Ollie, Ollie Hex n' Free

I’ll admit, I side-eyed the ‘witch caught between a wolf and a hard place’ premise at first—paranormal romance can so easily tip into cliché. But *Ollie, Ollie Hex n’ Free* surprised me by leaning *into* the tropes, then twisting them like a spell gone wrong. Selene isn’t a passive prize; she’s a woman drowning in the fallout of her family’s curses, and Schulte makes her frustration *palpable*. The love triangle (square? pentagon?) isn’t about who’s hotter; it’s about who’s willing to burn the world down for her—and who’s secretly hoping she’ll do the torching. Brittany Pressley’s performance is a masterclass in tonal balance. Her Selene is weary but never whiny, and she gives both love interests distinct textures: one all gravel and restrained power, the other smooth as honeyed venom. My only critique? The pacing stumbles slightly in the middle, where the shifter pack politics threaten to bog down the emotional core. And while the ending lands with satisfaction, a few secondary characters (looking at you, mysterious aunt) feel undercooked—like Schulte got distracted by the main course and forgot to season the sides. Still, the audio production is crisp, the chemistry sizzles, and the hex-based humor (“I didn’t *mean* to turn him into a newt”) had me cackling during my commute. If you like your romance with a side of existential dread and a narrator who can sell both a smirk and a sob, this one’s worth the listen.