Powerless: TikTok Made Me Buy It! The epic romantasy series taking the world by storm! (The Powerless Trilogy)

“I’m tougher than I look, I assure you. The strongest weapon a woman has at her disposal is that she is often underestimated. And I wield that all the time.” 😭 ahhh this book!! It’s been a while since ive been so submerged in a story and the characters. I savoured this book like a fine wine, I wished it wouldn’t end. The story building is epic, kept me hooked from the very first chapter. My first thought was, this is giving me hunger game vibes which I didn’t dislike as I love hunger games! But I hoped it would open up into its own and I think it did in the ways that count - I think you need to overlook the similarities and enjoy this story for what it is. Hunger games who?! 😉 Paedyn is officially up there with my all time favourite FMC’s!!! She may be labelled as an “ordinary” but this girl is anything but. She is an absolute bad***. She has been through some absolute horror in her life and is now living it out in the slums of Ilya with her best friend Adena. She claims to be psychic to survive and blend in with the elite. She is an epic thief!! Little did she know the guy she saves in the slums is the prince, which leads to her standing out and her name being picked for the the brutal competition - the purging trials. Anyway….. KAI!!!!! 😍❤️🫶🏼 new book boyfriend alert!! I’m so in love I can’t even. Brought up to be the kings enforcer, Kai has been brutally trained to play his role and execute whomever the king wishes. A killer. Brutal. “She is a vision, a nightmare, a dream. “ The banter between Kai and Paedyn is everything 😂 I was laughing so much throughout. The flirting and swoonworthy - ness 😍😍 I was here for it all!! But I will say, if you’re looking for any sort of spice, it’s not there. ** spoiler alert** we didn’t even get one kiss!! Soo damnnnn close!!!! 😫🥲😂 - Lauren you big tease!! You done us dirty there 😜🤣 “She is a devil. She is a deity. She is a man’s downfall in human form. She is my downfall.” And what with that ending, it might be a while till we get what we’re all waiting for!! But my god, that ending guys 😫😭 we all knew it was coming, but didn’t make it any less harder. I need the next book. Like. Now? 🙏🏼🥺

We have a world where a plague left a proportion of the Kingdom of Ilya with powers, The Elites, and a proportion without, The Ordinaries. The king wants to eliminate The Ordinaries from the kingdom. Our main female character is an Oridinary who inadvertently saves Prince Kai's life and then finds herself competing in the trials. I don't really understand why there are trials, the reason in the book seemed a bit flimsy, maybe there are better answers to come though. I found the development of powers interesting and I thought it was good how Paedyn faked her "powers". There's some nice flirting between our main characters and I really like both Pae and Kai. There are some similarities to The Hunger Games and The Red Queen. The pacing was a bit slow for me hower I loved the ending of the book and it has made me want to read the next one.

WOWW , THE TENSION , THE RAGE , THE CLIFFHANGER??!! 💔 plot line: Only the extraordinary belong in the kingdom of Ilya . . . The exceptional. The Elites. The Elites have possessed powers for decades, gifted to them by the Plague, while those born Ordinary are just that, banished from the kingdom and shunned from society. No one knows this better than Paedyn Gray, an Ordinary posing as an Elite. When she unsuspectingly saves one of Ilya’s princes, Kai Azer, she’s thrown into the Purging Trials, a brutal competition to showcase her ‘Elite’ powers. If the Trials and the opponents don’t kill her, the prince she’s fighting feelings for will if he discovers what Paedyn really is . . . completely Ordinary. my thoughts: I am utterly speechless… 🤯 from start to finish this book had me on a roller coaster of emotions , BELIEVE ME when I say that this book has more twists and turns than a snake. although this has no relevance to the plot i feel as though I should mention that as a reader I have struggled to read fantasy books in the past due to having so much information and terminology thrown at me (that I don’t understand) that in the end I have either lost interest or just put down the book. so I was VERY happy that it wasn’t the case when it came to this book. *if you have struggled to read fantasy books in the past (like me) please give this one a go and if it’s your style , listen to the audiobook not only because it’s more understandable but Kai’s voice is 🔥🔥🔥* the chokehold Kai had over me whilst reading this book was unbelievable speaking of the characters , they each had their own role that played a part in the whole of the plot. I especially loved Paedyn’s fierce and powerful personality as I think from a female perspective it shows courage to not give up , plus we love a bad b**ch over here 🫶🏼 whilst I LOVED the whole book and can’t fault the way it made me feel , as a reader who finds it hard to concentrate and zones out (a lot) this book was quite long and if I’m being honest I think it could’ve been shortened. I should also mention that whilst I’m not sure if Lauren was taking some inspiration from other books / authors - there were many similarities to the following movies; hunger games , maze runner & divergent. overall , I LOVED everything about this book and can’t wait to read book two later in the year 🥰

This romantasy epic has it all. Drama, tension, a love triangle, betrayal, murder, slowest of slow burn passion... And I absolutely loved it! Paedyn is an Ordinary living on the streets of Loot, hiding her lack of Elite powers with lies her late father instilled in her. She's a fierce, stabby FMC who isn't afraid to do whatever it takes to ensure the survival of her and her only friend. Kai, Prince Kai, is being raised to be his father's Enforcer - a mercenary, a trained killer. A chance meeting sees Paedyn save Kai's life, and as a (dubious!) reward for her efforts, her neighbours in Loot choose to nominate her for the Purging Trials - pitting her against several others, including Kai himself. There is a clear attraction between the two of them - but Kai's instructions are clear, and Paedyn has another goal in mind, that involves tricking Kai's brother Kitt, heir to the throne, and righting the wrongs being done to the Ordinaries - so what will happen? Whilst Paedyn is an absolute badass FMC, my favourite character in this book was Kai. He's in such a complicated place - raised to be a murderer against all his own wishes, despising his father, hopeful that his brother will be a totally different kind of ruler - and falling hopelessly for a girl he can never have. He fights it, and she fights it - the slow burn and banter are delectable. The concept of the trials is a little bit Hunger Games, a little bit Triwizard Tournament, but still enjoyable. I'm really looking forward to book two!

