Glitter Never Gold

Me before reading this: I can't believe I actually got an ARC! *jumping up and down and screaming* Chinese mythology + female Asian protagonist + defying gender roles + aliens!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Me after reading this: What the hell does that cliffhanger mean????????????????????????????????? I loved the themes of feminism and rebellion against societal expectations, especially in the backdrop of Chinese mythology and magic. One thing that was really interesting was the name for the weird alien monsters, the Hunduns. Just a little context: I'm half Chinese, and I grew up speaking the language. My Chinese grandparents like to make these soup dumplings called Hunduns (disclaimer: this is not pinyin and therefore does not reflect the authentic Chinese pronunciation of the word). So whenever I saw the word Hundun in this book, it was really funny and added to my appreciation of this book. However much I enjoyed Zetian's rise to power in a male-dominated world, it wasn...

I recently re-read this. It was (the plot and characters, at least) better than I remembered, and would've gotten four stars except for one gigantic issue that's deeply personal for me. Most people probably wouldn't care, but it really angers me to see authors misrepresent this. And it's even worse when no reviews talk about or even notice this issue at all. Apparently, Nasir's abusive dad, the Sultan, was possessed all along by the Big Bad (whose name I will not mention to avoid spoilers). The evil/abusive dad who happens to be a king is a trope I've seen several times in YA fantasy, the most prominent example of which is Dorian's dad, the king of Adarlan (from Throne of Glass). In addition, our heroes arrived at the conclusion of possession by Big Bad because the Sultan had occasional moments of humanity. So, by this reasoning, all abusers are pure cartoonish evil and if they do show some kind of humanity it's because they managed to temporarily break ...

Disclaimer: this is from a reader who has no prior experience with the Rabbits podcast. Rabbits. I don't even have the words to describe it. But I'm going to try. Reading Rabbits is like going down a deep, dark rabbit hole (pun intended) of mysteries, where there is truth in lies and lies in truth. The questions pull you deeper and deeper. What happened to Scarpio? What is Rabbits, truly? What is its real purpose? And what does this all have to do with K? The real world begins to fade away. You can't bring yourself to put it down, to stop reading. You need answers. You need to know how it all ends. And when you're done, when your dive into the world of Rabbits is at an end, you smile and say, "that was some novel". Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC.

This book was just... incredible.  I decided to read Year of the Witching because of the glowing reviews from my friends on Goodreads, and I was not disappointed. Henderson's gorgeous writing and beautiful setting exceeded all expectations. The dark yet hopeful tone was a great complement to the heavy themes and social commentary that I loved in this book.  Immanuelle was such an amazing MC. She had always been an outsider in Bethel, because of both her mother's sins and her father's heritage. She was shunned and ridiculed for it, but she didn't hold it against the people of Bethel. But she could've. She could've given in to vengeance, to the darkness in her heart and the anger of the witches. She, filled with righteous fury, could've let everyone succumb to the plagues, and know that they got what was coming to them. But she didn't. Instead, she saved them. She began a new age of mercy, not vengeance.  Through this skillfully crafted medieval(ish), dyst...

WARNING. RANT AHEAD.   This was one of the worst novels I've ever read in my life. Filled with numerous tropes and cliches, this book was a compilation of every single cringey thing ever written in the YA genre. The only reason I even read this book in the first place was that several of my friends liked it. And now I have to live with the consequences. My brain feels like a rotten, mushy pool of secondhand embarrassment, and I can't make a sound that isn't a groan.   First of all, there was literally no diversity. For some reason, everyone (and I do mean every single person) was white, straight, able-bodied, and wealthy. The MC was the freaking Mayor's daughter and lived in a giant five-acre mansion in the middle of the city. I mean, seriously. And the author didn't even address the MC's privileged life, just acted like it was normal and no big deal. I'd get it if the author made Abby the mayor's daughter as a parody or to make a point about her bei...

This was... intense. Like Six of Crows meets The Poppy War intense. I rarely rate books five stars, but this one is now a forever favorite. I loved how this book was about choosing to be a survivor instead of a victim, about conquering your demons and rising above them. This beautifully crafted fantasy world, with so much mythology and depth, served as a metaphor for the real world and dealt with real-world problems like violence and rape culture. It explored the darkest parts of human nature without sacrificing truth for a popular audience. And the characters. They had incredible depth, and sometimes I just wanted to hug them and tell them that they're not alone. Roma was shattered, again and again, in so many horrible ways, but she always got back up again. She wore her scars, both inside and outside, like they were her crown. And Leviathan. He endured fifteen years of being broken and molded by his father into a killer. But even though it would've been so easy for him to let...

  Me before reading this: OH MY GOD THAT GORGEOUS COVER *Jumping up and down like a crazy person* Sign me up! A bisexual MC (like me) and major gothic vibes! Me after reading this: *Sighing and banging my head against the wall* HOW DID THAT TURN OUT SO WRONG !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I really wanted to love this book. Everything was going so well: a massive hype, a cover to die for , LGBT rep.  But somehow, reading it felt like going through a gigantic caffeine withdrawal. Down Comes the Night was pretty much an average YA novel: not that good, not that bad. In the beginning, I was struck by the mysterious atmosphere that Saft managed to create with her third-person POV. Often, YA authors tend to mess up that kind of perspective, but Saft wrote it really well.  There was a slow start, and the characters were tiring at times. The plot was intriguing but trope-filled, in a fantasy world that was interesting, but not very original. The two countries at war...