Jade City

I FINALLY FINISHED THIS. half of the book was such a slog to get through and i honestly would have dnf'd if i didn't buy the entire trilogy at once like an insane person. still not sure why i did that, but at least now i probably won't sell the books like i was thinking of doing until this one finally picked up.

the worldbuilding and setting is the strongest part of this novel for sure– characters felt a little flat (love Hilo though), and the prose occasionally got on my nerves in the way of its VEHEMENT insistence on telling and not showing. it sort of felt like the author didn't have much faith in her readers to parse subtleties without explicitly just writing it out. an example:

“[Lan] was worried about Anden. The young man was like a true nephew to him, and Lan felt a great deal of responsibility for him.”