?????????? Did I hallucinate this book???????????

After discussing this book with a friend and reviewing the marketing materials I've received for this book, I have changed my rating to a 2. I think this book suffered from some bad marketing. While this book has romantic and fantasy elements, I'd describe it more as an erotic thriller than romantasy, which (to me) has a *significantly* different vibe. I would absolutely *not* call it a pure romance, as described by Booklist.

The concept here was really promising though to be honest, the writing did not do it for me. It was generally pretty bland and the erotic scenes left a lot to be desired. The pacing was a bit slow especially for a shorter book with mostly everything happening in the last third. There was no connection or chemistry between any of the characters, even in their original reincarnations, which felt disappointing because I wanted the draw and the emotional impact of following their journey through the lifetimes. I didn't get the force, undying love I was expecting. I also wished that the reincarnations had more linking them together rather.

Rollercoaster is definitely a good way to describe the plot of this book. It's completely unpredictable in a fever dream sort of way but didn't work for me at all.

CW sexual assault, dubcon, consensual & nonconsensual drug use, emotional manipulation, cheating, gore, death, ableism

DNF for now but I want to come back to this one for sure. This was definitely a "right book, wrong time" situation. At this point in the semester, my brain just didn't have the capacity for three storylines. Will definitely still be recommending this to people and getting a copy of my own when my brain is less fried.

The author clearly had a lot of fun writing this book 😂 and I'm totally for that! Somehow this one made me think a little of a chinese drama. Love the inspiration of the 9 tailed fox and being able to watch these soul mates as they go through time and discover each other over and over again.

Time is very fluid with this one, be prepared to be confused 😂. There are three timelines but even then there are flashbacks and things like that in each. I was saved by the fact the audiobook had different narrators based on the time 😂.

This one is also spicy but the romance between the two MCs is rather slow burn. Spice occurs with different characters at first. This one scene though, with the razorblade🤯😂. If you know, you know. Also, not the spice isn't always consensual.

Thanks to Harlequin trade publishing and NetGalley for the early copy and to Libro Fm for the ALC. All opinions are my own.

→1✰
dnf at 16%

my toxic trait is requesting arcs only for the cover
i didnt like the amount of spice in the first few chapters, but i guess that part is wholly on me. i noticed this wasn't for me but i could definitely see it having potential

thank you to netgalley for the arc in exchange for an honest review!

Unfortunately, this was a DNF for me. I just couldn't get into it. Wasn't for me. I don't feel I should give it a star rating, as I did not read the entire thing, but NetGalley makes you give a star rating.

The Emperor and the Endless Palace is an intriguing debut novel, it is a story of folklore and tradition, of danger and betrayal, of lust and, ultimately, eternal love. Blending elements of romance, fantasy, and historical fiction.

The story spans multiple timelines, from ancient China to modern Los Angeles. Across these seemingly unrelated timelines woven together only by the twists and turns of fate, two men are reborn, lifetime after lifetime, these lovers are inexplicably drawn to each other, constantly tested by the worlds around them. 4 BCE - an ambitious courtier has a secret mission; 1740 - a lonely innkeeper seeks a rare medicine to help a mysterious visitor; present-day LA - a college student has a familiar feeling when meeting a beautiful stranger.

I appreciated the genre-bending nature of the book, and found it to be an unpredictable roller coaster ride. I like the captivating prose, the immersive world-building, and the way the narrative challenged traditional notions of love. Despite the slow pace, the exploration of queer love across different lifetimes, combined with elements of Chinese culture and history, court intrigue and drama, contributed to an engaging and entertaining reading experience.

Overall, "The Emperor and the Endless Palace" is a book that will appeal to readers who enjoy unconventional storytelling and are open to exploring themes of love, fate, and identity across different time periods.

3.5*
a little slow and confusing at some parts but i had a fun time! i was not expecting for this to be as erotic as it was because there was no marketing about that lol! i thought it was just going to be a cute romance story but it was much more than that!

Thank you to NetGalley and Justinian Huang for providing me with an egalley of this book in exchange for my honest thoughts on it. I loved the premise of this novel, and a timeline bending fantasy that followed souls through the ages really drew me in initially. That being said, there were some parts I wasn't crazy about.

