Rating 4 but more of a 3.5. Full review to come but didn't entirely love how the ending happened

Daughter of the Moon Goddess is inspired by the legend of Chang'e, the Chinese moon goddess, and follows her daughter Xingyin, whose existence has been hidden from the world. After learning of her mother's imprisonment, and being forced to flee the moon, her only goal is to find a way to save her mother, and reunite them once again. It's a story filled with heartbreak, tough choices, and mystical creatures, all tied together by Xingyin's love for her mother and her determination as she tries to complete her increasingly dangerous goal of freeing Chang'e.

I honestly had quite high expectations going into this book, as not only did it seem exactly my kind of story, but a friend also highly recommended it to me, saying I would most definitely love it. These expectations were only heightened when I received the absolutely gorgeous edition of this book from Fairyloot, and every part of me was now desperately hoping I'd love the story. And luckily enough, I did!

There's a lot to love about this book, and while I wasn't obsessed with the romance, it ended up not mattering for my overall enjoyment because of how much else I did enjoy. This book is chock-full, of action, of plot, of characters... of everything, honestly. This book alone could have probably been divided into a trilogy, with just how much was set up and then revealed as the plot was unwinding. We get to see so many sides of Xingyin, and we almost get to see her grow up, in a way. Her journey spans years, full of heartbreaks, danger, and new friends, and I loved seeing her grow stronger and more resilient without ever losing her compassion and her heart.

Generally, if a book has a love triangle, I get easily frustrated and annoyed, as generally that trope comes with a lot of annoying side effects. Somehow, the love triangle itself wasn't capable of annoying me, and I think it's because of Xingyin herself. While she leaves space in her heart for romantic love, she also has her own goals and dreams she's set out to accomplish, and she tries so hard not to stray from that. I also think there was a good balance of friendship/romance between Xingyin and the two love interests, and their relationships don't revolve entirely around whether she's going to choose them. Overall, there's just a good basis of friendship and respect in both relationships, and it allowed me to just go along with where the romantic plot line was going, rather than feeling, adamantly, that she had to choose one or the other for me to be happy. While I definitely do have a slight preference, it doesn't dominate the story for me, and I trust this story's path enough to trust in where it'll end up, eventually!

I only wish some side characters (beyond the love interests) had been given some more space within the story, especially Xingyin's friend Shuxiao. The story definitely seemed to orbit around the love triangle, and while this wasn't necessarily an issue, I would've liked a bit of a break from the romance at times, and it would have been nice to see more time spent with her friends!

I also just love Natalie Naudus as a narrator, and that only added further to my experience of listening to this book! There's just something about the way she narrates that truly brings the books to life for me, and adds a nice finishing touch to the story, overall.

In the end, there's a lot in this book to love (and in general!), and I seriously can't wait to see where Xingyin's story goes in the next installment. (Though, I'm also really glad I'm not left with a hole in my heart, desperately waiting for the next book. While I like a good cliffhanger ending here and there, not every book needs it, and I absolutely love how this book feels like a solid, cohesive story, while still leaving a few open threads for the next book to pick up on).

There is not a lot that I love more than a good ole spooky, sentient forest in a fantasy setting. There’s just something magnetic about the forest and its many shadows, no matter the role it ends up playing in the story it exists in. Edgewood relies on the forest, centers itself around it, and so then you’d fully expect I’d love it, right? Well, so did I.

There are honestly a lot of interesting ideas at the core of this book, and so much I’ve loved in other stories, and yet the execution of them in this book just didn’t work for me at all. I honestly feel like this is the most boring way this story could have been written, and it honestly breaks my heart to say that! I adored The Last Namsara, and it’s sequels, and had such high hopes going into this one because of it. But Edgewood just doesn’t contain the magic that The Last Namsara did, and while it’s just as reliant on a large amount of stories and lore that build up the story world, it just didn’t relish in it.

I was hooked fast in this book, but yet it stagnated at around 20% in, where the events and revelations seemed to slow down, even as Emeline was exploring a literal magic forest with a diversity of mythical creatures around her. In the end, this is where the book began to lose me, and it never really got me back after it. I continued because I had to, because I had an ARC to review and friends to discuss it with, and even then I needed to borrow an audiobook to get me through the last 50%, because it was just impossible to make myself pick it up again.

In the end, there were so so many things that this story used that I’d seen in other books and loved before, but any enjoyment I got out of these events and tropes came from the remembrances of those other books (namely The Starless Sea and Echo North), not from the actual book itself. In another timeline, I can see myself adoring this book, as it does everything I love from a book, but it just lost me too early on in the story, and the execution of certain events just put me off and kept me from being reabsorbed into the story.

While my love of The Last Namsara will definitely have me coming back for more from this author still, I will be a bit warier going in, due to the letdown that this book unfortunately was.

