Thank you Netgalley and PENGUIN GROUP Penguin Young Readers Group | Viking Books for Young Readers for this galley, I was not obligated to leave a review. All opinions are my own.
This book took a lot of work to get into at first. There were times I picked it up and only read a chapter or so. There were other times when I couldn't wait to keep reading. However, it took me a bit to really want to keep reading. This isn't the author's fault. The world she has built and imagined is very cool. It just didn't pop off the pages for me. I like the main characters. I appreciate that Ye-Yang wasn't a clueless prince., I like him the most. Ying herself is smart and resourceful. This is a great start to a YA fantasy (trilogy I believe?) I DNF but will keep reading. I just wanted to get this review up before the date of publication. I like it enough to have a special edition on the way and I will read the next book.


Description

Mulan meets Iron Widow in this thrilling silkpunk fantasy about a girl who must disguise herself as a boy and enter the famed and dangerous Engineer’s Guild trials to unravel the mystery of her father’s murder.

Eighteen-year-old Aihui Ying dreams of becoming a world-class engineer like her father, but after his sudden murder, her life falls apart. Left with only a journal of her father’s engineering secrets and a jade pendant snatched from the assassin, a heartbroken Ying follows the trail to the capital and the prestigious Engineers Guild—a place that harbors her father’s hidden past—determined to discover why anyone would threaten a man who ultimately chose a quiet life over fame and fortune.

Disguised as her brother, Ying manages to infiltrate the guild’s male-only apprenticeship trial with the help of an unlikely ally—Aogiya Ye-yang, the taciturn eighth prince of the High Command. With her father’s renown placing a target firmly on her back, Ying must stay one step ahead of her fellow competitors, the jealous guild masters, and the killer still hunting for her father’s journal. Complicating everything is her increasingly tangled relationship with the prince, who may have mysterious plans of his own.

The secrets concealed within the guild can be as deadly as the weapons they build—and with her life and the future of her homeland at stake, Ying doesn’t know who to trust. Can she avenge her father even if it means going against everything he stood for, or will she be next in the mastermind’s line of fire?

Thank you netgalley and penguin young reader group for the gifted arc in exchange for an honest review.

Dnf 35%

I want to preface this by saying I try to write my reviews with an overall positive vibe, but sometimes it can be hard while I’m trying to remain honest. I intend no hate to the author. Just because this wasn’t for me, doesn’t mean it’s not for you.

The premise of this book was incredibly intriguing for me. I was thrilled when I was accepted for this arc because this was a highly anticipated read for me. However, I am left very disappointed. I do think that this book has so much potential, but it could’ve used a lot more editing.

The writing is extremely choppy and I had a very hard time staying engaged. There is so much info dumping without actually giving any relevant information. I still don’t understand the world as a whole and barely understand the guild/political hierarchy. There are also jumps in the timeline with no details on where we are now. 35% and it’s been over 45 days in the book? I thought it had been a week max bc nothing has happened. She’s supposed to be solving her father’s murder and she’s done absolutely nothing. Idk I just can’t get over that.

The characters felt really shallow and the dialogue is just off to me. I honestly don’t even know who any characters really are outside ye-Yang and ying, and these two main characters are superficial. Based on the characters and dialogue, this read really young. It felt closer to middle grade than YA.

I also think the focus of this book just feels off. I can’t say if it remains that way, but so far we’ve seen very little of what was promised out of this book. She hasn’t done anything to solve the mystery and we haven’t seen any high stakes trials.

I do hope there was extensive editing done after arcs were sent out, because I would love to give this another shot. I will be receiving a physical copy from a book sub soon so I’ll have take a peak to see!

This amazing book gives Mulan vibes but even better. The main character is disguised as a male trying to break in and be accepted to the engineer 's guild. She also is trying to find out who assassinated her father. She struggles with the trials of the guild and many other factors come into play. I could not put this book down.

This was a Wonderful story I thoroughly enjoyed it and I so look forward to the next books coming from this Author. This was fantastic and I could not put it down. In the blurb to say about this book was Mulan mixed with iron widow, and it could not be more of a fantastic description of this book! I loved it thank you for letting me read it.

