Reviews

Jade City by Fonda Lee

reyreads's review against another edition

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4.0

I think this book is supremely deserving of all the love it gets! It is artful and extremely well written: the world building is exceptional, the political intrigue tense, the characters unique. I think it occasionally suffers from a certain heaviness that drowns out otherwise stellar aspects. It was quite dense at some points and as a reader, would have much preferred the efforts toward extensive exposition and perspective shifts to be directed to closer character focus. I think Anden is the absolute standout and wish he had more chapters, I felt that he was the character that took me into that world. Near the end, I felt the closeness to Shae and Hilo that I was hoping for throughout, and mourn the fact that it hadn’t come sooner. I don’t think I enjoyed it as much as I expected to, but I also am acknowledging that it’s the first book in a trilogy and I’ll likely love the next two a lot more!

lvrsmoon's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional 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? It's complicated

4.5

mouse42's review against another edition

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2.0

I listened to the whole like 20 hours of this audiobook and it dragged on and on. Thought it would get interesting after the mid point but didn’t go anywhere. May give the rest of the series a chance but it’s not on my top priority. 

cjohnson216's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

klaudiazzz's review against another edition

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adventurous tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.25

duni100's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional inspiring tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

lejones1785's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

1.25

I had a tough time with this book, and I was really looking forward to reading it. It seemed like a lot of space in the story is just filler. Jade this, jade that, jade is worth ruining a city for. The characters are so smart, the characters have inner turmoil, on and on without much real substance. The main scenes in the book are over in a matter of moments, so there wasn't really any payoff for the filler material. It felt like this book was just for world and character building, so maybe the second book has more story?
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josies02's review against another edition

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3.0

3.5 ⭐️

this was so good, could’ve been higher but i took so long to read it, it was getting ROUGH

overhillunderhill's review against another edition

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I just couldn't vibe with the characters and the style

snoozepetal's review against another edition

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I actually stopped reading this towards the end of last year. Even though I had almost reached the end...I don't know, I guess I just got bored.