a dark and drowning tide by allison saft

Since its entire existence is so blatantly algorithm-optimized, I actually don't have much to say about the totally nonsensical premise, the weird pacing, the unoriginal fantasy setting, or the prose that's somehow overdone while still lacking romanticism. It's also completely my fault for cracking open another romance novel when historically I don't 'get' those. However, the novel totally shoehorned in political story elements, to no end. It spends 300+ overwrought pages to determine that colonialism is cool and everything will work out, which also represents no development from the beginning of the novel. I would not call this an adult novel because it is not very sophisticated, but I would not call it a YA novel because those usually have overstated and cheesier political sentiment.