This is the story of a princess of the wood-people being married into the human world, as part of a political agreement that is intended to keep the human world from encroaching on the nature that keeps the woods alive. The majority of the novella follows the princess in her preparations for her wedding and introduction into the human world, until the point where she discovers things are not as they seem (about 70% of the way through). It is also worth saying that this is the first part of a novella duology, so there is no real closure at the end.

The thing to like here is probably the transposition of a plot reminiscent of Naomi Novik's Spinning Silver or Uprooted to China. There is much more to dislike here though. First, the worldbuilding is a bit shoddy - it's never clear why things are the way they are, the internal logic is missing, and while one could argue that it will be delivered later, other books have taken this path in a better way. Second, the characters are wooden and boring. Their structuring is almost juvenile - they don't seem to have a soul, coming across as one-dimensional caricatures of fairly simple ideas. I couldn't find myself rooting for anyone. Third, while there is a very strong environmental theme here, and the juxtaposition of nature and industrial modernity is telling, it is also fairly naively done. In some parts, it's almost saying that protecting the environment is worth doing at all costs, and that modernity is evil, in all its incarnations. This comes across as a simplistic argument, even in the world of this book, which seems to put all the things the author finds objectionable in one basked (eating meat, destroying the environment, industrialisation, globalisation, etc). Finally, the fact this is a first part of a novella duology is odd - either publish this is a proper book, or one single novella. I don't understand this decision - by the time the next instalment is published I will have completely forgotten what this part was saying. There was just no need for this.

Overall - nothing really special here, and even the writing is not particularly well done. A miss, in my view. There are better things being written today, as well as better things that have been written in the past.

My thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this novella in return for an honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley and Titan for the arc! This wasn’t it, and for a multitude of reasons. It sucks ass because this was an anticipated read of mine, but it seems I’ve been left down a lot in this unholy month of November. I mean, my favorite Ghibli movie is Princess Mononoke so I did have high expectations; the result was low below the floor. Here are some of my grievances:

A note to this book: you will never be Princess Mononoke. They fucking tried it, but it lacks basically everything that made Princess Mononoke great. There was absolutely no nuance, the messaging was constantly being dropped on my head like an anvil, it was full of unanswered questions and holes, and was crammed (derogatory) with shit that simply couldn’t be well written in a novella format. Actually, I take that back: it could’ve been decently written by a more talented author. Genuinely, this book reminds me of all the essays I’d pull out of my ass on the due date at 11:59 PM. The messaging is essentially this: man bad. How fucking powerful.

The mc was horrifically stupid and even worse: annoying. I wanted to throttle her for almost the entire book. Worse still, she basically has no character arc. I can tell the author kind of tried, but they just failed. Just pure stupidity, naivety, and foolishness for the better of 200 pages.

If you’re going into this book expecting revenge, you will be very disappointed

Progression and pacing here were poorly done. I don’t care if it’s a novella, you should still be able to properly pace. Progression was either abrupt or simply not there at all. If you want your book full of Dues Ex Machina bullshit, you will be very happy.

The world building was too ambitious for this author’s current talents in this format. I love an ambitious author, but don’t let your ambition usurp your current skills.

To sum up, if I could describe this book in two words I’d say the following: overcrowded and irritating. This book either should have been a novel, or should’ve been explored much farther down the road in this author’s career. Princess Mononoke fans you will unfortunately need to look elsewhere (I will take any recs please please). - 2 oversaturated stars

I really loved this book. I loved how Ai Jiang created this really unique world and wove it all together with so many intricate details. I feel as though Jiang has such a beautiful way with words that everything just seemed to flow naturally and I felt as though the story was so easy to follow. I loved how there was a mix of lore and technology and it really created a unique world which I felt as though I was submerged in.

The book centres around Liu Lufeng who has grown up knowing what her tradition and duty is, as we navigate through the book we begin to see her understand how she needs to break this tradition for the future of her family.

In terms of a main character, I found Liu Lufeng to be refreshing as she was someone who had a purpose and was also cautious of how her plan was executed. She was written well, as were the side characters, which is always a bonus.

I loved how there were so many different twists and turns and I feel as though the book ended on a very strong note which sets us up nicely for the sequel to the book.

I would definitely recommend reading this. I liked the length of the book, but I definitely would not have complained if there were a few more pages, purely for how much I enjoyed this and wouldn’t have minded some more of the story to read.

I once again really liked the world Jiang created. I think she’s incredibly creative and I’m always excited to explore a new place with her. The contrast of nature versus industry, intertwined with conflicting loyalties, strained family bonds, and distrust, was really neat to read about. Sadly though, the plot and characters both felt… rushed and flat, I think. While I enjoy having shorter stories to read amidst my longer novels, I think this would’ve benefitted from more development in those areas.