There is definitely a market for this book, but I am definitely not it. I'm not an overly big fan of the rising trend of "spicy" fantasy novels, and this book honestly just seemed to me to be a vehicle for spice. I usually read when I'm on the train and had to stop for this novel as there was genuinely a spicy scene every 3-4 pages. I will say, I missed the note that this was a "spicy romantasy" which is entirely on me, so I'm not including this particular grievance in my rating of the novel. In the future, however, it may be wise to be a bit more overt in the marketing of this novel, as for how much of this "plot" was made up of sex scenes, it shouldn't be taking a prospective viewer by surprise.

My issue moreso lies in the characterization. I couldn't find anything online that would definitively suggest that the author was an only child, but I would have to assume so just based off of the interactions between River and Garden. I found the way they spoke to each other bizarre, but more so than that, I found Garden's character, or lack thereof, to be frustrating. She seemed to exist exclusively to be a wall for River to bounce his bad ideas off of and be completely ignored, and was given no other personality traits other than "abandonment issues" and "has one leg." It at times felt like her disability was just used as a litmus to prove that other characters were good people for not treating her differently. Maybe it is just because a lot of the scenes took place at night, but why did a high school aged girl have nothing better to do than sit around at home spam calling her brother? Given that she was one of only two women with any sort of role to play in this story, with the other being, by all accounts a villain, I found her one-dimensionality odd.

I have similar thoughts about Calvin's character, where it was implied that it was sweet that he was chasing after a guy he went to a single party with because he reminded him of his dead fiancé. I'm not certain why we were supposed to see it as kind that he would follow River to Thailand (in an obvious attempt to draw him into a relationship that he had already turned down once) rather than borderline obsessive. I don't understand how he expected to be perceived as the rational and good choice while condemning Joey when he also claimed to love River after knowing him for at most a couple days.

I also found the pacing odd at the end of the story. This went from a somewhat realist fantasy novel to there suddenly being a magical cult where it was implied that gay men were lured into orgies so they could be turned to statues of River using the power of the seal? Where did the initial statues come from before they had the seal? What did this have to do with the curse? Sure, all of the incarnations of Winston are implied to have the same level of control over Joey's incarnations, so then why is Joey treated like some terrible person for that? Is the takeaway that Joey finally got access to the seal and then just decided that he wouldn't break the curse because of Winston's powers? This just felt like way too much information to be jammed into the end of the novel. I get that none of these points could be resolved because everyone is doomed to repeat the same cycles, but for a story that purports to be about soulmates the author fails to make a compelling case about how these two characters could ever be soulmates if their relationship is so consistently toxic. In fact, I really have a hard time believing they were in love at any point, as you never see the two of them having a meaningful conversation that isn't interrupted by a sex scene at any point. Lust, maybe. Love? No.

I appreciate the lengths that this author went to to research the backdrop for this novel, but I think there is a bit more work to be done to the foreground.

First, note that there are explicit scenes in this book. I didn't realize that was coming until I saw a different review and helped me to go into this book with accurate expectations. I found this story to effortlessly and perfectly weave together various timelines in this gay fantasy story! It was a really enjoyable and spicy read!

This queer Asian story is very sex forward and is told between 3 stories of different lifetimes. At first I thought the contemporary character of River also shared the same past lives of the other narrators depicting the past, but I was pleasantly wrong. I wasn't particularly attached or rooting for any of the couples depicted and I'm not sure if it was because the timelines were sharing so much with each other or if it was because there wasn't enough built up between the characters to be fully invested. The fantasy element of the curse and the weird cult situation at the end of the book also felt irrelevant while the characters didn't get together in the end either. I did like that I was able to recognize Thai imagery and Thai culture in the end of the book but with the situation at the end I had really mixed feelings about it taking place in Thailand, especially since I'm from a Thai background.

If you want to read the story for the steamy parts and not expect the couple to be together by the end, it's a very nice fun light read.

**I was provided an electronic ARC from the publisher through NetGalley.**


Justinian Huang presents The Emperor and the Endless Palace, a Chinese history inspired fantasy romance that follows two men through three reincarnated lifetimes. Readers spend time with Joey and River in modern day, with He Shican and Huang Jiulang in the 1740s, and with Dong Xian and Liu Xin in 4 BCE Han Dynasty China. Dong Xian and Liu Xin are true historical figures. He Shican and Huang Jiulang are characters reimagined from the folktale written by Pu Songling.

Huang handled each of the shifting time periods admirably and it was interesting to see which perspective was chosen for each time period as well as which characters would recur across time. Conceptually, the idea of soul mates across lifetimes is one that isn't all that uncommon, but Huang gave a magical and sensual flair to the stories of these two men that had finesse and was evocative of folklore across the timelines.

I was also grateful that the time spent in each timeline was pretty even with a little more time afforded to modern day as a way of tying together the story. Unlike many stories that use multiple timelines, I actually didn't have a clear favorite and enjoyed all of them which speaks to Huang's skill. Each timeline procided a snippet of the characters' lives where they encounter one another again, and though I didn't feel strongly about the ending, I felt settled and secure in it as it felt inevitable based on the premise of the story.

Overall, I enjoyed my time with The Emperor and the Endless Palace and look forward to future works by Justinian Huang.

What a thrilling journey this book took me on! Going into it blind, I was initially shocked by the story(all the spice) but soon found myself unable to put it down. The characters were incredibly well-developed and I couldn't help but become attached to them. Each storyline kept me on the edge of my seat, excited to uncover the answers to all of my questions.

The book was filled with secrets, complex family dynamics, angst, and love. I was fully immersed in the story, feeling every emotion alongside the characters. The love declarations were so beautifully written!!!!

I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a captivating romance with a hint of intrigue and spice. Even as someone who doesn't typically seek out spice in their readings, I wouldn't change a single thing about this book.

I give it a rating of 4.5 stars
and I must admit that Calvin was my favorite character throughout the story haha!

I think the book has the potential to be good I did enjoy the writing style and the premise is interesting but unfortunately I had to dnf it…it just wasn’t something I found myself gravitating towards. I’d say this is more erotica than romance 😂 and the pink plum used to describe …something… threw me out ..I might pick this up another time but :/

Wow, this book was an experience. Beautifully written and incredibly complicated, Huang shifts back and forth between the three timelines in a way that maintains narrative tension while not causing confusion. The characterizations are great, the storylines are great, and the book itself is compulsively readable. That said, it feels like any more concrete descriptions or commentary would be spoilers, because part of the joy of reading this was having no idea what was going on - the reader discovers it along with the characters.

I will note that everyone in this book is extremely (and realistically) emotionally messy, and the interpersonal relationships involve a lot of transactional and sometimes dubiously-consensual sex. I would describe it as a book about love rather than a romance novel, or even a book about romance.

Thank you so much, Harlequin Trade Publishing | MIRA and NetGalley, for the chance to read this book in exchange of an honest review.

In the year 4 BCE a courtier is called upon to seduce a young emperor, but they are both ruled by blood and desire. In 1740 a innkeeper helps a mysterious visitor procure a medicine and he's involved into a otherwordly terror menace and now, in the moder Los Angeles, a college student meets a beautiful stranger and he's sure they've met before.
This story spans three, seemingly, unrelated timelines woven together in a complex story where two men are reborn together, meeting across time, again and again, tested by the surrounding world, but drawn to each other all the time.

I absolutely loved The emperor and the endless palace, this spicy and romantic debut, that have everything I could hope for in a book. It's romantic and funny and so queer I could die. I loved this book and representation and the idea of two lovers who find each other in different times, again and again, facing dangers, problems and time issues. It's a story filled with twists and morally gray characters, filled with erotica and love, passion and dangers, messy and swoony and I loved every single moment of this story. It left me wanting more and more.

The non-linear plot and multiple timelines made this a fast-paced read for me. I was hooked from the very first chapter. I really enjoyed all the "Ah ha!" moments along the way as the connections of these cursed lovers' lifetimes became more clear.

