Review: The Prism Society: A Spicy Friends to Lovers Novel

The Prism Society: A Spicy Friends to Lovers Novel by Gabi Salas
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

2.5 stars 

I received this book for free, this does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review 

His eyes held mine in a silent conversation, filled with unsaid words and hushed confessions that had yet to cross our lips. It was as if his stare was whispering secrets his voice couldn't articulate. 

The Prism Society tells the story of childhood friends, Emma and Liam, as they separate after Emma leaves town to go to design school in NYC and Liam continues his college in UCLA. The story opens with Emma leaving and while it's clear that two years older Liam has missed Emma at college and there are some feelings there, Emma only sees the diving head first into freedom and women Liam has partaken in after escaping his extremely restrictive parents. While they try to keep in touch through texts and social media, a surprise visit, where Emma sees in real time Liam about to hook-up with a woman, has her running away and slowly distancing herself, they eventually lose touch for three years. But when Liam shows up out of the blue as Emma's about to graduate in NYC, they find that time and growing up has only ignited their chemistry. 

It was as if we were picking up right where we left off, but this time, we weren't just teenagers dreaming about what our lives could be. This time, we were adults living our own separate lives, hoping they somehow intersected. 

The first half of this started off slower, with a New Adult vibe (Emma is 22yrs old and Liam 24yrs old) and Emma trying to work towards her dream of interior design. Told all from Emma's point-of-view, we get a lot about her worrying about her career. Her college career is skipped through, with her roommate Jessie getting added in as a secondary character and their shared dream of working for the “it” company Spectra. Since Emma talked about how it was her and her mother's shared dream and how close they were, I wish we would have gotten to see more of this relationship, instead of a very quick ending scene between the two. However, Liam comes back into the picture and the two realize they still have those feelings for each other that they were trying to hide before. Since we don't get Liam's pov, his character didn't feel as flushed out to me. You can tell that he has feelings for Emma, but his relationship with his friend and business partner Dominic and why they're working to set-up a club where people can be free to safely and consensually indulge in their chosen physical activities, isn't really delved into; it felt like a wobbly constructed table to get Liam to be able to say “good girl” a couple times. 

“I see the beauty in The Prism Society. I see the beauty in what you're trying to create. And I'm sorry that it took me this long to admit that to myself...and to you.” 

The conflict comes about because when Emma gets a job at Spectra, she has to sign a non-compete but she just can't help herself with helping Liam design his new club, even coming up with the name. It makes it hard to feel bad for her when it all comes back to bite her, because, she clearly knew she was in the wrong but just kept forging ahead anyway. There's some misplaced blame put on Liam and then Emma deciding a new path for herself that eventually, in the very last few pages, has her getting back with Liam. As far as the “spicy romance” tag, your mileage may vary. I don't consider any and all open door scenes in romance to be “smut”, I actually never use the term, but I know some younger and newer readers to romance have different thoughts on this. Liam is into voyeurism, which is where you could say the steamier scenes come from, there's a handful of them but they're fairly short and, yeah, “good girl” gets thrown around but there wasn't a lot of intimacy to them, more of the by rote “this sounds hot” that gets shared around; closer to a Tessa Bailey and far from a Cherise Sinclair. I did like how Emma and Liam started off open and addressing issues and this did have readability, but I thought the first half showed more care in setting up the story, while the latter half wobbled around and wasn't sturdy enough to deliver a hot engrossing read.

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