This is a good one... Amazing. I have been in the biggest slump and just recently got out of it, only to be hit with this book. Thankfully, it's one of those books that is going to keep me going rather than putting me back into a slump.

I loved the characters. Especially Ying and Ye-Kan. And I really don't know where I want this story to go in the future, I'm torn. But I do know that I will be reading any sequel(s) that come out of this.

<spolier> I sat here the entire time waiting for a betrayal.... Gah. Anyways. I loved this book so much. The ending was a bit rushed to me, but oh my goodness. So good. I feel betrayed and heartbroken and want to go cry in a corner now. </spoiler>

This is the kind of book that I need a special edition of. Immediately. I need this book on my shelves ASAP.

Thank you to Penguin Teen for the ARC!!!

There's nothing objectionable about this book - it's pretty good - but it kind of under-delivered on its intriguing premise and promising beginning. I went in with high hopes. Fantasy meets Asian mythology meets steampunk - sign me up. It had hints of Mulan and Howl's Moving Castle, but somehow it never really managed to find its way to the book it could have been. The characters felt underdeveloped and flat, and I wasn't able to connect with them. We don't really get to know them very deeply, despite the book's (somewhat excessive) length. I loved the flying airships and cool contraptions, but the book didn't explore the engineering angle as much as I would have liked. The world building felt like another missed opportunity that left me wishing for more depth to flesh out the nature of the political machinations and intrigue. The writing itself was pretty good, but the story felt a little bit cheesy at times. The ending sort of redeemed itself for some of my issues with the book, but the epilogue might have kind of undone it. The story was sometimes compelling and at other times I found myself bored and skimming ahead to a more interesting part. I think YA audiences might have a better time with this book, which was pretty good but not one I'd read again, and it's not a series I'm likely to continue reading.

Thanks to the author, the publisher, and to Netgalley for providing me with a free advance reader copy of the book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions expressed are my own.

I think this was a fun YA novel, I especially loved the strong female main character that was Ying, I think the most impressive thing about this book is that I am left wanting to continue the series in a big way.

3.5 stars

This is marketed as "Mulan" meets "Iron Widow", as it follows Ying, an 18-year-old girl from a small village, as she disguises herself as a boy for a chance to track down her father's murderer and join the Engineering Guild in the capital city (which of course only admits men). Ying becomes allies and ~potentially more~ with a prince, Ye-Yang, who finds out she's a girl in CHAPTER FOUR. Sorry for yelling, but I was expecting awkward homoerotic-but-not-really tension between them for at least half the book, so that threw me. There's a few Harry Potter-esque elements here, with the school setting and the teachers who have history with Ying's father that influences their dynamic with her. Not to mention that she suspects some of them of being involved in his death. There's also trials that the candidates go through before being invited into Guild, so that's entertaining.

I found the school setting fun, and I liked the trials aspect and the actual engineering parts. But I found myself wishing that those all had more detail to them. I felt like the passage of time was a little off-kilter sometimes; we'd go from having several chapters covering one evening to suddenly it being 45 days later and having skipped most of the work Ying was doing to prepare for a trial, which I'd have liked to see. I didn't feel very attached to most of the characters, so there wasn't the emotional impact I need in order to really love a story. I think Ye-Kan, Ying's bratty classmate, was probably my favorite, for the comic relief.I did like the twists towards the end and the focus on the morality questions of invention and its uses, that was very well done. Also, this did make me want to watch "Mulan" again. Thanks to Penguin Teen and the author for the advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley for giving this ARC, and this doesn’t influence my review. This was a good book, the plot was intriguing, however the romance could’ve used some work. The Mulan-inspired part could’ve gone better in my opinion as well.

This was a strong start to a YA Fantasy series inspired by the Qing Dynasty and the story of Mulan. I liked how the mc, Ying, was written.
She showed intelligence and wisdom beyond her years while retaining the essence of a young adult. The romance aspect wasn't my favorite part, but I really did enjoy the other relationships that were developed and cultivated throughout the book. Very cool story and cool world.

Thank you NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

DNF, I’ve tried reading this book for the last month and have finally decided to just DNF it. I didn’t really care about the characters and it just reminded me to much of other books I’ve read. It also read to young to me.