Whle I was distracted piecing together the parallels between the three timelines, I almost overlooked the fact that the oldest timeline, in 4 BCE, was based on actual Chinese history. Of course, some creative liberties were taken with names and such, but the Endless Palace and the Han Dynasty were very much real.

This novel is a perfect blend of history, destiny, and fantasy. I loved the ending, it was unexpected, but brilliant.

Recommended for: fantasy and historical fiction readers

Content warning: explicit sex scenes; forced sex; drug & alcohol use

Thank you @netgalley and Justinian Huang for this ARC! It was unlike anything I’ve ever read before and I loved it! Obviously, being a heterosexual woman and liking men, I’ve not sought out many LGBTQ+ romance books. BUT this one was so damn magical and the romance was literally timeless. I loved the modern humor and whit mixed with the historical fiction aspect of this Romantasy. Like this line:

“𝙉𝙤, 𝙄 𝙙𝙤𝙣’𝙩 𝙬𝙖𝙣𝙩 𝙩𝙤 𝙠𝙣𝙤𝙬 𝙮𝙤𝙪𝙧 𝙢𝙤𝙤𝙣 𝙨𝙞𝙜𝙣 𝙖𝙣𝙙, 𝙮𝙚𝙖𝙝, 𝙗𝙞𝙩𝙘𝙝, 𝙄 𝙠𝙣𝙤𝙬 𝙩𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙞𝙨 𝙨𝙤 𝙏𝙖𝙪𝙧𝙪𝙨 𝙤𝙛 𝙢𝙚!”

Starting off, the smut was like right in your face and I personally thought it was a bit much, but then I kept reading. I think it was mostly for character development. The storyline is at once magical and modern. I really enjoyed reading from different periods of time! The imagery was absolutely beautiful!! Definitely give this one a read!!

“𝙄 𝙙𝙤𝙣’𝙩 𝙪𝙨𝙪𝙖𝙡𝙡𝙮 𝙡𝙖𝙮 𝙬𝙞𝙩𝙝 𝙢𝙚𝙣 𝙤𝙪𝙩𝙨𝙞𝙙𝙚 𝙤𝙛 𝙗𝙖𝙩𝙩𝙡𝙚. 𝘽𝙪𝙩 𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙧𝙚 𝙞𝙨 𝙨𝙤𝙢𝙚𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙖𝙗𝙤𝙪𝙩 𝙮𝙤𝙪, 𝙗𝙤𝙮, 𝙩𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙢𝙖𝙠𝙚𝙨 𝙢𝙚 𝙬𝙖𝙣𝙩 𝙩𝙤 𝙛*𝙘𝙠 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙪𝙣𝙩𝙞𝙡 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙖𝙧𝙚 𝙨𝙘𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙢𝙞𝙣𝙜.”
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ʏᴏᴜʟʟ ʟɪᴋᴇ ᴛʜɪꜱ ɪꜰ ʏᴏᴜ ʟɪᴋᴇ:
•fantasy world building
•star crossed lovers
•smut
•LGBTQ+
•Chinese culture

This was a great debut novel by Justinian Huang! It had everything that I look for typically in a romantasy book. Strong characters, a compelling story, SPICY scenes, and an ending that just leaves you wanting more from this story. I really hope thats an option because 3 timelines is simply not enough!

Thank you for the digital ARC!

EMPEROR AND THE ENDLESS PALACE is a gorgeous masterclass of interwoven timelines, beautiful romance, twisty intrigue, and clever prose. Huang is an author to watch.

Big thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for hooking me up with an early copy in exchange for my honest take.So, this book had all the makings of a deep dive into love, sex, and obsession. I was ready for a real exploration of how sexuality can be used as a weapon, a tool for gaining and wielding power.But instead? Ugh. We got stuck with some seriously cringy erotica (seriously, can we retire "pink plum" forever?), dialogue that had me questioning if anyone talks like that in real life, and way too many instances of iffy consent that caught me totally off guard. And don't even get me started on the lack of explanation for the curse or the whole deal with the third person (I'll avoid spoilers) and their supposed magical powers.I'm not sure if I'm just not the target audience for this or if there's some deeper meaning I missed, but unfortunately, this book goes on my DNF list.