A review by alyssabookrecs
To Gaze Upon Wicked Gods by Molly X. Chang

dark slow-paced

• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.5

Thank you to Del Rey for the Netgalley ARC in exchange for an honest review! To Gaze Upon Wicked Gods was a book I highly anticipated, but it didn't live up to that hype unfortunately. Chang does a wonderful job with flowery prose (which I did enjoy quite a bit), but aside from the first 25%ish of the story, I felt as though she glossed over Ruying's transformation in her death powers, simply telling us how many people Ruying has killed and who she's killing next. It leaves a lot of the political and emotional intrigue out of it, and it dulls compared to the sharp start to the story. There is lots of telling the reader what's happened and not us experiencing it alongside Ruying. Like many, I am also deeply uncomfortable with Ruying's relationship with the colonizer Prince Antony; however, I do get the vibe that this will not be the endgame romance. Still, in this book we do have to sit through it, and I think the book could have benefited from a different approach to that. Besides Ruying and Antony (whose backstory is basically told to us...), I did not get much of a feel for the supporting cast in this book, and it felt like a disservice not to have a fuller picture of Ruying's family and friends who also suffer under colonization. I also did not get a bigger sense of the world beyond Pangu and also the science behind how the Romans invaded through the Veil in the sky. As a science fantasy, I do feel it's important to specify certain rules in world-building. I did enjoy the touch of Chinese culture to this book and the cover is gorgeous. Overall, this is not a strong YA fantasy, and I'm unsure if I'll continue the series. We'll see.