Once Upon a Broken Heart
A girl who believes in true love strikes three bargains with the Prince of Hearts, an immortal who deals in exactly that kind of belief. Fairytale-styled, deliberately artificial, and very good at making a bargain feel dangerous. On the House's scale it rates 1 for spice (a door, closed), 5 for how much of the book is the romance, and 4 for craft. Readers who want a villainous love interest with no spice and maximum yearning.
Last reviewed
How it rates
- Author
- Stephanie Garber
- Series
- Once Upon a Broken Heart, book 1 of 3 · series complete
- Spice
- Spice 1 out of 5, A door, closed1/5 · A door, closed
- Romance
- 5/5
- Plot
- 3/5
- Worldbuilding
- 4/5
- Darkness
- 3/5
- Writing craft
- 4/5
- Burn
- Slow burn
- Point of view
- third person
- Ending
- Happy ever after · cliffhanger
- Setting
- The Magnificent North, a kingdom that runs on stories
- Audience
- Young adult
- Pages
- 416
On the spice rating Kissing and longing. Closed door throughout. How the scale works.
Content warnings manipulation, violence, memory loss.
Tropes in this book
What to read after Once Upon a Broken Heart
Chosen by hand rather than computed, and each one rated on the same scales.
Lists this book appears on
How we checked this
Ratings on this page are editorial judgement applied on a published scale, not aggregated reader scores. Factual details were checked against the sources below and last reviewed on .