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3.77 AVERAGE
3.77 AVERAGE
adventurous
funny
inspiring
lighthearted
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Interesting story, fast paced.
And based on true events!
And based on true events!
I chose this because [b:Wolf by Wolf|24807186|Wolf by Wolf (Wolf by Wolf, #1)|Ryan Graudin|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1424193184s/24807186.jpg|44446095] was one of the best books ever, so I decided [a:Ryan Graudin|5228256|Ryan Graudin|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1480517006p2/5228256.jpg] was a new favorite author. However, it was too intense, too dark, and kept my stomach in knots the entire time in a bad way. Girls sold to brothels, girls forced to become heroine junkies as punishment for trying to escape the brothel....I just felt completely hopeless even though the plot was a rescue in the making. Perhaps this just invoked in me my suppressed knowledge that this kind of thing is all to real with too few real rescues, and I couldn't shake it. I couldn't buy any of the good stuff and felt overwhelmed by the dismal setting and desperate characters. I don't recommend it, but now that I think of it, those who liked the book [b:Legend|9275658|Legend (Legend, #1)|Marie Lu|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1501368160s/9275658.jpg|14157512] might be fans of this one.
Amazing. Beautiful. Beautiful.
(One beautiful isn't enough)
It took me three or four (or even five) chapters to realise that this is not a science-fiction. It's totally realistic fiction. Hah.
From the first chapter, I already knew this was going to be one of the book I really like. By the time I got into the story, I enjoyed it immediately although there were some parts that were quite predictable.
This is well-written (and very well-researched). It has three POVs. Personally, Jin's is my favourite. But Dai is cool too! Dai and his secrets. I pictured him as the same person from the start to the end.get the f out of my mind dammit ki hong lee!
However this book is special for me. It's slow-paced. I easily get bored everytime I read anything slow-paced, but not this one. Somehow this book has its own way to impress me. I read every chapter happily. Even when I took break, this book was haunting like it was calling me. That my business here wasn't done yet so I couldn't take the break for too long.
I'm satisfied with the ending. I hugged it thight to my chest after I finished reading. Much less when I found out that Hak Nam (the Walled City) is based on a real walled city called Kowloon, along with its real tough society (the story itself is fictional tho), and that Ryan Graudin is female! Not that it matters but yeah, she's awesome! Thanks for writing this book.
There are lots to learn from the Walled City. Things we should not take for granted: friendship, family, trust, and hope for the future. It's just beautiful!
(One beautiful isn't enough)
It took me three or four (or even five) chapters to realise that this is not a science-fiction. It's totally realistic fiction. Hah.
From the first chapter, I already knew this was going to be one of the book I really like. By the time I got into the story, I enjoyed it immediately although there were some parts that were quite predictable.
This is well-written (and very well-researched). It has three POVs. Personally, Jin's is my favourite. But Dai is cool too! Dai and his secrets. I pictured him as the same person from the start to the end.
However this book is special for me. It's slow-paced. I easily get bored everytime I read anything slow-paced, but not this one. Somehow this book has its own way to impress me. I read every chapter happily. Even when I took break, this book was haunting like it was calling me. That my business here wasn't done yet so I couldn't take the break for too long.
I'm satisfied with the ending. I hugged it thight to my chest after I finished reading. Much less when I found out that Hak Nam (the Walled City) is based on a real walled city called Kowloon, along with its real tough society (the story itself is fictional tho), and that Ryan Graudin is female! Not that it matters but yeah, she's awesome! Thanks for writing this book.
There are lots to learn from the Walled City. Things we should not take for granted: friendship, family, trust, and hope for the future. It's just beautiful!
