Review: Heir of Blood and Secrets by Linda Xia!

 **I was given a copy of this book from the author for free, this does not affect my review, which is unbiased and entirely my own opinions**

I'm always on the lookout for more diverse dystopian books, and while this book doesn't heavily go into a different culture, the main character does deal with being different in a world where status and what you look like/are can get you far. 

Heir of Blood and Secrets by Linda Xia

*I was given a free copy of this book by the author, this does not affect my review, which is unbiased and of my own opinions*

Our main character, Scylla, is a daughter of a Magistrate, which is a government official in charge of certain things, her mother, who is not from Devovea, died when Scylla was young. Scylla was humbled by going to school outside of the "castle" in a place called the "tiers" (think like Ba Sing Se from Avatar or the town in Attack on Titan, the further out from the leader, the worse the conditions). Scylla reminds me of a cozy mystery MC, she will throw herself into situations to get the answers she wants without regards to what happens to her. Overall not a bad MC, I was never annoyed with her, and even thou there is a slight romance going on, it didn't overtake the story, nor did Scylla turn dumb once with the boy or to get the boy. 

The mystery itself was good, thou I knew who it was at around the 40% mark, but Xia did a good job of making me doubt myself when she kept throwing more suspects/motives at me. 

I enjoyed the world building, the only issues I had was Xia explained in detail the gondola system twice, and I had slight confusion when it came to if Scylla had been to Galen's apartment or not. Once it was said "I know where he (Galen) lives, but early on he had made me promise to never visit unless it was life-or-death" but then later states "I've know where Galen lives for quite some time, but I've never actually entered his apartment. Mostly because Galen refused to let me in the first few times I'd randomly showed up at his door. After a while, I'd just stopped trying, accepting it as one of his quirks". Just comes across confusing, to me anyhow. *shrug*

Overall a good book, and I'd pick up book 2 if this was a series or try another book from the same author. 

Review: The Ex Hex by Erin Sterling!

The Ex Hex by Erin Sterling

Kindle/318pgs 

 I guess I should have looked at reviews before reading this as I was aware that sex was going to be heavily involved in my witch book *le sigh*

Harry Potter exists in this world and the main characters live "kind of" the same life, which I feel is slightly lazy writing to make sure your reader is aware that Harry Potter exist, and your main character even refers to it and then write the MCs life pretty close to that story as well. Vivi lives with her aunt (no uncle in sight but she even has a cousin living there), her mom was a witch who died when Vivi was young, thou her mom didn't teach her much magic. Vivi works at a college that has a special "magic" building/library. 

Besides that, Vivi is a decent enough character, thought too much about how she dressed and was weird towards the other witches at the school she worked at. Rhys (the love interest/ex from the title, and also our other POV) is also decent, probably should have liked to Vivi about why he had to go back home when he told her about having to break off his engagement since he was falling for her, would have saved everyone some time and trouble. He also said this: <i>Rhys had caused . . . twenty? Two dozen? Too many to count, really.</i> which who says two dozen after saying twenty but what made it so weird/dumb was then he had an interaction with his dad: <i>“Half a year,” his father replied because why say a normal thing like “six months”?</i> but like dude you just said something equally as head scratching so like what? 

The ending was super rushed, like SUPER RUSHED, maybe a page was written detailing the climax of this book, and up to this point it was very boring, nothing noteworthy happen, just tons of sex, the main characters straight up ignore the major issue so they could have more sex.  

Review: Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao!

 

Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao. 

Kindle/400pgs 

A female main character is actually written strongly and wants to take down a misogynist government. Giant alien monsters whose bodies are turned into fighting machines! Think Pacific Rim but the giant fighting machines aren't actual machines but they're the corpses of the aliens you're fighting, oh and with some elemental magic as well.  

Side rant about something before review: I do try to be as cultural as I can be, and feel like I know some things about Asian cultures, but since China is a little bit more secretive of what all is going on over there, I don't know much. I have always been aware of foot binding and more or less the way their did it, but it still really hit me when the main character's own grandma just nonchalantly broke her feet and bound them. I also didn't know there was an actual shape they would try to achieve (lotus feet) and I did google the images of what was known as "perfect" ones. 

I'm always on the look out of strong female main characters, I can not stand reading about some girl who can't "go on" if she loses the guy or doesn't get the guy, oh you will lose a star or two if you're female MC puts the fate of the world aside as she tries to get some dude to notice her *insert huge eye roll*. Zetian is probably one of the strongest MCs I've encountered, she straight up murders a dude and carries his body out for the cameras to see with a freaking smile on her face! (the dude totally deserves it) Zetian has a goal of taking down the misogynist pilot system that is currently killing hundreds of girls, granted those girls are helping to keep the monsters at bay, but Zetian thinks there is another way or knows she is strong enough to be who own pilot. I don't have much in my cons section against Zetian, can't even think of one right now actually. 

Slight spoilers ahead... there is a love triangle in this book. First we have Zetian's childhood friend, YIzhi, who is mega rich and sneaks out to see her in the forest near her house. His father is very connected in the big city. In no way can he be with her thou, at least not in her current standing. Then we have Li Shimin, the murdered who they call Iron Demon. He kills every single girl who enters into the pilot system with him, he has major issues, and you feel for him by the end. <spoilers>The love triangle turns into a true triangle thou, Zetian hooks up with both boys and then they boys hook up with each other! 

The book's flow is decent, but then you get the climax and ending thrown at you, it's the main reason I'm only giving it 3.5 stars. Super rushed ending in my opinion, I needed more time with the big fight and <spoilers> the whole golden dragon/prince thing, like really, you're only gonna give me a few pages of that, it's a freaking golden dragon and a prince WHO HAS BEEN FROZEN FOR 100S OF YEARS! AHH. 

I liked the book overall and am looking forward to book 2. 

Trigger warnings for this book are r@pe, alcohol/addiction, sexual assault.