For all their flaws, Jake and Adrien are one of my top couples I’ve read.

Oh, and I hated Mel.

That’s just not how it goes for me or anyone I know even if you date someone else gay or straight you then meet all their friends and family and go hang out at their favorite places. So even if Adrien did not have friends or lost his or something traumatic like that he then would at least acquire some acquaintances outside his immediate circle from these huge loves of his life Guy or Mel or even Jake.

That is another thing that does not point to something I would expect to happen unless again he chose to isolate himself and only have these men as his social outlet as I said I did not say it was totally unrealistic that people can act this way but it is not healthy.

I get the trope but in this case even if it was a M/F after all the self sufficient kick ass and take names heroines I have read I would still be vaguely creeped out because of the lack of indication that this was a healthy choice for this particular type of person at this time.

But I agree, after all this reading I also wanted the HEA but felt I had to be honest.

I thought a lot about Adrien’s isolation in this book as I read, because it seemed more pronounced here than in earlier books, even as his relationship with his family took up more page space. Felt ambivalent about it because it wasn’t healthy, but since it is also a fairly standard romance trope, it wasn’t really alien or remarkable. In genre romance, the heroine is often abandoned or orphaned or isolated in some way, and part of the HEA, implicit or explicit, is the dissolution of that isolation by the bond created with the hero. Often readers don’t get to see the building of the new community or circle of friends/family, just a snippet of it via the obligatory epilogue. Although AEM isn’t genre romance, the comparison feels apt to me. Ultimately Adrien getting over himself and reaching out to Jake will (I hope, as a reader) further reduce his self-imposed isolation, even though we don’t get the romance-style epilogue with TDT.

Or not.

But the romance reader in me wants the HEA for them, even if Adrien was spineless and Jake a cipher for much of the series.

You cannot tell me becoming a shut-in does wonders for ones emotional stability.

I think Jenre I was rooting for Adrien to change and grow and become healthier. I felt shorted in that area because as you said I saw him becoming even more isolated and hurt with each new book. He loses any normal balances in that regards so it is hard for me to root for him being with Jake since I really have no outside view that lets me know Jake is all that great for him.

All you really have to do is see what happens with Adrien physically through the whole series. With just all that we do not even really have to go into the emotional roller coaster ride Jake took him on.

I just think that poor old Adrien has the worst luck. Plus his sarcastic exterior puts people off – again something he admits himself in Fatal Shadows, so it’s no wonder he has few friends. You are right in saying that he does isolate himself – he rarely ventures out anywhere further than downstairs to his shop or to visit his family. He doesn’t go to clubs or bars any more – although he clearly did when he was younger as he seems to know quite a lot of bars. He likes his own company and doesn’t really seem interested in surrounding himself with people – some people are just like that and it’s not entirely unrealistic to base a character on that type of personality.

I am reminded of a scene from THYS when Adrien pays a visit to his hairdresser and confesses that Jake has just dumped him. The sympathy and fuss that he got at that point bemused him, but also made him feel better about himself. Perhaps things may have gone a lot better for Adrien if he’d had someone he could confide in. But he didn’t, so he had to muddle along by himself.