Review by crothe77 - The Scorpion and the Night Blossom

crothe77 's review for:

The Scorpion and the Night Blossom by Amélie Wen Zhao

5.0

dark fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

I received an ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest review

The Scorpion and the Night Blossom by Amélie Wen Zhao is a first person-POV YA fantasy romance inspired by Chinese historical fantasy romance dramas. Àn’yīng was trained by her father to protect her family from beautiful demons who can kill with a single kiss. When a chance to win an immortality pill comes up, Àn’yīng goes to the land of the immortals to save her ailing mother. But things won't be easy for her and there's secrets behind every corner.

While Àn’yīng and Yù’chén’s overarching romance arc could be classified as enemies-to-lovers, it's actually more complex than that within the story. They are initially rivals and they are also enemies and allies and lovers at various points in the plot and that makes their dynamic more complex and harder to pin down to a single relationship dynamic. This is further complicated by the revelations throughout the story about who Àn’yīng and Yù’chén are as people, their heritage, and in their relationships with each other and the world at large.

One of the details I really liked was that all of the blades Àn’yīng received from her father have names and she uses those names every time the specific blade is mentioned. It's little details like that that help establish characters, as we so often personify inanimate objects but the kind of objects we personify varies from person to person. The blades are also something of an extension of her father and they are one of the few things he left her besides a jade amulet.

The worldbuilding is fairly fleshed out. We have a decent understanding of politics in the immortal kingdoms, clothes are given some descriptions to help readers visualize, and the demons are given some explanation. The setting feels very wuxia and like a historical fantasy romance C-drama. I'm not exactly sure which time period it would be most analogous to, but I definitely could get a strong feel for the world because of my reference bank and the details introduced by Zhao.

Content warning for gore

I would recommend this to fans of historical fantasy romance C-dramas and readers of fantasy romance looking for more twists

Content Warnings