A review by books_onthe_ground
These Violent Delights by Chloe Gong

adventurous dark funny mysterious 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? Yes

5.0

Okay I’m a Shakespeare nerd (my Instagram username is literally a Shakespeare meme) so there’s no real surprise that I loved this book. The only thing that did surprise me was exactly HOW MUCH I loved this book. This book now lives rent free in my head and I’m begging it to stay despite it taking up valuable real estate. 

Firstly, the world building of this book is phenomenal. Now, I can’t picture things in my head but because of the descriptions of every part of Shanghai from the docks to the houses to the bars I was in awe at how well I could understand what everything was supposed to look like. (I know I’m not the first to say this, but I just wanted to mention how nice it is to read a book, especially a retelling that isn’t western, specifically American. Seriously I’m sick of hearing about New York.) The atmosphere is also incredible. The building of dread and slow escalation of fear was beautifully done and this book made me realise how, in nearly every fantasy/magical realism book I’ve read, I rarely care about the outcomes for the everyday people living in the world. I care about the other, ordinary people in Shanghai and how the events of the books affect them. It makes the actions of the characters have so much more meaning when you are thinking not only of them, but of everyone. I rarely think of these things in books because I rarely see the people in the towns and cities, and I rarely see them be affected. But Chloe Gong creates a fantastic sense of the fear and paranoia, and the everyday people have lives and views and fears and feel like people! I never realised how many books lack that and now it’s something I notice when reading other books. 

Secondly, the characters. The. Characters. I cannot explain to you have much I love these characters. They are so well developed and so well written. The dialogue is so so so good, I’m the same age as most of the characters and they sound their age. Their relationships are realistic, and you can tell, just from how they talk to each other and through little details, exactly how much they care about each other, that they’ve known each other their whole lives, etc. It’s no surprise that Marshall was my favourite because Mercutio has been my favourite character in every version of Romeo and Juliet I’ve seen but oh my god I loved him so much. I loved the relationship between Roma, Marshall and Benedikt and how it mirrored the relationship between Juliette, Kathleen and Roselind (I also loved how Juliette finally got actual friends in this version THANK YOU) and how you could easily see and understand the relationships the characters had with each other. 

I love the development between Roma and Juliette’s relationship and how it also affects the people around them, especially how their friends react whenever the other is around. Their issues were serious, and they respected each other’s boundaries and understood each other’s actions and reasons for doing what they do. Nothing felt rushed or underdeveloped and their actions had consequences that stayed throughout the book and weren’t just resolved and forgotten about. They also aren’t stupid. I know a lot of people’s issue with the original characters is how they don’t seem to think about what they are doing about how it will affect others, but these characters aren’t like that at all. Their jobs, family and friends come first and their relationship with each other come after. Again, these characters are older and understand what they are doing. It’s a realistic look at the whole enemies to lover's trope and I LOVED it. This is one of my favourite examples of enemies to lovers.

The dialogue could easily have been taken from my group of friends and everything from the little looks to hitting each other when a stupid joke was made just emphasised that these are still young characters despite their circumstances. They didn’t feel like 30 year olds. There’s not a single character I dislike, apart from the character’s I’m meant to dislike. And there’s no “ooo edgy bad boy that I’m going to call misunderstood despite him just being a horrible person” like no, you just dislike them like the rest of the characters and I love it. I love waiting for a character to get a well deserved slap in the face. I don’t think there are enough characters like that. 

Lastly, the Shakespeare references. If you are like me and were drawn to this book because it’s a Shakespeare retelling let me tell you this, I screamed so loudly at so many moments in this book simply because the references are THAT good. They range from perfectly times lines that are almost directly from the original play to tiny little details that just make you so aware of how much thought and love went into this book. References that didn’t need to be there but just make the whole experience of reading this book just so much better. And I just have to say, there was one moment that I was WAITING to see in the book and when it happens, I actually screamed so loudly my flatmate in the room next door to me, texted me to ask what's up. Also, something I appreciate so much is that, despite this being a retelling, not everything happens as it does in the play, which means that I have absolutely no idea where this story is going and how it’s going to end. Despite Romeo and Juliet being infamous and a lot of the structure of the book following plot points and moments from the play, it’s so different that I have absolutely no idea what to expect. Every time I think I know how something’s going to go, it changes direction, and all my expectations are thrown out of the window. I cannot express to you how stressed I was at moments of this book. The tension that Gong creates in serious moments between the gangs is incredible and has probably taken about 5 years off my life. 

In conclusion, I love this book so much it now occupies about 37% of my brain. I can’t wait for the second one; I’m actually counting down to its release. I can’t wait to be emotionally destroyed for days because of it, and I know I will be because I saw Gong’s Instagram story where her friend was reading an arc of the second one and crying. I haven’t been this scared and excited for a book in a long time. Gong has instantly become an instant buy author for me, and I can’t wait to see what she brings out next after this duology ends. If you are debating picking this up, I couldn’t recommend it more. 

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