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

3.0

I had high hopes for this book, as the blurb sounded like something I would really enjoy, however it wasn’t really what I expected at all, this was advertised as a romance, however nothing in this book felt romantic. My problem is that I’m sure many of these decisions have been made with regard to the next books, but when an author tries to be too clever it takes away from the book as is. 

The whole thing was rather rushed, she agreed to be his assassin and then we just skipped to 6 months later and lost so much character development. Ruying went from hating Antony to trusting him implicitly 6 months later, but it all happened off page so it meant nothing. It also felt as though the development paused for the 6 months as she killed lots of people before she began to question it. 

I didn’t feel an emotional connection to any of the characters I was meant to care for, which made it very difficult to feel invested. There plot line with Taohua didn’t feel strong enough because we only had 2 maybe 3 conversations with her and that was not enough o build an significant connection with her, she was mentioned, then 6 months passed and I didn’t think of her anymore. Similarly with Meiya as much as I pitied her at the start, I was expecting that relationship to go somewhere, but she never changed, and just told her sister off, quite rightly, but her plot seemed to flatline quite early on and then she was just something to throw in Ruying’s face when she disagreed. 

When is this set? We have fighter jets and missile launchers but Er-lang still fights with bows and arrows, they have travelled through a portal to combine worlds. Feels like distant historical fantasy mixed with WWII historical fantasy also named as Rome so it’s a alternate history? Could have created a different name for them that doesn’t contradict history or cause readers to try and use external information that doesn’t match.