Bitter Medicine is a fantasy/paranormal romance novel written by debut author Mia Tsai. The novel features a world where paranormal beings exist alongside humanity without their knowledge, all coming from myths and creations of different cultures - so our protagonists are a Chinese Immortal and a Half-Elf Fae - many of whom work together for a Fae Company under its boss Oberon. The story doesn't focus too much on how this setting should or could work, and instead deals largely with the romance between its main duo: Elle, the aforementioned immortal - who conceals her magical/medical skills to hide herself and her older brother from her dangerous but still loved older brother - and Luc, a half-elf who serves as Oberon's best fixer, meaning he kills or gets rid of whatever stands in Oberon's way, despite his dislike of what that entails and what that means about him. The story follows the duo as they finally admit their feelings for one another, come into conflict due to their secrets, and have to figure out what to do about it.

And Bitter Medicine tells this story really really well, and drew me in quite strongly. The story's approach to the romance begins kind of slow burn as both characters are afraid to spit it out, but once they do it gets incredibly steamy in the best way possible. And when their secrets do come out, Tsai takes the story in directions that really aren't the usual way - for example, not to spoil too much, this book avoids the usual romance plot arc where the characters get together, break apart due to a conflict, and then get back together again and reconcile....events and difficulties do occur, but our characters approach and deal with them in different and understandable ways, and this diversion from the usual plot arc really works. Tsai's refusal to go with normal pathways for this romance, and the development of her characters, their plot arcs, and the setting around them, wind up really working and being highly enjoyable, such that I could barely put this book down. If you're looking for a fantasy romance, this is definitely something you should be into.


------------------------------Plot Summary--------------------------------
Elle works as a middling-rank shopkeeper for Roland & Riddle, the faerie temp agency, drawing magical glyphs for B and lower level agents. It's a waste of her magical talents as a descendent of the Chinese god of medicine, but Elle is determined not to let on that she can do more, for fear it'll attract attention to her real identity..and to the thought-dead older brother Tony who she once saved from her murderous younger brother Yìwú. Only by staying hidden can Elle ensure her safety...and that of Tony.

There's just one problem: Agent Luc Villois, the half-elf agent who has been patronizing Elle's shop for the last few months, and who Elle has a serious crush on. For Luc, Elle can't help but customize her work without him knowing to give him better results, and to hope that one day he might want more from her than merely glyphs.

And unknown to Elle, Luc is just as infatuated with Elle as she is with him, and keeps coming back to her not just because her magic seems to have saved his life, but also because well...he wishes he had the courage to ask her for more. But Luc is not just the ordinary agent he pretends to be, but the top "fixer" - assassin, spy, thief, cleanup man - for Roland & Riddle's top man: Oberon. And Luc's latest mission is, unknown to him, to track down Elle's brother Yìwú....who has seemingly tracked down Tony and Luc and aims to finish the job he once started years ago.....
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Readers who are familiar with romance will start Bitter Medicine and think they can see what's coming here, because the book is structured in a really familiar way. You have a story whose perspective shifts between each of the two main characters, each of whom is falling for/has a crush on the other. Both characters have secrets that if discovered threaten to put the two in opposition to the other, especially when Luc's secret job puts him on the hunt for Elle's younger brother. So what you expect to happen is something like: the two characters fall in love, have a romantic moment, discover the truth about each other and break up, only for Luc to decide that Elle is more important and switch sides/not quite fulfill his orders in order to help Elle and to be with her, after which they reconcile. This is how most books of this type work, but Bitter Medicine doesn't take that tack at all.

And it's able to avoid that tack by making each of its main characters have depth and background that makes them something more than either just a romantic partner for the other or the person their secret suggests they should be. In Elle for example, you have a person used to struggling with being torn all over the place by her emotions. On one hand, her magic (and her) wants to be free and used, but on the other she has to keep it hidden to protect Tony; similarly, she is on the run from her other brother Yìwú for fear of him killing her and Tony, but at the same time she loves Yìwú as a sibling and as she remembers him, so she doesn't actually want to ever take a stand and confront him. And of course she longs for the family she left behind and let them think she and Tony were dead, but at the same time wants to get free of that family who only thought of her and Tony as tools to do their duties (especially Tony). So it's probably less of a surprise that when Luc's secret is revealed, her reaction is not to reject him, but something different.

Meanwhile Luc is a man who is torn apart by his job as a Fixer and what it leads him to do...and what his boss Oberon makes him do, under threat of using Luc's true name (given when Luc didn't realize what that meant) to compel him if he doesn't comply. Luc has a softer side he only previously shares with his aunt, a Sphinx, and it's that side that colors his greatest failure, a failure (which I won't reveal here) that he is desperate to try to correct. Luc is thought of as a monster by those who work around him and don't know the truth, but Elle - who has a brother she still loves despite her believing him to be a monster - is able to see those other sides or give him a chance to show them, which prevents the pain of a rejection coming from her.

Of course all of the above only comes after a ton of pining and "cannot spit it out" moments, as you would expect from a romance like this, and god are those moments painful (in a good way). But when the two characters do finally get together romantically and share a good kiss and hot sex (we do get one very nice sex scene), it pays off in spades. And then the book takes its last act and all the character development to change things up dramatically by drastically altering the status quo, forcing a difficulty onto Elle and Luc's relationship that isn't caused by one of them betraying the other, and the way they adapt to that new status quo is extremely well done, as they deal with depression, loss of power, and more.

The result is really great, and I really don't want to go into too much more depth without spoiling, but let's just say this is a really great urban fantasy romance/paranormal romance/whatever you want to call it, with great characters, romance, and plotting all the way through the end. I highly recommend this if romance is what you're looking for.

This certainly was a surprise! Bitter Medicine was taking the blue pill in The Matrix. In for the sweetest love story of an unlikely couple that will ravage the Gods for ages.

As a descendant of the Chinese god of medicine, ignored middle child Elle Jiang was destined to be a doctor. Instead, she is underemployed as a mediocre magical calligrapher at the fairy temp agency. Nevertheless, she challenges herself by covertly outfitting Luc, her client and crush, with high-powered glyphs.

Half-elf Luc, the agency’s top security expert, has his own secret: he’s responsible for a curse laid from an old assignment. To heal them, he’ll need to perform his job duties with unrelenting excellence and earn time off from his tyrannical boss.

La fantasía urbana es un caldo de cultivo perfecto para el romance paranormal y hay que reconocer que Mia Tsai mezcla de una forma tan equilibrada ambos subgéneros en Bitter Medicine que no se puede decir que haya un exceso ni un defecto de ninguno de ellos. Para ser una primera novela, hay que reconocer que consigue un equilibrio perfecto en la trama, con toques de humor y acción que le sientan muy bien.


La historia gira entorno a Elle, una descendiente del Dios chino de la medicina que trabaja en una tienda de hechizos de protección y Luc, un semielfo francés cliente habitual. Aunque hay una atracción innegable entre ellos, la situación de ambos no les permite ponerse a pensar en establecer relaciones más que profesionales.

Mia Tsai ha entrelazado en esta historia de amor los hilos de las obligaciones familiares y laborales de una forma ágil y creíble. Elle está dispuesta a sacrificar su libertad por proteger a su familia y Luc se debe tanto a su trabajo por razones que poco a poco se irán desvelando que ambos parecen condenados a seguir sus trayectorias divergentes sin posibilidad de encontrarse nunca. Pero claro, la casualidad siempre está presente para ayudar a las almas en pena, y Luc le pedirá ayuda a Elle para su próxima misión, que está íntimamente ligada con el pasado de Elle.

La construcción de mundo que lleva a cabo la autora es encomiable, ya que a la tradición feérica occidental más conocida por estos lares añade la fantasía asiática algo más desconocida. Los personajes están construidos desde el cariño y aunque algunas de las opciones que escogen son un poco rocambolescas, tampoco rompen la continuidad de la historia. Me gusta especialmente el desarrollo de Elle, desde el autosacrificio más encomiable a la vez que absurdo a la autoafirmación más valiosa, un camino nada fácil de recorrer.

Bitter Medicine no ha venido a remover los cimientos de la literatura ni lo pretende, pero sí que está aquí para hacernos pasar un buen rato.

Mia Tsai's beautiful debut is a gorgeous blend of east and west fantasy. A romantic yarn with good plotting, terrific prose, and a romance comprised of romantic chemistry that practically sizzles off the page. Mia Tsai is absolutely one to watch and her characters will absolutely win the reader's heart.

Narration in Bitter Medicine alternates between Elle Mei and Luc Villois, who both work for the Agency, which seems to exist to give nonhumans a place to learn to interact with humans safely under the direction of Oberon (possibly the Oberon). Or something. It's a little unclear, to be honest, what the Agency is for, but they both work there.

Elle is at least a century old and does magic with Chinese calligraphy. She makes and sells glyphs to people in the Agency to help them do their jobs more safely and effectively. She also feels responsible for looking after her older brother, Tony, who used to have magic but no longer does. He is in danger from their second brother, who, as it turns out, is Luc's target. Luc is a half-elven super-agent of some sort who is almost too badass to be believable. He’s 230-something years old. He has a crush on Elle that she’s (of course) unaware of.

As they work together to bring down Elle's second brother, their unspoken attraction becomes very spoken and acted on. In these instances, it was good to have these ancient people doing consent checks, even though neither of them would have been raised to do so. It was especially refreshing to have Elle also checking with Luc for his consent: often in m/f romance, it feels like it's all the male partner receiving permission and the female partner receiving instruction. So, that was a good thing.

Less good were the pacing and the characterization. Pacing-wise, there were a number of instances where I would have preferred the story move along faster, and others where I could have done with more detail and explanation. With regard to characterization, I didn't really feel that any of the characters were fleshed out much beyond their role in the story (hot love interest, evil scheming boss, supportive gay brother, happily violent coworkers, etc.). This wouldn't ordinarily be a huge problem in a book this length, except that the two leads also felt more like cardboard standees with labels draped over them like boas than characters a reader could get invested in.

I enjoyed the author’s note on language following the narrative, which brought up some salient points and I applaud Tsai’s decision to depict language in this way. But the note on language was my favorite part of the book, and that's not great. As a debut piece, Mia Tsai's Bitter Medicine shows promise, but for me it missed the mark.

Going in to this book, I wasn't quite sure about how YA it might be, how romancy it might be, how urban fantasy it might be.

I'd say that it's mostly romance with an urban fantasy bent. I wouldn't call it YA.

Unfortunately, I was hoping for mostly urban fantasy with a romance bent. If you want a romance then you might really like this!

The writing is decent. I liked that Elle was a magic practitioner who worked out of a studio instead of slinging spells around to blast all the baddies. I didn't like so much that Elle had decided to give up her entire life and hide away her talent for family members who really had not asked her to do this. As for Luc, he's an assassin cinnamon roll. Both of these two spend a LOT of their time noticing just how adorable the other person is. Neither of them seem to have much clue how the other person perceives them.

The author has created an interesting world, but it didn't necessarily feel well thought out. I felt rushed through it when I wanted more detail. Most of what the author wanted to focus on was about the budding romance between the main characters and I could have done with fewer adoring gazes and more looks at how exactly the world of magic interacted with the mundane world. Just not what I was in the mood for, but it might be exactly what you like!

An okay book, with a lot of unexplored potential.

This book felt "half-baked".

So many correct ingredients, but none of them fully used. The world-building is sparse, and unfortunately not in a way that is forgivable. The book is pitched as a fantasy with romance, when really it is a badly written romance with a sprinkling of magic that isn't fully explained. The "facts" of the characters (i.e. age, origins etc.) by no means match their characterization. The characters often make decisions/take actions that are so absurd and inconsistent that I began to wonder if I was confused.

The dialogue was mediocre, and at times unbelievable.

Did not finish book. Stopped at 86%.

There was no disclaimer for explicit sexual content - which would have been greatly appreciated. This book is not my thing, a part from my personal preferences clashing with its contents, I also found this book to be, for lack of a better word, boring. It had so many aspects that I would usually love (fae, xianxia etc.), so I'm so sad this book wasn't my cup of tea.

I hope whoever else reads this enjoys it, and thank you to Tachyon Publications and NetGalley for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Mia Tsai is a brilliant writer. Bitter Medicine flawlessly builds a multicultural city center in a way that so many contemporary fantasy stories are missing out on. Our city centers are luscious and full of life, and Mia Tsai captures that life impressively through a fantastical world. It's genuine, heartfelt, and full of honesty.

I had to stop after 25% of the book. I found it hard to connect with the style and the characters, and the storytelling was confusing. There were scenes that I liked, and the beginning was strong to hook me right away, but I couldn't keep the same level of interest as before. I think it's a matter of likes and tastes, so I'm sure other readers will enjoy it more than me.

While I applaud what Mia Tsai is trying to do with Bitter Medicine, it just wasn't the book for me. I liked the world building and the magic systems, but for most of it it felt like I was slogging through the story.

Ahoy there mateys!  I am not a huge romance reader but this world building sounded like so much fun that I decided to give it a shot.  And I have no regrets about reading this.  Elle is a Chinese glyph maker who is hiding her real skills to work in a fairy temp agency doing basic calligraphy.  She has a crush on Luc, a French half-elf secret agent. So she makes him some better charms that save his life.  But he has secrets too.  Chaos and coincidences ensue.

