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wonderreads's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
yourbookishbff's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
This was a reread for me, and, again, a five-star reading experience. Sherry Thomas excels in using dual timeline/time slips to slowly reveal character backstory and heighten the suspense, and this dual timeline is particularly devastating. This story of two unlikely people brought together by circumstance is explicitly a fated romance, and with its lightly fantastical wuxia elements and chi-based magic, the world feels soft around the edges in a way that fits such a sweeping story of star-crossed spies and unearthly villains. This hits so many of my favorite beats - second-chance romance, hidden identity, on-page declarations of fidelity, and the list goes on (and on). I highly recommend reading both installments in this duology, and honestly they can be read in any order (The Hidden Blade is a prequel to this story and shows our two characters as they grow up and their paths begin to merge). Please note content warnings on this one - I have included additional detail for one potentially triggering scene.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Murder, Gun violence, Child death, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Pregnancy, Colonisation, and Sexual content
Minor: Infidelity
Child death: there is on-page infant death. It is alluded to from the very start of the book, so it is less a reveal and more a flashback of events. The baby's death is at the hands of our supernaturally powerful villain, and is not realistic or likely (as a parent, this made it far less triggering for me than death-while-sleeping, death due to an accident, death due to illness, etc.). It is tragic, but I personally feel that it is not gratuitously so. For some readers, though, this is understandably a topic they will avoid entirely, and I want to note it here for that reason!xandrarama's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
tense
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Spywork, martial arts through a wuxia lens, revenge killings, betrayal, regret, reconciliation… This romantic adventure sweeping from the plains of nineteenth century Chinese Turkestan (now known as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China) to the ballrooms of London is told via dual timelines and is a hugely satisfying resolution to everything that started in The Hidden Blade. Sherry Thomas is the master of delicious angst that never tips over into melodrama, and I bow down before her genius.
jackiehorne's review
3.0
Not bad for an action-adventure romance, but the characters, and the romance arc, felt woefully underdeveloped in this book when compared to Thomas's outstanding earlier romances. No wonder—when you get to the "Author's Note" at book's end, you are informed that there's a prequel to the novel (mentioned nowhere on the book's cover), a prequel in which "the events of Ying-Ying's and Leighton's formative years that have made them what they are, events the repercussions of which are still very much felt in My Beautiful Enemy" are described. This prequel is an ebook. What, did Thomas deliver a novel that was too long, so the folks at Berkeley decided that they'd break it up into two and make more money? Was the publishing of one story in two volumes planned from the start, a way to get readers to pay both the $3.99 for the prequel AND the $7.99 for the main story, and/or to create more frequent "publishing events" for an author who writes more slowly, and thus keep her work more in the public eye (and on the charts at Amazon)?
No matter what the reason, I'm really feeling cranky about this. Thomas has been on my auto-buy list for a while now (with the exception of the prequel, which I somehow missed), but I'll be a far more wary consumer of her future books.
No matter what the reason, I'm really feeling cranky about this. Thomas has been on my auto-buy list for a while now (with the exception of the prequel, which I somehow missed), but I'll be a far more wary consumer of her future books.
ltennant09's review
adventurous
challenging
emotional
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
kimu23's review against another edition
3.5
Sherry Thomas have cracked the code for second chance romance. I always love the way she writes yearning and her romance almost always a hit for me. I hope one day she would write another historical romance with Asian heroine because I’m pretty sure this series is the only one she wrote with Asian lead.
gabymck's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
5.0
sunedupreez73's review
adventurous
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
3.25
seeinghowitgoes's review
4.0
Set simultaneously in 2 time periods, it's a slightly jarring experience to realise that when we're first reunited with our hero and heroine it's actually their 2nd encounter.
Now under the name of Catherine Blade, Ling-Ling has come to England the land of her beloved teacher Herb. Sent by her stepfather Da Red to retrieve 2 jade tablets, she's stunned to run into Leighton, war hero, injured and now engaged.
The real truth however is much further in the past back in China, the history is so much richer and it's in the past where the story really flourishes.
Thomas excels with this mesh of cultures, the flavour it adds enriches the experience and if anything I felt the scenes in London felt rather bland in comparison.
Now under the name of Catherine Blade, Ling-Ling has come to England the land of her beloved teacher Herb. Sent by her stepfather Da Red to retrieve 2 jade tablets, she's stunned to run into Leighton, war hero, injured and now engaged.
The real truth however is much further in the past back in China, the history is so much richer and it's in the past where the story really flourishes.
Thomas excels with this mesh of cultures, the flavour it adds enriches the experience and if anything I felt the scenes in London felt rather bland in comparison.