Actual rating: 3.5 stars
This was actually surprisingly good! The synopsis sounds like a dystopian, but when you start getting into it, you realize that it's based on a real walled city in HongKong, China, that was torn down back in January of 1987. The whole feel of the book is Chinese with touches of Japanese culture here and there. With those touches, I don't know if they were accidents (like someone called "mama-san" or having bonsai trees, since that's all I can remember for now), but they were minute enough to not derail the story. I mentioned in an update that it kind of felt like a modern day Mulan because the MC Jin Ling wants to save her sister from the sex trade she was sold into, as well as take down the crime lords in the walled city who are doing this to others. Plus add in that she dresses as a boy and this is her older sister she's trying to save, and slowly my mind kept making more connections to Mulan. However, I will say that the ending was a bit of a disappointment. I don't know if it's because I'm heartless and I roll my eyes at romance, but I wish Dai had stayed dead! I wish he had been killed and there was no "Happily Ever After" ending between him and Mei Yin. And I say that because life is hard and full of shit. Nobody has it good, and if it looks like it, it just means that you're not looking at it completely because everyone has secrets, everyone has skeletons in their closet. The other complaint from other reviewers here on goodreads was that the pacing was slow. I've read some slow ass books and this one wasn't that slow at all. It had a steady pace that picked up towards the end. The only other problem is that towards the end, in the last 50 pages, the action scenes weren't as well written and consisted more of "I did this and he did that and this is what happened." It disappointed me because action scenes are important in a book when the shit is going down. I still don't like the ending, but the book has been read and it's time to move on. Either way, I'd say give it a try and maybe you'd like the ending. I didn't really because it felt a bit too much like a HEA (happily ever after) ending. The other way it could have also turned was with Mei Yin wanting to go back and live in the shadow world, that she has been broken so much that she keeps wanting to go back and her turmoil with that. Many of the girls who escaped with her had these problems and would slowly disappear to go back to that life because it's all they know and that they can't find a place in this new world out of the shadows. That would have made for an interesting twist and this could have all happened after Dai died! If only he had died. Oh well.
This was actually surprisingly good! The synopsis sounds like a dystopian, but when you start getting into it, you realize that it's based on a real walled city in HongKong, China, that was torn down back in January of 1987. The whole feel of the book is Chinese with touches of Japanese culture here and there. With those touches, I don't know if they were accidents (like someone called "mama-san" or having bonsai trees, since that's all I can remember for now), but they were minute enough to not derail the story. I mentioned in an update that it kind of felt like a modern day Mulan because the MC Jin Ling wants to save her sister from the sex trade she was sold into, as well as take down the crime lords in the walled city who are doing this to others. Plus add in that she dresses as a boy and this is her older sister she's trying to save, and slowly my mind kept making more connections to Mulan. However, I will say that the ending was a bit of a disappointment. I don't know if it's because I'm heartless and I roll my eyes at romance, but I wish Dai had stayed dead! I wish he had been killed and there was no "Happily Ever After" ending between him and Mei Yin. And I say that because life is hard and full of shit. Nobody has it good, and if it looks like it, it just means that you're not looking at it completely because everyone has secrets, everyone has skeletons in their closet. The other complaint from other reviewers here on goodreads was that the pacing was slow. I've read some slow ass books and this one wasn't that slow at all. It had a steady pace that picked up towards the end. The only other problem is that towards the end, in the last 50 pages, the action scenes weren't as well written and consisted more of "I did this and he did that and this is what happened." It disappointed me because action scenes are important in a book when the shit is going down. I still don't like the ending, but the book has been read and it's time to move on. Either way, I'd say give it a try and maybe you'd like the ending. I didn't really because it felt a bit too much like a HEA (happily ever after) ending. The other way it could have also turned was with Mei Yin wanting to go back and live in the shadow world, that she has been broken so much that she keeps wanting to go back and her turmoil with that. Many of the girls who escaped with her had these problems and would slowly disappear to go back to that life because it's all they know and that they can't find a place in this new world out of the shadows. That would have made for an interesting twist and this could have all happened after Dai died! If only he had died. Oh well.
Koukuttavasta alkuasetelmasta huolimatta kirjan ensimmäinen puolikas on hitaanpuoleinen. Loppupuoli onkin sitten täynnä vauhtia ja vaarallisia tilanteita. En ole pitkään aikaan lukenut mitään näin juonivetoista, joten vaihtelu virkisti. Graudinin tapa kirjoittaa oli paikoitellen lumoavan kaunista, mikä muodosti raadollisen vastakohdan tummille sävyille ja lohduttomille ihmiskohtaloille, jotka Hak Nam Walled City kätkee sisällensä.
Beautiful, atmospheric writing, wholesome characters with heartwarming relationships (a nice contrast to the raw and grittiness of the theme and setting). Truly an underrated gem. Please please please read this book!
I received this book from the Publisher in exchange for an honest review. This in no way changes my opinion of the book.
"Kids with roofs and hot food have better things to do than play survival of the thuggiest."
Holy freaking cow, this blew my mind. I couldn't stand the amount of action at the end yet I couldn't put it down. I was a mess.
Warning: there are kind of a lot of characters and multiple perspectives. If you haven't recently sharpened your Asian name reading skills, you may have a problem.
