Reviews

Immortal Longings by Chloe Gong

Only show reviews with written explanations

mylittlefootnotes's review against another edition

Go to review page

not in the mood rn, picking it back up eventually

christyjean's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

mccarshanon's review against another edition

Go to review page

A big part of the story is the characters jumping from body to body. Paired with multiple POVs, it left me totally confused at who was who because i couldn’t hold an image of the characters in my mind. I have loved Chloe Gongs books in the past but I think this one just isn’t for me.

akiikomori's review against another edition

Go to review page

2.0

Goddddddd.............
I should have looked up who wrote this book beforehand.
This was part of the Fairyloot subscription and I think they advertised it as a Anthony and Cleopatra retelling? I hadn't read the original story but I love retellings, and the universe looked really cool.

DO. NOT. READ.
So much info dumping. Just a bunch of TELLING and not SHOWING.
Advertised as some sort of Hunger Games, Battle Royale, mixed in with some weird Altered Carbon non-sense that was just.... ugh.... nothing was interesting except a few tiny things which I can't say.
I promise the only interesting things WERE the fight scenes and there were SO FEW OF THEM. Way too many characters for a story like this, most of them have very little significance to the story or are just designed to throw you off. Like just go play Cyberpunk 2077 - it'll probably be better than this.

Overall. Bored. Not as bored as "Wicked" but bored.
Do not read.
Same author as the one who wrote "These Violent Delights" which people enjoyed but someone I know said it was terrible. Apparently that is a Romeo and Juliet retelling.

I've basically stopped my book subscriptions because most of the year is terrible.... and you'll have a few good ones.
Like I get it's for promoting DEBUT authors most of the time but just....not for me.

I am glad this is over, onto something that I hope is better.

breaba's review against another edition

Go to review page

medium-paced

3.0

gardens_and_dragons's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.0

I wanted to like this more than I do, as I had high hopes from previous works of Gong’s.

What it did well: rivals to lovers Roman, getting a good sense of place in the dual city of San-Er and its various streets, people’s, troubles.

It also has some great action scenes, and great descriptions of how the games worked.

What could be improved: the Jumping magic that allows people to jump from body to body via their Qi is… it’s lackluster. It’s interesting in concept but it is hard to envision a world that this is the norm. There are safeguards for keeping identities and such for bureaucracy purposes , and keeping the monarchy and its powers installed. But you’d think that the politics and systems of a world where qi could be transferred would be a much different one with different troubles.

Content Warnings