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4.29 AVERAGE
4.29 AVERAGE
adventurous
dark
emotional
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
This book has so much potential, the plot is good and I love the random quotes from Romeo and juliet but this book is so unbearably slow. I contemplated dnf-ing so many times.
I enjoyed reading this, but I can't help but think it was unnecessary. It didn't really add that much to the story, and was too similar to the first book.
This is the completion of a duology-- definitely don't read these out of order since this one picks up right after the events of the first one and there are a plethora of characters and important plot threads you will definitely not understand (even if you are a Romeo & Juliet fan).
Juliet Cai is running around Shanghai trying to keep the Scarlet Gang from getting too mixed up in the complicated political scene muddied with the oncoming march of Chiang Kai-Shek's Nationalists, the Communists, and of course, the ever present rival White Flowers. But someone with the same monster/insect-spread madness plague she thought they'd defeated is blackmailing the gangs.
Meanwhile. Roma Montague is angry and confused after seeing Juliet kill his best friend Marshall Seo. His other best friend, Benedikt is also fairly out of his mind with grief.
If you're reading this series for the R & J reimagined as historic Shanghai goodness, really we're just waiting for Roma and Juliette to rejoin forces. We're waiting for some Shakespearean plot beats-- and don't get me wrong. There are a couple nice quotes, a secret marriage, folks thinking other folks are dead, etc.
But there's a lot of complications. there's the Blackmail, Juliette's secret about Marshall, Benedikt's feelings, the confusing alliances of Nationalists/Communists, power plays in both gangs, etc. etc. And then as one by one things begin to crumble or get resolved, it just keeps going. Way beyond my desire to see R & J plot beats.
So this is a lovely duology, and theres cool history, and some tragic romance, but not quite enough focus on that tragic romance for my taste.
Juliet Cai is running around Shanghai trying to keep the Scarlet Gang from getting too mixed up in the complicated political scene muddied with the oncoming march of Chiang Kai-Shek's Nationalists, the Communists, and of course, the ever present rival White Flowers. But someone with the same monster/insect-spread madness plague she thought they'd defeated is blackmailing the gangs.
Meanwhile. Roma Montague is angry and confused after seeing Juliet kill his best friend Marshall Seo. His other best friend, Benedikt is also fairly out of his mind with grief.
If you're reading this series for the R & J reimagined as historic Shanghai goodness, really we're just waiting for Roma and Juliette to rejoin forces. We're waiting for some Shakespearean plot beats-- and don't get me wrong. There are a couple nice quotes, a secret marriage, folks thinking other folks are dead, etc.
But there's a lot of complications. there's the Blackmail, Juliette's secret about Marshall, Benedikt's feelings, the confusing alliances of Nationalists/Communists, power plays in both gangs, etc. etc. And then as one by one things begin to crumble or get resolved, it just keeps going. Way beyond my desire to see R & J plot beats.
So this is a lovely duology, and theres cool history, and some tragic romance, but not quite enough focus on that tragic romance for my taste.
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
This was a cute little duology! And by cute I mean horrifying and awful if you think too closely about the fantasy plot points. There is a concerning amount of straight up genocide in the book? which always makes a long book feel even longer, but the loose wrap up at the end made it all worth it!
MISS CHLOE PLS this sequel was exactly what the first book needed to really sell this for me. Once again, it took me forever to really get into it again but once I was in I couldn’t put it down. Chloe Gong is a genius. Loved.
slow-paced
dark
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
I didn't like this book as much as the first one and I think it's partly because of the ending. I felt like it was just a bit too slow for me. But there are the parts that I loved so it wasn't that bad. The ending was not really what I was expecting and I'm still not sure how I feel about it. I do know there's more books that take place in the same world but follow different characters so I might read those.
dark
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes