*I was given a copy of Foul Lady Fortune in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to Hodder & Stoughton and Chloe Gong*

Synopsis: 

Assassin. Immortal. Spy.

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of These Violent Delights comes the first book in a captivating new duology following an ill-matched pair of spies posing as a married couple to investigate a series of brutal murders in 1930s Shanghai.

It’s 1931 in Shanghai, and the stage is set for a new decade of intrigue.

Four years ago, Rosalind Lang was brought back from the brink of death, but the strange experiment that saved her also stopped her from sleeping and aging – and allows her to heal from any wound. In short, Rosalind cannot die. Now, desperate for redemption for her traitorous past, she uses her abilities as an assassin for her country.

Code name: Fortune.

But when the Japanese Imperial Army begins its invasion march, Rosalind’s mission pivots. A series of murders is causing unrest in Shanghai, and the Japanese are under suspicion. Rosalind’s new orders are to infiltrate foreign society and identify the culprits behind the terror plot before more of her people are killed.

To reduce suspicion, she must pose as the wife of another Nationalist spy, Orion Hong. Although Rosalind finds Orion’s cavalier attitude and playboy demeanour infuriating, she is willing to work with him for the greater good. But Orion has an agenda of his own, and Rosalind has secrets that she wants to keep buried. As they both attempt to unravel the conspiracy, the two spies soon find that there are deeper and more horrifying layers to this mystery than they ever imagined.

Review: 

I will be completely honest and say it took me a while to get into this, but once I did I was hooked. Foul Lady Fortune began with high action and from this, I assumed the whole book would be this way, that was not the case. To start with everything was a little too slow-moving for me and for the majority of the book it seemed like not a lot was happening. 

That doesn’t mean I didn’t love this though, I really did. Rosalind was one of my favourite characters from These Violent Delights and it was great to get to know her even better. I do have to admit that I still haven’t read Our Violent Ends yet, so there were a few minor spoilers in this, but if you know the story of Romeo and Juliet (on which These Violent Delights is based) then you can already guess how it ends. 

So many of the characters were instantly loveable, Orion has to take the prize as my favourite. He was so charismatic and the growing relationship between him and Rosalind (which is not necessarily romantic so not a spoiler) was completely endearing. I was rooting for them from the beginning so you know it was done well. 

Although slow to get moving I really enjoyed the storyline and the mystery they were trying to solve. Throughout the book, there are so many tiny hints at later plot points and personally, I think everything was laid out perfectly. There were even some callbacks to the start of the book and once I connected the dots I don’t know how I didn’t figure it out sooner. Well very done. 

If you enjoyed These Violent Delights then you will 100% love Foul Lady Fortune. With returning characters and connecting mysteries, it’s really interesting to see how the series work together. 

I usually struggle with books over 500 pages but once I got into Foul Lady Fortune the pages flew by. The action really gets ramped up near the end and you’ll find you can’t turn the pages quick enough.

Foul Lady Fortune is available on September 27th!

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