Thank you to NetGalley for giving me an ARC in exchange for honest review. DNF. I will not be finishing this. I don’t really care about what’s happening and even though it started off interesting it feels really slow. I am only rating and reviewing this, so it doesn’t hurt my feedback ratio and it makes me.

Of Jade and Dragons:
• YA Fantasy with some romance
• Academia-like: Engineer guild feels very similar to a university setting
• Female in STEM when its forbidden
• Political plot centered on avenging the death of the FMC’s father
• Based on some interesting historical people and inventions
• No real dragons (but there are dragons)
• Silkpunk – science fiction and fantasy combined with historical East Asian flare

I love a girl with a STEM centered way of thinking. Ying (FMC) is brave, headstrong, loyal, smart and lucky. She lives fairly isolated from her nation’s capital, leaving much of her father’s past a mystery when he is murdered for his engineering ideas and inventions. When her brother and sister don’t share her fierce need for vengeance, she sets off to achieve it herself. Ying’s character development is great from start to finish. I found her endearing, and I easily wanted to route for her. I really enjoyed the world building throughout the book as well.

I think anyone with interests in YA fantasy and STEM/academia should give this book a consideration. I enjoyed it!

What kept this from being a 5 star read for me were convivence issues, specifically how lucky Ying was and how easily she formed strong relationships with others. Ying found the one person that could help her be successful in the whole empire/nation by chance at the exact right time in a completely random location on her journey she had no real plan for. Regardless of why that person decided to help her, she wouldn’t have been able to get past the city gates, let alone achieve her goal, without that chance occurrence. Also, the only real on page relationship development happened between Ying and Ye-kan (he’s my favorite as a result!). They started out as “stay away from me” acquaintances and evolved into true friends [(fingers crossed for something deeper) – not a spoiler just my hopes and dreams]. Friendly relationships with Ye-yang and Chang-en were instant or dang close to it – these relationships are a center focus of the storyline. Banter and tension between friends, enemies, romantic interests, it all counts, get me hooked in stories; I thought there were a lot of missed opportunities in that arena.

Thank you so much to NetGalley, Amber Chen, and Viking Books for sharing this eARC with me!

I received an ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Of Jade and Dragons by Amber Chen is a YA third person-POV fantasy retelling of Mulan. When Ying’s father is murdered, she heads to the Engineers Guild to not only pursue his murderer, but also to become an engineer. Women are not allowed into the Guild, so Ying disguises herself as a young man while she grows closer to the beile, a prince of the High Command, Ye-yang.

The worldbuilding was a blending of steampunk and Ancient China, allowing the story to explore inventions and mechanical parts while those same inventions are informed by the world around them. There's a mysterious country with green-eyed people who brought some of the ideas to Ying’s country, but people like her father have made those inventions their own and found ways to improve upon them.

I really liked that the story was about a young woman pursuing invention and being an engineer. We always need more women in STEAM and engineering still seems quite male-dominated. The guild tests reminded me a bit of the tests engineers need to take in order to get a license to practice.

Ying spends the majority of her time among her cohort of engineering hopefuls, getting to them and learning bits and pieces about her father from their conversations. Ying was aware of her father's brilliance as an engineer, but not that he was almost the guild master before he returned to his rural home. Recontextualizing a parent after they pass is never easy, but I felt that seeing Ying struggle with learning just how involved her father was in certain things and what he was involved in was realistic and added a sense of complexity to her character arc.

I would recommend this to fans of fantasy retellings of Mulan, readers looking for stories about invention in a fantasy world, and those who want a YA Asian fantasy with a slower pacing.

4 out of 5 stars

⚙️ 🧡 Poppy War meets steam punk!🧡⚙️

Overall description: This book reminds me of the Avatar: The Last Airbender episode where they discover engineers working out of the air temple. A duality of engineering is explored in this book between invention and engineering as a public benefit or as an arms race for war.

The setting and plot has academia, a girl undercover as a boy (Mulan vibes), a beautiful asian inspired setting and age appropriate romantic pining🏮. The story was interesting with twists and political maneuvering while the characters are loveable yet frustrating at times. I feel like the character development and relationships were realistic in how they build and grow. I would say this book skews to the upper end of YA as there were more mature and complex plot lines that I don't usually see in YA nowadays.


