This is one of the most difficult stories for me to review. Not because of its length, however. Its because I am well aware of its presence within the community, and know how much of a positive reputation it has with everyone. I know everyone is already bearing the pitchforks and torches at me for daring to even give this a 2 for overall enjoyment, but you'll have to hear me out, because my reviews are based on personal opinion when all technicalities are said and done.
Basically, I'm gonna be the Devil's Advocate here.
BE is a very wide genre. Most people only see it as "boobs grow", but there are so many factors, ideas and variations within the genre that it is near impossible to make a "perfect" BE story that is right for everyone. It just isn't possible.
I say this to point out my first qualm with this story: starting size.
Samantha starts out with the size of two buses. Already my brain is struggling to even picture how anything of this size is actually feesable. I mean, I know this is fiction and I know I need to use the good ol' imagination for a lot of this to do anything...but starting out with this size makes it very hard to visualize them getting any bigger. This immediately turns me off from this story, unfortunately. Does that make it bad? Of course not. What I pointed out was personal preference and does not relate to story quality. You go into such thorough detail in describing every little thing about Samantha that its hard NOT to have a fully formed picture of her. What's hard to imagine is her growing any bigger than her already massive size.
My next issue: characterization. Samantha, our main character, feels arrogant, domineering and power hungry. These traits are a personal turn off. Again, are they gonna be turn offs for everyone? NO. But the fact that this character is totally cool with destroying every last thing around her because she wants bigger boobs is not sexy to me...its unsettling. I don't want to see this character grow. I want her to stop. And at the scale she goes into...it crosses the line from erotic to full blown ridiculous. But these are my own complaints. Once again, there is SO much detail and description that this isn't a BAD story - not one bit! Its just not a very erotic one to me, and possibly to others, that's all.
Those are my two biggest qualms with this story. I should say some positives as to make it seem like I don't absolutely despise this story.
I love Dan's character. He is a very good antithesis to Samantha and very likable for that reason. His utter awe and amazement at Samantha's growth and size never ceases to entertain. He's very relatable as well, which makes him a very accessable character.
The technical quality is near flawless. I couldn't find a single error in this 387 page story. That is damn impressive.
But I fear the downfall for me is the plot. Some will absolutely adore that this centers around Samantha's breasts. This will be a dream for some that it focuses on boobs and boobs alone, their growth, the incriments she passes such as the sky, other cities, the ocean, etc. This will be the absolute definition of what a BE story SHOULD be to some. And of course we had a romantic plot between her and Dan, I'm not leaving that out. I just wish that was enough to carry the story.
But to others, such as myself, the plot was not enough. I'm not saying there had to be some ridiculous espionage nonsense shoehorned in, I just wish...there was something. Something just feels missing and I can't put my finger on it.
I seriously congratulate you on completing this story, ryver. This is an actual novel - a novel completely centered around BE. No weird transformations to distract from what was going on. No odd character distractions, plot derisions, none of that nonsense that kills a story. This was focused. It was clean cut. And it is something to be proud of, without a doubt.
But it is not for everyone, and I suppose that's all that I have to say about it at this point.
