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Thanks to @fiercereadsya and NetGalley for providing me with an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review
✩🌬️🪷Review:
An explosive conclusion that won’t let you come up for air.
Picking up where “Strike the Zither” leaves off, “Sound the Gong” follows Zephyr, now a god in a warrior’s body, as she pays the ultimate price to see her lordess Xin Ren succeed in ruling over the three kingdoms.
This book takes a darker turn with more betrayal, more scheming, more politics, and more death. My heart was racing as Zephyr slowly unravels Crow’s master plan and discovers where his loyalty truly lies. With a deeper understanding of his motivations, I found myself looking back on every move he made in the previous book with fresh eyes and marveled over Joan He’s craft.
Zepyr is ruthless in her pursuit of taking fate into her own hands. She stays true to her character in not deviating from her mission of putting Ren on the throne, but her act of cutting down whoever is in her way toes the line of villainy and makes readers question whether the harm she inflicts is justified by her noble cause. As the author puts it, Zephyr isn’t a “shining hero” and I loved her all the more for that. I was rooting for her to the very last page.
As a ZephyrCrow fan, the ending of “Sound the Gong” shattered my heart, but it fits the story well. The bonus epilogue is what put me back together again (available on the author’s website - you won’t want to miss it) and left me feeling hopeful. Both endings are satisfying in their own ways and wrap-up the duology nicely.
Cross-posted to: Instagram | Amazon | Goodreads | StoryGraph
“The Children of Huang Shi,” (2008) a fact-based war drama filmed in China starring Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Radha Mitchell, Chow Yun-Fat and Michelle Yeoh.
Roger Spottiswoode’s feature tells the story of a British reporter (Rhys Meyers) in China during the country’s second invasion by Japan in 1937. He rescues 60 war orphans by leading them on a thousand-mile journey to a village near the end of China’s Great Wall with the help of a local political leader (Yun-Fat), an aristocrat (Yeoh) and the American nurse he falls in love with (Mitchell).
Comparable to: Goodbye,My Princess (cdrama); Ashes to Love (cdrama) ;
This is one of those hella complicated, hella melodramatic rollercoaster of a ride historical cdrama’s. It’s so much fun, yet exhausting at times too. It does take a handful of episodes to fully get into, but once you do, if you’re into this type of genre, since this won’t be everyones cup of tea, you’ll be fully hooked. The female lead has the best storyline and character growth throughout even though she’d could be a bit obtuse at times but no more worse then her counterpart. The main male lead I wanted to throttle him and don’t get me started on the ‘brother’. All the torture he put his ‘sister’ through. Ugh. In the end though, with all the tragedies, it made a excellent melodramatic drama.
Triss and I watched New Interpretation Records of the Three Kingdoms (2020) and god. It opens on some hilarious skits and just Does Not Let You Off The Ride
I absolutely fell in love with Joan He’s strong female leads in her reimagining of the Three Kingdoms. The mind games, politics, plot twists, and subtle romance is what drew me in, but the reluctant found family dynamic and sisterhood had me reaching for book two. All this and more is what makes this duology so special and might explain why I had such a visceral reaction when I reached the last page. Tears are a guarantee, but the ending deserves nothing less.
Cross-posted to: Instagram | Amazon | Goodreads | StoryGraph