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A review by graculus
The God and the Gumiho by Sophie Kim
- Loveable characters? No
3.0
In short: a lot of interesting ideas, in a world that won't be familiar to many of its prospective readers (unless, like me, they watch a lot of K-drama!) spoiled by lacklustre plotting and thin characterisation.
The basic premise of the book is that, like much urban fantasy, there's an unseen world alongside the one the humans know, inhabited by all sorts of supernatural beings - this one is set in 1990's Korea with the gods and creatures to match. Our protagonists are Seokga, who's currently subject to the need to deal with a certain number of demons he released on earth as part of a failed attempt to become ruler of the gods, and Hani, who's a gumiho successfully concealing just how old she actually is. Hani is working in a coffee shop and gets lots of pleasure from messing up Seokga's order every day but insinuates herself into his professional life when she discovers her own secret is at risk.
Unfortunately, while characters bickering can be entertaining in the short term, the ongoing strife between these two characters means they actually come across more as teenagers than how old they both supposedly are. In addition to this, I struggled a bit with feeling any kind of sympathy towards one character who'd messed up badly and caused all sorts of mayhem in a putative relationship with another who's literally left a trail of dead bodies in her wake. Sure, maybe one of them was Jack the Ripper and others are clearly arseholes, but is being an arsehole a capital offence?
The cover's nice, it's not a particularly challenging read if you don't actually think about the implications of both protagonist's previous actions, but I couldn't get away from them myself. So, not for me and not a series I'll be carrying on with.
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher, via Netgalley. This is my honest review of the book in question.
The basic premise of the book is that, like much urban fantasy, there's an unseen world alongside the one the humans know, inhabited by all sorts of supernatural beings - this one is set in 1990's Korea with the gods and creatures to match. Our protagonists are Seokga, who's currently subject to the need to deal with a certain number of demons he released on earth as part of a failed attempt to become ruler of the gods, and Hani, who's a gumiho successfully concealing just how old she actually is. Hani is working in a coffee shop and gets lots of pleasure from messing up Seokga's order every day but insinuates herself into his professional life when she discovers her own secret is at risk.
Unfortunately, while characters bickering can be entertaining in the short term, the ongoing strife between these two characters means they actually come across more as teenagers than how old they both supposedly are. In addition to this, I struggled a bit with feeling any kind of sympathy towards one character who'd messed up badly and caused all sorts of mayhem in a putative relationship with another who's literally left a trail of dead bodies in her wake. Sure, maybe one of them was Jack the Ripper and others are clearly arseholes, but is being an arsehole a capital offence?
The cover's nice, it's not a particularly challenging read if you don't actually think about the implications of both protagonist's previous actions, but I couldn't get away from them myself. So, not for me and not a series I'll be carrying on with.
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher, via Netgalley. This is my honest review of the book in question.