neonfrills's reviews
158 reviews
Court of Wanderers by Rin Chupeco
adventurous
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Silver Under Nightfall is my favorite book I read in 2023, and I was waiting ever so patiently to read the sequel. A huge thank you to Saga Press for sending me this ARC to review.
Court of Wanderers starts off immediately after the very dramatic ending SUN left off on, and we waste no time resolving some of the conflicts set up at the end of that book, and also jumping into an all out war with the Night Court. The book moves very fast early on, but for the most part everything is perfectly paced, with us staying at each new location long enough to get a feel for its role in the story, collect the relevant info, and then move onto the next leg of the journey.
A weird request for this book is that I wished it included a map, since I tend to get lost with fantasy world location names, and early on it would’ve been helpful as a way to ground myself when reading.
This book overall is more focused on world-building and vampire court drama than the first book, which I think mainly dove into Remy’s character and established his dynamics with Xiaodan and Zidan. At the same time, this book does feel like it leans into the more “silly goofy” parts of Romantasy Worldbuilding that makes me take it a little less seriously than I did the first book, but I don’t come to fantasy for realism.
Even with the shifted focus, the characters are what I love and are the heart of this series. Remy feels more self-assured and has gone through a lot of character growth that we love to see. Xiaodan really stole the show for me; she’s my favorite character and brightens up any scene she’s in (really living up to her role as the sun incarnate XD).
Overall, I really enjoyed this entry in the series, and can’t wait until it comes out so I can enjoy it all over again. 🙂 I would do anything for another book… Xiaodan needs her own cover!
Content Warnings
Moderate: Violence
Minor: Transphobia
Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Sequel to Gideon the Ninth… I cannot say much more bc of how intense and spoiler-y the end of Gideon is.
While this book is definitely a harder reading experience than Gideon, it’s all so well crafted and intentionally written. Like the choice to use 2nd person for one storyline, and third for another, I was like “Oh this is showing how Harrow feels dissociated from the person she once was” and then it was the Secret Other Thing also and I was like !!!
The characters in this book are again, amazing. Everyone is morally-gray and backstabbing, but you learn to love them all. Ianthe grew to be even more of my fave after this book. She gives everything; she's a horrible lesbian, she's a gay boy, she's committing man-made horrors beyond your comprehension. I'm madly in love with her.
Bottom Line:.... Still obsessed. I need Alecto to get a damn release date so I can read Nona and then know that I’ll have the end in sight
The Serpent and the Wings of Night by Carissa Broadbent
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
An Indie Vampire Romantasy that follows Oraya, the adopted human daughter of the vampire king Vincent, whom is forced to join a fight to the death competition that is being held in the honor of the patron goddess of vampires to gain a wish. While in the tournament, she forms an alliance with a vampire named Raihn, and (no duh) as they work together they learn to trust eachother and start developing feelings, which is bad news for Oraya since she needs to kill him to get the wish she’s always dreamed of.
What this book does well is its characters. It makes the vampires seem actually scary, and so inhuman in how they view humans as livestock. Oraya has a lot of trauma and insecurities related to being the only human in vampire high society. And then Raihn is a good foil for her as a turned vampire who misses his humanity.
The main flaw comes from bad pacing in the trials. The tournament is broken up into 5 smaller trials, so with each one there’s like a down period wherein we see Oraya and Raihn interacting and training. Which I think was supposed to help with character development, but I think made me just find the trials more boring because I knew they were like, requirements for us to move the story along over anything that interesting on their own.
Bottom line: I do think that there are good elements in this book, but I feel like the first 2/3rds get really weighed down in the minuta of the trials that I personally, for all the action, are pretty boring. I can see myself reading the second one, since Raihn and Oraya’s relationship is the most interesting aspect, and I feel the series is going in a more, court drama, political intrigue route which I do like in other series.
A River Enchanted by Rebecca Ross
2.5
An Adult Fantasy that follows Jack, who is called back to his childhood home of the Isle of Cadence, as he as a bard is the only one who can speak to the elemental spirits that the islanders think are behind a string of recent missing girls.
This book was… okay. The pacing is definitely off, since it takes so long for anything of note to happen. I personally felt pretty bored for most of this, and didn’t connect to any of the characters. I also didn’t really care about the situation regarding the clans fighting, and would’ve wanted more of the spirits and the magical elements to be more prevalent in the story. It overall felt pretty meandering, and because I wasn’t super interested in the final reveals, I’m not going to be reading the sequel.
Divine Rivals by Rebecca Ross
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
A Historical (more on that) YA fantasy that follows Iris and Kitt, rival journalists who start sending anonymous letters to each other through their magical typewriters.
This book has some incredibly unique world-building, combining an alternate universe WWI setting with the presence of gods and monsters as the tools of war. The writing is super beautiful. You hear the MCs are supposed to be great writers, which really means that their writing will only be as good as the author behind them, and here it does deliver. Watching Iris and Kitt fall in love was very sweet, and fully had me believe their story. Even if the relationship is the heart of the book, the surrounding world- building and plot set up is also so good and immersive to the pain and struggles of war. Overall, I really was pleasantly surprised that another booktok fave lived up for the hype, and can’t wait to read the sequel when it comes out this December.
Foxglove by Adalyn Grace
3.5
Sequel to Belladonna, that involves Signa and Death working on another murder mystery, this time to clear Signa’s uncle from a crime he did not commit, all while Death’s brother Fate seeks to pull them apart.
Belladonna was one of my favorite books from last year, and its sequel was a bit of a let down for me. I think this comes from maybe the author not knowing how to write an established couple and needing drama, so Signa and Death don’t get nearly as much time together as they do in the first book. There was also a twist that when it happened I thought “oh my god are we really doing this?”. I think I had expectations for where the story should go, and while the ending was kind of close to my predictions, the way we got there wasn’t always the best. I’m still going to read the third book when it comes out next year, but my expectations are now lowered so as to not be disappointed.
Silver Under Nightfall by Rin Chupeco
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
An Adult Fantasy that follows Remy, a vampire hunting noble rumored to be a dhampir, who has to join forces with two of the leaders of the vampire courts to stop the spread of a more monstrous, zombie breed of vampire that threatens both humans and court vampires alike.
This book is actually difficult to talk about because I love it so much. If anything tops this as my favorite book of the year, I will be shocked.
Here’s a random list of stuff I loved bc I can’t explain it any other way:
- Magical Military: a niche favorite trope of mine. The order of vampire hunters that Remy belongs to, the Reapers, are also entrenched with political drama and secrets, plus lots of R&D science stuff which I love in a fantasy setting.
- Remy’s entire backstory, how he both 1) doesn’t know he was abused but also 2) how that abuse coloring all his expectations of how relationships are supposed to work and actively impacting his attempts to form new ones.
- WE LOVE A THROUPLE!! Remy, being impulsive and full of pent up rage but also being sooo emotionally damaged, Xiaodan having a “kill it with kindness” attitude as well as being a bad bitch, and Zidan, being the Type A intellectual asshole with a heart of gold and troubled past…all flawless. Things about each member's past gets revealed so well and aids in building up the organic relationship between them. Also, for a book that has surprisingly little smut, the sexual tension is also insane and had me ready to gnaw off my own arm at the slowburn of it all.
I cannot stress enough how Castlevania this feels; there’s even an inclusion of “a horrible night to have a curse” that I could recognize as a non-fan. This book is for all the gays who wanted the Castlevania anime to have a canon throuple. I am waiting very impatiently for next year when the sequel comes out so I can see my babies again…
Content Warnings
Moderate: Sexual assault