The first half of the book was a delight.  I liked Elle and I liked Luc and I enjoyed their playful banter and the basis of their friendship.  For the most part, I enjoyed their backstories.  Elle can be annoying and Luc is a bit tortured but the action was fun.  I didn't even mind the sexy times too much.

The second half of the book was different.  I truly appreciate what the author did here in terms of character and themes but it was more about Elle and Luc's inner demons and making choices about how they wanted their relationship to unfold.  I wasn't interested in the angst even if it made complete sense.  I also didn't love the resolution of the ending.

I wanted the whirlwind action of the first half and more information about the mythological creatures in the world.  I wanted more about how the fairy agency works.  That said, I would certainly read more from this debut author.  Especially if there is more insight into the fun world she created.  Arrrr!

Chinese traditional magic, European fae magic, and the magic of other cultures exists alongside the non-magical world.

Elle is a descendant of a Chinese medicine god. She's got considerable magical talent, and was supposed to be a doctor.

Instead, she's working in a magical calligraphy shop, masquerading as a person of relatively modest power and careful to do nothing that would expose the truth, making magical glyphs for agents working for the agency that runs the magical side of this world. She has a regular client, Luc, whom she tells herself she regards as only a "business friend." It's just impossible for her to have any deeper feelings for him, because she can't risk exposing who she really is.

Luc is a half-elf who works directly for the head of that magical agency, as an elite enforcer, and he's had to do some very ugly things. He also has secrets to keep, but he's more willing than Elle to explore the attraction between them.

He has also noticed that recent work she's done for him is better than her official magical rating says it should be, and he wants her and only her doing any future glyphs for him. He also has some special items he wants to commission from her, for a big job he has coming up.

We slowly learn that Elle is in hiding from her family, but especially from her younger brother, and hiding her older brother, who was supposed to be heir to the family's most important magical legacy. He's supposed to be dead. The why of this is complicated and understandably riddled with emotion, but Elle takes all the guilt on herself.

Luc is very, very good at what he does, but he's starting to hate it. But he's trapped, and sees no way out. He's also terrifyingly dangerous, and at times it results in levels of violence and blood some may find uncomfortable.

But when he's not on a job, he's a different man. He notices a lot about Elle that she doesn't recognize about herself. She feels responsible for taking care of everyone around her, and feels guilty and ashamed that she can't make everything work right for everyone she feels responsible for. She doesn't acknowledge the ways those people have contributed to the problems she's struggling with.

Elle is stretching herself far too thin, and not taking any care of herself.

Luc is coming to a breaking point, too, though it's a very different one.

The language here is beautiful, and the characters and the world they live in unfold with exquisite care. By the time we learn Luc's secrets, we're ready to understand them.

Other characters are also well-done. Luc's boss, Oberon, is monstrous, but very believable. Elle's older brother, Tony (no more his real name than Elle is hers), is utterly likable and charming, even when we recognize his role in creating the situation that may kill all of them.

All the cultures involved are treated with respect, and scattered through the book are works or phrases in the characters' respective languages and scripts. It's little bits, never enough to frustrate--just lending some reality to the fact that these people really do come from a variety of cultural backgrounds.

I thoroughly enjoyed this.

I received an electronic galley of this book from the publisher via NetGalley.

Truly one of the most heartwarming and cute stories I've ever read with the best character dynamics. I loved Elle and Luc and the world building was amazing with different cultures and languages. The characters were realistic in a way that made them easily relatable and I would give anything to visit their world for even just a day.

Thank you NetGalley for the chance to read this!

I wished I could have loved this book, but honestly it bored me. Like there is nothing else. I don’t know if it’s a structural issue or if it’s just me!

As a disabled reader and someone who has always been interested in healing magics in fantasy, Bitter Medicine by Mia Tsai sounded very interesting to me. That side of the storyline and world-building was as intriguing as I expected, however, quite a bit of this book just wasn’t my cup of tea.

Firstly, the synopsis of Bitter Medicine is quite misleading in the way that it describes Luc as having a curse. It made it sound to me that there would be some aspect of healing happening, especially considering the title of the book. What is described as a curse is not actually a curse. Someone knows his true name and is using it to control him; that is very different from a curse. The healing of a curse verses that type of trauma are two completely separate things, and this adds a certain level of trauma to the storyline, which I was not at all prepared for as someone with PTSD (see the content warnings for more details).

Likewise, the saving of Luc’s life happens in a roundabout way. The synopsis suggests that something happens in the book, where in fact it happens off page before the book even begins, and it is nowhere near as dramatic or romantic as the synopsis makes it sounds.

