this close to losing it \(^ヮ^)/

Wayhaven is such a promising series of books that fell so flat with book 3, even though some could argue there were already issues popping up in book 2. I, personally, enjoyed it just as much as the first one, but that's up to anyone's opinion. Hold on, this deserves a whole list.

My personal and biggest gripe, MC's relationship with their mom. To write something so complex and then chuck it down to two choices (the choices being "forgive your mom" or "don't forgive your mom and everyone will make you feel like a piece of shit") feels so disappointing, especially if you consider what people with parental issues usually deal with irl. Of course there are people who choose to forgive their parent or not, but more often than not (and, as a result of that, what feels most realistic to write in a book) they end up somewhere in-between - it's a bittersweet relationship which you can either choose to continue or not, but the past memories and missed childhood can't just be forgotten and thrown under the rug. That's what MC's relationship with Rebecca could've been, too: a *complex* relationship that can either continue or get cut off completely, and it's a choice that should be respected, because a child that has been neglected has the full right to not trust their willingly neglectful parent again. And to some degree the author does try to achieve it, but in the end you will still have only two choices. And also, in Wayhaven you can literally feel what option author considers to be correct and not choosing that gets you punished severely, e.g. the carnival situation and every dialogue where you choose to not be cordial with Rebecca (the author never forgets to mention how you made everyone feel terrible. "Congrats you piece of shit, you ruined everything because you just can't accept that your mom wants to be buddy buddy again, ugh.") This pattern of turning complex situations into only having yes/no answers, with a negative choice having severe punishments, is such a recurring pattern throughout the whole book series that at this point it feels like a feature that I just didn't get (e.g you don't even get a choice if you want to join the agency or not, you just do, because that's the correct option). Also, I don't believe that literally no one, not even MC's best friends or partner, would try to see their side or god forbid agree with MC cutting contact with Rebecca.

You can literally feel that N and A are supposed to be the star children of TWC. While it was less obvious in book 1, it can't be ignored anymore in books 2 and 3. It does feel even more weird because M and F have the darkest complexions out of the cast, and are depicted as overtly sexual/flirty for absolutely no reason, to the point that sometimes it literally contradicts what the author established about the characters before (M can't handle most fabrics touching their skin and can't eat food because the taste of anything is too much for them, what do you mean they are hypersexual?? isn't sex one of the most stimulating things you can do that can literally be too much for a lot of people that don't even struggle with overstimulation on a daily basis??), but it doesn't feel appropriate to say too much on this issue as I'm literally as white as paper, not to mention that this topic has been brought up by many POC in the IF community who can have more nuance on this situation than I ever could. I can, however, talk about how inconsistent and over-exaggerated M and F's personalities are, compared to A and N feeling much more realistic and well-paced. I hate how M and F are mischaracterized in their own universe and all the meaningful things are overshadowed by "haha M likes sex and is lewd and aggressive" and "haha F is a silly lil' goober". Their romances suffer from it too, which brings me to-

The romance routes could be so much better. And I'm not talking about N or A obviously, even though that's another can of worms that I, frankly, don't want to open, but F and M. M is dumbed down to being aggressive, sexual and borderline feral at times, which are all GREAT traits to give all at the same time in your book to a person of color btw (they're not), but their scenes perform best when the author acknowledges that M is actually none of those things. Just them existing in the same space as MC and feeling at ease and relaxed (and, dare I say, vulnerable) feel much more intimate and rewarding than literal sex scenes, and I feel like that's what romance with M should've been about: two people, who are both lost and confused and overwhelmed in this new to them world (M from memory loss, MC from being thrown into the supernatural scene) bonding, finding comfort and familiarity in each other. Breaking all that buildup with innuendos and sexual propositions feels unnecessary, to be honest.

Continuation of the previous point, but the same could be said about F too. Poor F, the forgotten child of TWC; they're my absolute favorite, and it hurts to see them being thrown somewhere in the background as a comedic relief side character so many times. I feel like they could be the character who gets MC the most, even if they're not dating or particularly close. They have a difficult relationship with their mom, they're thrown into an unfamiliar world that's hard to navigate and it feels like everyone wants too much from them. You can't tell me that it's not some great exposition for a deeper connection between F and MC, both romantic and platonic, as well as an opportunity to explore anxiety and impostor syndrome/separation anxiety (not interchangeable, just feels like either one could fit F) in a seemingly optimistic character. But nah, they like Rebecca and are just a funny little fella. Definitely not playing into more media stereotypes of the only black character in the main cast being a flirty comedic relief.

At this point TWC is going to rival One Piece on the amount of meaningless fillers. And they wouldn't feel so meaningless if the author didn't try to mix slice-of-life and supernatural, or at least didn't mix them so poorly, but most of the time an occasional meaningless scene is thrown into the plot for some short-term tension for what feels to be absolutely no reason other than increasing the word count. Take the blood drive thing as an example of this: what was this scene for?? It started unnecessary tension, had a weird solution and just offered nothing to the rest of the book except for allowing Bobby to finally confront the RO of choice in a very awkward manner. I feel like the author promising 7 books (correct me if I'm wrong, but I remember something like that mentioned in the earliest tumblr posts) feels like a the author chewing off more than she can bite. And it sucks, because had she not had that amount of books (and subsequently a gargantuan word count) looming over her head, we could have had more actually meaningful and fulfilling scenes like ones in the bakery, literally my favorites. It could benefit the pacing, worldbuilding and reader enjoyment greatly.