Girls of Paper and Fire by Natasha Ngan
I can’t remember exactly when I tried to read this, definitely within the last few years, but I don’t know when as I apparently didn’t track it anywhere. I really wanted to love this book. I’d had it on my to be read for a really long time and I constantly talked about picking it up. So much so that my expectations for it were sky high, no reason I might add – I’d never read a single review for this book so I had nothing to base these expectations on.
If you are interested in this book please read the trigger warnings first, it is HEAVY. This is one of the main reasons why I firstly wasn’t enjoying the book and secondly DNF’d it. I find explicit descriptions of sexual assault very discomforting, as any person should. There’s a lot of that going on in this book, literally entire chapters dedicated to these poor girls being used by the king. It’s sickening. I think if these instances were off the page and just mentioned that they happened I probably could have kept reading and maybe even enjoyed the complexities of this world and its story but it was too much for me.
Synopsis: Each year, eight beautiful girls are chosen as Paper Girls to serve the king. It’s the highest honor they could hope for…and the most demeaning. This year, there’s a ninth. And instead of paper, she’s made of fire.
In this richly developed fantasy, Lei is a member of the Paper caste, the lowest and most persecuted class of people in Ikhara. She lives in a remote village with her father, where the decade-old trauma of watching her mother snatched by royal guards for an unknown fate still haunts her. Now, the guards are back and this time it’s Lei they’re after — the girl with the golden eyes whose rumored beauty has piqued the king’s interest.
Over weeks of training in the opulent but oppressive palace, Lei and eight other girls learns the skills and charm that befit a king’s consort. There, she does the unthinkable — she falls in love. Her forbidden romance becomes enmeshed with an explosive plot that threatens her world’s entire way of life. Lei, still the wide-eyed country girl at heart, must decide how far she’s willing to go for justice and revenge.
Rhythm & Muse by India Hill Brown
This was one of my most anticipated reads for 2023 and it massively missed the mark. There wasn’t anything particularly problematic with it but having a songwriting competition to win a date with someone is a little wild. There was just something about the whole idea of this book that I didn’t get on with.
Firstly, I hated the main character and liking them is a huge part of enjoying a book. He was judgemental, mean and a little bit creepy. He was way too obsessed with the “love interest” of the book (the one who created the songwriting competition). I’m talking about literally stalking her online to figure out where she was so he could ‘conveniently bump into her’. Gross.
Also as someone that studied music for a long time, having him be so judgemental and mean about other people’s performances was horrible. Especially as he stopped performing himself for this very reason. But don’t worry, he has ‘the best voice in the world’ apparently, so none of this makes sense.
This is yet another book that I really wanted to love but other than being a pretty quick read I didn’t have anything positive to say about it.
Synopsis: Darren Johnson lives in his head. There, he can pine for his crush—total dream girl, Delia Dawson—in peace, away from the unsolicited opinions of his talkative family and showboat friends. When Delia announces a theme song contest for her popular podcast, Dillie D in the Place to Be, Darren’s friends—convinced he’ll never make a move—submit one of his secret side projects for consideration.
After the anonymous romantic verse catches Dillie’s ear, she sets out to uncover the mystery singer behind the track. Now Darren must decide: Is he ready to step out of the shadows and take the lead in his own life?
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