Due to a sudden, unexpected passing in the family a few years ago and another more recently and my subsequent (mental) health issues stemming from that, I was unable to download this book in time to review it before it was archived as I did not visit this site for several years after the bereavements. This meant I didn't read or venture onto netgalley for years as not only did it remind me of that person as they shared my passion for reading, but I also struggled to maintain interest in anything due to overwhelming depression. I was therefore unable to download this title in time and so I couldn't give a review as it wasn't successfully acquired before it was archived. The second issue that has happened with some of my other books is that I had them downloaded to one particular device and said device is now defunct, so I have no access to those books anymore, sadly.

This means I can't leave an accurate reflection of my feelings towards the book as I am unable to read it now and so I am leaving a message of explanation instead. I am now back to reading and reviewing full time as once considerable time had passed I have found that books have been helping me significantly in terms of my mindset and mental health - this was after having no interest in anything for quite a number of years after the passings. Anything requested and approved will be read and a review written and posted to Amazon (where I am a Hall of Famer & Top Reviewer), Goodreads (where I have several thousand friends and the same amount who follow my reviews) and Waterstones (or Barnes & Noble if the publisher is American based). Thank you for the opportunity and apologies for the inconvenience.

I received this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review – thanks as always to Netgalley for sending this to me!

For anyone who follows my reviews, you’ll know that I’m not generally much of a non-fiction reader. When I heard about this book, it seemed like an ideal opportunity to branch out. I’m a huge fan of the Astro Poets Twitter account, and though I have only a passing interest in astrology and wouldn’t say I’m a die-hard believer, I figured it would be fun to learn more.

I read this book in kind of an unconventional way, which is basically my way of saying that I started with the signs that are of personal interest to me – my own sign, my family’s signs, my partner’s sign etc – and then went back to the others later. The most interesting part of the reading experience for me was getting to compare the claims made about each sign to my own personal experience of the sign. As expected, some of it hit home and some of it felt way off base, but I’d imagine that’s true of everyone. I definitely took it all with a pinch of salt, but I had fun comparing the book to my own experiences anyway. For example, the book states my boyfriend and I (Aquarius and Leo) are completely incompatible. He told me to stop reading at that point (I didn’t.)

My main issue with the book was that it could be a bit repetitive. Each sign is divided into sections that tell you about the signs’ general personalities, what they’re like as friends, lovers and communicators, and while I appreciated that they covered a lot of ground, it got a bit tedious to read after a while. I found myself skimming certain sections – the texting parts in particular, because the messages were all so wildly abstract that I wasn’t sure what exactly they were trying to convey other than mild confusion for every sign – and wasn’t really motivated to pick up the book after I’d read about the signs I was most interested in, which I guess is my fault for hopping back and forth so much. I’d recommend reading this in chunks, because I think it’s a book better suited to being dipped in and out of rather than read all in one go, and I did get a little bored trying to power through large sections at a time, but that’s probably not the idea of it. It's meant to be a reference guide more than anything else, I think.

Overall, this was an interesting reading experience. It was a little outside of my comfort zone, but I appreciated having the experience to broaden my horizons – and it made me realise that the MC of my NaNoWriMo novel is a textbook Aries – who knew?

For a bit of fun, this book is great. Told me I’m a passive aggressive Virgo with party tendencies, and my husband and I are useless at making decisions. Pretty funny, and kind’a true. Not sure I’d lay full price but it would be a book if definitely pick up if it was under $10.