hatred.

Rating: ★