What lacked for me were the politics seeming one-dimensional, a few logic things that took me out of the story and the geography/empire was a bit complex, For example, there 10 isles, 9 banners and 8 banner-men - or something of the sort. It only minorly detracted from my understand and enjoyment of the story. The story wraps up nicely with room for the overarching plot in future books.

I’d recommend this if you enjoy steampunk or Asian inspired fantasy.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Teen for the opportunity to read and review this eARC.

I hybrid read of Jade and Dragons by Amber Chen thanks to PRH audio and Penguin Teen. We follow Aihui Ying, a young girl who witness's her father's murder. She sets out to figure out who would want her father dead, disguised as her brother. She joins the trials to join the prestigious Engineer's Guild, in hopes she'll find more about her father while also following her dream to be a guild master engineer. This mysterious, captivating debut kept me at the edge of my seat! I loved the trials and the main character's tenacity and stubbornness. The twist and turns made this book a 5/5 for me. And THAT ENDING, WOW! Run to get yourself a copy on June 18!

Of Jade and Dragons by Amber Chen is an enthralling fantasy novel that captivated me from the very beginning. The story follows Yin, a brilliant and determined young woman who disguises herself as her brother to enter an engineer’s guild and solve her father’s murder.

Yin is a standout protagonist—smart, vigilant, and possessing a strong moral compass. Her unwavering attitude and strength make her an inspiring character to root for. The way she navigates the challenges in a world where she must conceal her true identity is both gripping and empowering.

The book is rich in fantasy elements, and Amber Chen does an exceptional job building a vivid, imaginative world. The city of Fei, with its unique customs and detailed setting, comes alive in the reader’s mind. Chen’s world-building skills are impressive, making the complex fantasy setting easy to understand and deeply immersive.

One of the highlights of Of Jade and Dragons is its diverse and well-developed cast of characters. There are no annoying or unnecessary characters; each one adds depth and significance to the story. The inclusion of more main characters in STEM fields is a refreshing and commendable touch, adding to the novel’s appeal.

The plot is a perfect blend of mystery and fantasy, with a hint of romance that enhances the story without overshadowing the main narrative. The mystery surrounding Yin’s father’s murder is skillfully woven, leading to a series of unexpected twists and betrayals that left me stunned when the secrets were finally revealed.

Overall, Of Jade and Dragons is a beautifully crafted novel with strong characters, an engaging plot, and a richly detailed world. Amber Chen has created a story that is both thought-provoking and entertaining, making it a must-read for fans of fantasy and mystery alike.

Interesting from the get go, this was a great story that I couldn't put down. Solving the mystery of her father's murder, Aihui goes to great lengths to stay hidden and find information to help her.

Thanks to Viking Books for Young Readers for the gifted copy of this book!

When Aihui Ying's father is killed and she's left only with a jade pendant snatched from his assassin, she decides to head to the capital to try out for the Engineers Guild, learn more about her father's killer, and get revenge.

Mulan meets IRON WIDOW was a great way to describe OF JADE AND DRAGONS. The Mulan-esque storyline is soooo up my alley becuase Ying just wants to follow in her father's footsteps and be an engineer in a society where women are not allowed to be engineers. The apprenticeship trials contain lots of action, there's a lovely eighth prince of the High Command (Aogiya Ye-yang), who makes some ~feelings~ come out, a great friendship, and of course lots of secrets. I couldn't put this book down... the 480 pages absolutely flew by! If you're worried about the IRON WIDOW comparison / sci-fi element, I promise you -- this is SUPER light on the sci fi front and easy to understand!

I gave four ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ to Of Jade and Dragons. Thank you Net Galley, Penguin Group Publishing and Amber Chen for this ARC. These are my honest opinions.

I had to wait a few days to review this book because I needed to see how I truly felt about it. This is a retelling of Mulan and Amber Chen does a great job!

I struggled with it when I first started reading it. It is pretty fast paced at the beginning with a lot of information thrown at the reader. But, it was necessary information, so I felt like I had to pay close attention. The middle of the book got a little tedious and didn’t feel like it moved forward for a while. But, the end was fabulous! Somewhat predictable, but not everything was and I love when I’m taken by surprise.