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A review by kanyanko
泾渭情殇 by 请君莫笑
dark
emotional
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
no because the ending pissed me off so much i was seething for days. and the extra chapters just made everything worse. not to mention there were many, many loose threads. first of all i refuse to believe the masked person just disappeared after the rebellion. there is literally no mention of her after chapter 290. there was so much build-up for her as the final antagonist of the story only for it to just fizzle out. very anticlimactic if you ask me.
many characters have an open ending, including qijing. we never quite find out what happened to bayin and jinwushu. gongyang huai, jiya, the seventh and eigth nangong princes and the sifang bank staff - there is no mention of them in the extras. on top of all that, the angst in the final 20 chapters was all over the place. listen, there is tasteful angst and then there is forced angst. i had no problem with the rest of the story but the forced angst in the finale was sickening, starting from nangong sunu's death. in the end it was like pdl decided to put her characters through heartwrenching misery not because it was relevant to the story but because she felt like it and she could think of no other way to introduce drama.
another thing that didn't sit well with me was the shunu and xiao-die pairing. xiao-die especially as a character has been put through a lot. in fact her and jingnu have suffered the most in this story. xiao-die's revenge arc ended extremely abruptly. her development was fast-paced. i did like that she reunited with her daughter in the end but we will never know how that will play out in the future- whether yuxiao will find out that her mother is actually xiao-die, and whether her and jinwushu will ever meet. as for shunu, i like her as a character, but the pairing has no chemistry. not to mention shunu's reason for falling in love with xiao-die was very icky. she would've been better off with jiya. after the midway point jiya was kinda cast aside which was yet another thing that annoyed me.
however that doesn't mean i disliked the story. the two main characters are definitely the heart of the book. despite the miserable open ending they had, one cannot argue that their love for each other changed the world. i love jingnu the most. her growth from the beginning to the end was so well written and i was extremely proud and also in love with her. we stan the emperor zhenzhen for introducing feminism. qi yan was a very complex character and her mental gymnastics from desiring nothing but revenge to starting to have feelings for jingnu was delicious and i loved every second of it.
despite being not a big fan of politics, the court politics in jwqs is explained very well by pdl and it is easy to understand. there were several parts that just hooked me and i couldn't put down the book until i finished the entire arc. qi yan's galaxy brain is so sexy muah! the romance paired with the angst is very sweet yet heartwrenching. however my point for the ending still stands. i guess in pdl terms you could call it a "happy ending" but if you want a truly happy ending then yeah there is a chance that you will be disappointed.