SYNOPSIS:

She has power over death. He has power over her. When two enemies strike a dangerous bargain, will they end a war . . . or ignite one?

Heroes die, cowards live. Daughter of a conquered world, Ruying hates the invaders who descended from the heavens long before she was born and defeated the magic of her people with technologies unlike anything her world had ever seen.

Blessed by Death, born with the ability to pull the life right out of mortal bodies, Ruying shouldn’t have to fear these foreign invaders, but she does. Especially because she wants to keep herself and her family safe.

When Ruying’s Gift is discovered by an enemy prince, he offers her an impossible deal: If she becomes his private assassin and eliminates his political rivals—whose deaths he swears would be for the good of both their worlds and would protect her people from further brutalization—her family will never starve or suffer harm again. But to accept this bargain, she must use the powers she has always feared, powers that will shave years off her own existence.

Can Ruying trust this prince, whose promises of a better world make her heart ache and whose smiles make her pulse beat faster? Are the evils of this agreement really in the service of a much greater good? Or will she betray her entire nation by protecting those she loves the most?

REVIEW:

Well what happened was that, i saw an East-Asian fantasy book in a pre-loved bookstore and i was like why not. I love books, I love fantasy books. I love East-Asian fantasy books.

‎i looked at the synopsis, oh wow a girl who has death powers, and has to work together with the enemy prince!! Sounds so good!! WRONG!! Every time I thought, it can't get any more bad than this, it got worse...

‎i can sum up the events of this book in less than 10 sentences:

‎1. Orphan girl with death powers, coming from a family of famous army generals has one twin with life powers who's a part of a resistance and one old but wise grandma.

‎2. Everyone in her kingdom has magical powers that are being affected by drug addiction caused by the Romans who are currently ruling her country from the sidelines(very directly tbh), the said Romans are also kidnapping her people to do experiments on them and she loathes them oh so much

‎3. Her childhood crush is now a traitor and helps her get drugs for her sister, and she hates him fo all of that (plot twist near the end: he was not a traitor), and her childhood best friend is now actively fighting alongside her army general dad

‎4. She kills whoever the roman prince tells her to kill(I-am-protecting-my-family-and-i-don't-care-what-happens-to-the-rest-of-the-country, NO YOU'RE NOT), she also falls in love with the roman prince...

5. In the end she finds out her beloved colonizer prince’s secrets and starts to hate everything about him and his bloodline all over again.

‎

‎oh look! i summed it all up in just 5 (long)sentences...

Details:

‎even though the book starts with Ruying telling us about the atrocities of Romans and ruins of her kingdom that they left behind in their wake, even though her own family(both dead and alive) has suffered in every possible way because of the Romans, even though the same Romans imprisoned and tortured her, even though the Roman prince threatened her into working as an assassin for him by using her sister and grandma life as bait(even though it’s been made very clear that her 2 and only family members will prefer to die over being at the mercy of a roman), she still in love with him... her reasons? He’s very pretty, he knows her language and culture very well while the other colonizers don't, he hugs and soothes her after making her kill innocent people(I'm frowning so hard my face hurts), he never raises his voice on her, he tells her that he doesn't want a genocide(just an occupation...) even though he has all the means and power to do exactly that in a blink of an eye(that's very there-was-very-pretty-girl-flirting-with-me-today-but-i told her-that-i-am-sorry-i-have-a-girlfriend), he's an orphan adopted by the Roman royal family’ and did I mention that she finds him very beautiful?

and that brings us to yet another point, the pretty privilege(?). I am living hand to mouth and I am so pretty, my sister is an opium addict and she’s so pretty, Baihu is a traitor and he’s so pretty, our princess is a prisoner of the roman royals and a pawn of her own family’s political game play and she’s so pretty, Antony is my country’s colonizer and he’s so pretty. And this was told to the reader multiple times how everyone who has anything negative linked to their character was oh so pretty. And? What do you want me to do with that information? It wasn’t necessary but well whatever; this brings me to yet another point.

The repetition, my arch nemesis. Everyone is pretty and it’s somehow important to mention it again and again, in some instances complete sentence were repeated word for word after few chapters, everything was a serpent… her hate for the Romans? Like a serpent. Her fear of opium and what the enemy might do to her family? Like a serpent. Someone’s voice? Like a serpent. Someone’s gaze? Like a serpent… she hates Antony with all her heart and she looks at his lips while he’s talking and keeps imaging if and when he’ll start kissing her(friendly reminder that he’s the colonizer/oppressor prince) we are given this type of information again and again…

The author so badly wants us to realize that Ruying only loves Antony how Juliette loved adam in shatter me. She wants you to say, oh Ruying fell in love with Antony because he treated her better compared to all the other men in her past, whether they be friends, romantic interests, or her own drug addict father, just how you justified Juliette falling in love with Adam only because he was the first man who was kind to her and helped her after a very long solitary confinement/imprisonment. But Molly X. Chang wants you to think that this is not a colonizer romance book, even though she used real history(Unit 371 incident), even though Ruying thinks that all of actions would’ve been justified if only she were a boy and somehow that would’ve made her actions heroic instead of treasonous, she also somehow forgot about all the torture Anthony has put her through just because he treated her nicely, how she was killing her own people on Antony’s orders because he’s lesser of the two evils, and because she’s doing this for her family and she doesn’t care if the rest of the world gets wipped clean but then again she’s also saying that her sister is stupid for being a part of a resistance that will only make her sister a martyr who died in vain, and how she’s actually acting like his puppet because of the better of her people…??? by the end of the book Antony really has fallen in love with Ruying and he’s ready to fight wars for her all while running secret experiments on her people- oh, another point… maybe the SERIES is not a colonizer romance, but this BOOK surely is.

Surprise!!! Near the end of the book she suddenly hates Antony again… why? because she saw Antony’s secret scientists experimenting on her childhood best friend Taohua in their secret labs… because her beautiful and pretty princess in also imprisoned in the same labs… there is so much tell and no show in this book, the fmc is so annoying and so unlikable, the morally gray characters(Ruying and Antony) are not really morally gray but actually morally corrupt, a real life massacre/genocide is being used as a base for the romance plot(that the author’s still trying to deny even though it’s already printed on paper). I fell saddened for all the resources(natural and man-mad) that were used to bring this book to the world, I don’t care for whatever happens in the series next, this book was pure rage bait and I want no more of it.

Jen Reads Lit

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colonizer romance? more like waste of all resources. To Gaze Upon Wicked Gods by Molly X. Chang; book review

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