Luc and Elle’s relationship is sweet and endearing, and both are likeable characters. What I disliked was how quickly Elle’s personality changed as soon as the sex scenes started. It felt like she became a completely different person, and in this way it reminded me of moments in some anime and manga where the female character becomes over sexualised. That’s not to say in any way that women should not enjoy themselves in the bedroom or take control, rather that it didn’t feel like a natural personality transition. It felt very disjointed and that made those scenes feel awkward to me.

Overall, Bitter Medicine by Mia Tsai was an enjoyable read with some interesting characters and great world-building. It has a nice amount of representation, and there’s a scene towards the end of the book where a character is recovering from something (spoilers!) that was very well written. Unfortunately, this one just didn’t quite work for me personally. The main issue for me was that I went into it expecting one thing and got something else. It is also very slow paced, and it just felt like I was slogging my way through it at parts. The light-hearted nature of Bitter Medicine was just a bit too light-hearted for me considering some of the themes discussed in this book, and it didn’t mesh well for me.

Bitter Medicine is a light mix of mythologies, Elle involving Chinese mythology and Luc bringing up the elves, but there are also mentions of beings from other mythologies, such as a sphinx being Luc's godmother and confidant. Even if it's not with Lira - Elle's work partner - I'd love to read other stories in this world, to better understand how it works.

My excitement for the book came and went in waves, especially in the final stretch of the book which I think was too understood for the amount of things I still had to wrap up. The romance that unfolds ranges from acquaintances to silly lovers, as they are two fools running away from talking about their feelings with silly excuses.

Full review at: https://deiumjeito.blogspot.com/2023/04/review-bitter-medicine-mia-tsai.html

Elle Mei is a descendant of Shénnóng, the Chinese god of medicine making her a gifted immortal. Due to her family’s past, she has chosen a career of doing magical calligraphy which could had become a lucrative career for her. She chooses to hide her gift to work as an ordinary glyphmaker. It is the only way she knows to protect her family. Elle has a crush on half-elf Luc Villois. He is her favorite customer. When Luc realizes what Elle’s truly capable of, he hires her to create custom glyphs for his upcoming assignment, and, against her better judgment, she agrees though she does make him promise not to tell where his glyphs came from. Luc has a secret and if Elle knew it, she would have nothing to do with him. What is the secret? Their friendship turns into love. When both of their pasts come back to haunt them, will their love save them?

The author has written a blend of mythology, love and magic. It is a magical novel in which two lonely people have to let go of their pasts and forgive themselves to save their relationship. I loved the allure and mystery of the two of them as they go from friendship to love. It is a paranormal adventure that the reader won’t forget!

Sometimes it takes me a minute to really sink into a fantasy romance, but Bitter Medicine pulled me in pretty quickly. I was immediately invested in Elle, well before I actually understood what was going on. This book is deeply intrenched in Chinese (xianxia?) mythology/folklore, which was really neat and also brand new for me. This is an Urban fantasy setting with magic based in part on embedding magic in calligraphy and it has a suspense plot because Elle's hiding from someone and Luc, her love interest, is a spy type person. Or a fixer. I mean, whatever you want to call him. The world-building unfolds pretty naturally so I don't want to say much more.

This book is an adult fantasy romance, though I'll be honest that I sort of felt like I was reading a YA fantasy that just happened to have explicit sex scenes sometimes. Of course, it reading like a YA fantasy is probably why I enjoyed it as much as I did because I struggle with adult fantasy because my brain is just really not built for that these days. I enjoyed the world Tsai created quite a bit though and would definitely not mind continuing in this world by following different characters in follow up novels. While the world-building was engaging and relatively easy to fall into, what I really appreciated was the character development and the intricacies of how the character development fit in with the overall plot. For example, with Elle's development, there was a lot of exploring her familial dynamic and decision making that maybe deviates from the standard or acceptable. Then with Luc, there was a lot about balancing work and life and... Well, I don't want to say more really because of spoiler possibilities, but just know I really loved how everything came together.

The only thing that keeps me from giving it five stars is that for once, I think this book needed to be a little bit longer. The pacing was so quick, which was great for my attention, but it also meant that there were scenes that felt like we were really just jumping from one thing to another without time to process. I think if you read this book slowly, the pacing might wind up feeling perfect for you, but I binged it and so I really felt the lack of lingering over parts that felt like we should sit in them for a bit. But I'm definitely looking forward to reading more from Tsai in the future!