I hadn’t read any previous books by Lauren Roberts so I had an open mind when starting this series. The reviews I had read seemed a bit mixed but I purchased the book when I saw it drop to 99p on Kindle. The main character is Paedyn, an 18-year-old orphan, who has been left to fend for herself and works as a pickpocket on the streets of Ilya, after her father's brutal murder. Ilya is a kingdom ruled by a king who wants only the magical Elites to have a place and the powerless Ordinaries to be eradicated. Paedyn is a secret Ordinary and she manages to pass herself off as a Psychic using her powers of observation. Paedyn ends up being entered into the annual Purging Trials where she is forced to compete against a group of Elites, all with their own deadly magical abilities. She makes an unlikely alliance and we see her using her skills to fight to survive the trials and bring down the tyrannical king. This book was not very original, I got vibes from a combination of many other books but it was easy to read and kept me interested. The characters were good and the pace and storyline was interesting, maybe a bit predictable.The world building was something I wish we had more of but I really enjoyed learning about the different powers the Elites have and how they can be used and what their weaknesses are. Overall, a good introduction into a new series, it wasn’t amazing but it was interesting enough to make me read the rest of the series at some point.

Beyond the basic premise of Powerless and seeing an aesthetic video on Insta I didn’t know much about this book other than it’s a YA fantasy with a stabby FMC. Paedyn is an 18-year-old orphan, left to fend for herself and work as a pickpocket on the streets of Ilya, after her father's brutal murder. Ilya is a kingdom ruled by a king who wants only the magical Elites to have a place and the powerless Ordinaries to be eradicated. Of course, Paedyn is an Ordinary in hiding and using her abilities to read her adversaries' weaknesses and pass herself off as a Psychic. When she picks the pocket and then saves the life of a handsome stranger, Paedyn is entered into the annual Purging Trials. In these survival challenges she is forced to compete against a group of Elites, all with their own deadly magical abilities. Making an unlikely alliance with Kai, the king's second son and personal fixer/assassin, Paedyn must use her skills to fight to survive the trials and bring down the tyrannical king. I really enjoyed the story and characters but I know if I hadn’t read The Hunger Games I would have loved it so much more. There are so many elements which are a direct parallel to THG that it started to become a bit predictable. For example the contestants are made to gain the Ilyan peoples votes through a public interview (where Paedyn doesn’t say the script she’s meant to follow), royal balls (where of course Paedyn goes against tradition and dresses to stand out) and of course the trials themselves which despite knowing there can be only one winner they form alliances. For a new YA generation this book does a great job of combining a fast paced fantasy adventure with a very capable female main character, a dark haired morally grey Prince who only has eyes for her and enough slowburn tension to keep the reader wanting more. If like me, you’re an older reader that likes to dip back into YA then this might not be the best choice as it has so many elements of other books that it loses some of its charm and becomes too unoriginal in places. Overall an enjoyable book and I’ll definitely be reading the other two books in the series. Ratings Spice: 0.5🌶 Story: ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Characters: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐ Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐

TikTok did make me buy it for a friend as a perfect secret Santa gift. This was very much enjoyed and worth getting for anyone who likes dark fantasy.

great reading material for my daughter

Gorgeous book! Came very well packaged and no tears etc. gorgeous interior and exterior. Cannot wait to read this.

Love love loved this book, the novella that recently came out I couldn't get into but I cannot wait for more of the main story. I loved the world building, the story line, it had me in tears at the end. My heart shattered by decisions made, but the second book release is creeping up and I cannot wait to pick it up. The story follow Paedyn, she lives in the slums, she's bottom of the food chain. She's what they called an "Ordinary" but no one knows this, because if they did it would cost her life. An Ordinary is someone who doesn't have powers, instead she has taught herself, well her father at first taught her, to be extremely observant and she pretends to be a physic. Which she successfully fools everyone. Now bring in the storyline, Paedyn is a thief, and thiefs steal. She so happens to steal from the younger prince, the future enforcer. But later in the day she sees that the prince is struggling to fight against a really powerful person who has the ability to almost overwhelm someone by stripping them of their power. Now since Paedyn doesn't have powers, she's able to save the prince. But instead, she lands herself as a contestant for the Purging Trials. Which kind of reminds me of Hunger games. Through these trials she gets to know the prince she saved, but also the other prince as well, the future king. Now that is all I am about to say about the story because you've just got to read it to experience it. Its enticing, its a little slow to begin with but I legitimately could not put the book down for the second half.

I have put off reading this for so long but I’m glad I finally tackled it. I say tackled because it has all the feels! I love these characters and I have fallen in love with their story. This book has everything, a somewhat love triangle, an evil king, deadly trials and a sarcastic FMC. On to book two!

Good book

I love this book it’s so well written and so good and the chemistry between Kai and pae is so good if you haven’t read this test I’m begging for you to read it!!!