The Plot: In The Walled City, we follow three main characters. Character one is a boy named Dai. (Kinda like Day from Legend and just as bada**). He's got a mission. He's got a limited amount of days to do something. But he can't do it alone. He's stuck in the city with hardly any resources and he needs help to complete his plan.
Enter character two, disguised as a boy. This is little sister. She's a fast runner. She's runs like the wind. Boy sees her run, recruits her to help him get close to his target.
Why is girl helping boy? She's looking for older sister whom she hasn't seen for years. This is her only chance to get close to where she thinks her sister might be.
Big Sister is, indeed, where little sister thinks she is. And she can't get out. So when she's asked to help, she agrees, she has nothing to lose, not really. And then we get the story of how these three (plus a few of big sisters friends) destroy a city. Pretty crazy. Everything that can go wrong, goes wrong. Anything that can be messed up, is messed up. Really this book is a walking disaster and I loved every second of it. :)
The Writing Style was magnificent. It did not interrupt of ruin the story.
The Characters: I classified the main characters as: boy, big sister, little sister. I don't mean to be racist or ignorant, it's just that I confused all the names at the very start of the book and never got around to identifying characters by name. As I was retelling this story to my best friend, I used those exact terms. It's the only way it made sense to me.
Also: when the sisters are apart, I can tell which is which because the lives are so different, but when they're together? And their memories are so similar?! Yeah I was CONFUSED.
What Else I liked:
5 kids save the world. Or ruin it. Whatevs.
That the ending isn't happy. It's real. It's natural, raw.
That there is such a strong focus on the bond between the sisters. They don't let anything get in between - only reason they help Dai is because he reunites them and clearly cares for both of them.
The tiny amount of humor. There aren't that many funny parts in this book but when there are funny parts, they're epic.
"Cassiopeia? She was a queen long ago, in a different part of the world. The stories say she was very beautiful, but very proud. Too proud. She smack-talked some goddesses and got herself stuck up there for all eternity."
What I didn't like: That the pretty sister gets the guy. I get that the other one is probably too young and doesn't want that anyway but really?
Overall: Five stars. Almost perfect. Seriously.
"Kids with roofs and hot food have better things to do than play survival of the thuggiest."
Holy freaking cow, this blew my mind. I couldn't stand the amount of action at the end yet I couldn't put it down. I was a mess.
Warning: there are kind of a lot of characters and multiple perspectives. If you haven't recently sharpened your Asian name reading skills, you may have a problem.
The Plot: In The Walled City, we follow three main characters. Character one is a boy named Dai. (Kinda like Day from Legend and just as bada**). He's got a mission. He's got a limited amount of days to do something. But he can't do it alone. He's stuck in the city with hardly any resources and he needs help to complete his plan.
Enter character two, disguised as a boy. This is little sister. She's a fast runner. She's runs like the wind. Boy sees her run, recruits her to help him get close to his target.
Why is girl helping boy? She's looking for older sister whom she hasn't seen for years. This is her only chance to get close to where she thinks her sister might be.
Big Sister is, indeed, where little sister thinks she is. And she can't get out. So when she's asked to help, she agrees, she has nothing to lose, not really. And then we get the story of how these three (plus a few of big sisters friends) destroy a city. Pretty crazy. Everything that can go wrong, goes wrong. Anything that can be messed up, is messed up. Really this book is a walking disaster and I loved every second of it. :)
The Writing Style was magnificent. It did not interrupt of ruin the story.
The Characters: I classified the main characters as: boy, big sister, little sister. I don't mean to be racist or ignorant, it's just that I confused all the names at the very start of the book and never got around to identifying characters by name. As I was retelling this story to my best friend, I used those exact terms. It's the only way it made sense to me.
Also: when the sisters are apart, I can tell which is which because the lives are so different, but when they're together? And their memories are so similar?! Yeah I was CONFUSED.
What Else I liked:
5 kids save the world. Or ruin it. Whatevs.
That the ending isn't happy. It's real. It's natural, raw.
That there is such a strong focus on the bond between the sisters. They don't let anything get in between - only reason they help Dai is because he reunites them and clearly cares for both of them.
The tiny amount of humor. There aren't that many funny parts in this book but when there are funny parts, they're epic.
"Cassiopeia? She was a queen long ago, in a different part of the world. The stories say she was very beautiful, but very proud. Too proud. She smack-talked some goddesses and got herself stuck up there for all eternity."
What I didn't like: That the pretty sister gets the guy. I get that the other one is probably too young and doesn't want that anyway but really?
Overall: Five stars. Almost perfect. Seriously.