This book gave me relationship anxiety for 7 straight days and didn't even give me any substantial cuteness or happiness to make up for it....

I wasn't 100% sure what to expect going into this one, since I ended up not being the biggest fan of The Flatshare, but I was pleasantly surprised! I found myself falling into this story very quickly, and loving Eileen even faster. It was overall just such a sweet book, even as it dealt with some very heavy topics throughout.

I think I slightly preferred Eileen's story, just because it's a story unlike many I've read already. I almost never see protagonists aged above 40, which is honestly a shame. I honestly really enjoyed seeing Eileen's perspective on the world, from online dating to the busy streets of London, and I love how stubborn and strong she was throughout, even though I would definitely get annoyed if I had an Eileen meddling in my life haha! Overall, I adored her, and I loved how hard she tried to make the lives of those around her happier, even if they were complete strangers just a few pages ago.

Leena's story was one I've read variations of before, but often in romance books, where the story is much more focused on that romance instead of personal and familial growth. I expected a stronger romance, but I ended up really appreciating how much time was spent more on Leena as a person, and her struggles with grief and anger. Her POV led to some extremely tough scenes, especially regarding her mother, but underneath it all you could always see that Leena was trying her best to be the best for everyone, and just needed to be stopped for a bit, so she could start being the best for herself, too.

I also really enjoyed the audiobook for this story, and I loved that we had two distinct narrators for each POV. I've listened to books narrated by Leena's narrator before, and have always really enjoyed her narration style. I did prefer Eileen's narrator though, but I just felt like she perfectly embodied Eileen and her thoughts, and I definitely had the most fun in those sections!

Overall, I did really enjoy this book, and I do think I'll be giving more of Beth O'Leary's books a shot again!

“When a monster stopped behaving like a monster, did it stop being a monster? Did it become something else?”

Stars (Out of 10): 10/10 Stars

Favorite Character: Katsa and Po

Spoiler Free: I couldn’t put this book down once I truly got into it. Looking back, I can’t really find one thing I disliked about this book. The world was built fantastically, and explained in an easy to understand way while also not leaving anything important out. All the characters felt fully fleshed out, and entirely their own, constantly sticking to their values. Additionally, the romance, while fantastic, did not entirely dominate the book nor change the characters involved. And lastly, the plot was one that kept going from the first line to the last.

It was a tale about discovery, love and friendship, and of breaking free. A tale about fighting and learning to love (both others and yourself.) It was a tale unlike any I’ve read before, and I still cannot stop thinking about it.

This is quite possibly the best and most well-rounded fantasy stand-alone I have ever read. It didn’t feel rushed, and the build up constantly contained excitement while still giving the entire novel a base to build upon. And while the world does continue on into other books, I am still sad to leave these lovely characters here.

Until 80% yesterday, finished today (sorry, for my reading journal!)

This melted my brain a little (affectionate)

I've read a few of these style romances by now, but I'm still surprised every time by how much I end up enjoying it! The Book Coven's romance club decided to go for a monster romance bracket for the month of October, and this ended up being the winner. I was originally a bit wary because it was extremely wrong, but honestly the pages ended up flying by, and I really enjoyed myself!

I had some issues with Reia, especially at the end, that I felt like were never fully addressed, but Orpheus as a character more than made up for it. He's just so soft overall, and I loved seeing them bond and learn to love each other, despite everything. I also really liked how the world-building was added into this book, and that even though the romance is clearly the main focus, there's still a lot of depth to the fantasy world itself. It makes me excited to continue the series!

I really enjoyed Cemetery Boys when I read it back in 2020, and while I have yet to read Thomas’s other recent release, I was super excited when The Sunbearer Trials was first announced. I’ve always loved stories about competitions, especially when blended with mythology, and this seemed like a fantastic new book with exactly those things! And honestly, it was! This was fun, full of diverse characters, and a wonderful dive into mythology that is less frequently seen in published stories.

I saw some reviews comparing this to Percy Jackson, and honestly, it’s a fair comparison! I feel like it has a similar energy and atmosphere to Riordan’s work, while still being wholly unique. There’s this incredible range of characters that complement each other well, and they all felt quite developed, even if they were only side characters. There’s also just this core of goodness at the center of the story, and especially within Teo, who seems to just want to do good and be good for a large part of the story. This, combined with a competition and world that is honestly quite gruesome when you think about it, makes for an interesting contrast, one that I can’t wait to see explored further in the next book as the consequences of the ending of this book become clearer.

There were moments where this book felt quite young, especially considering Teo is 17. I think it might just be the writing style, as I remember feeling similarly about Cemetery Boys, and I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing overall! I feel like it generally just lends some additional lightness to most of the story, which works with the overall energy the story seems to have anyway.

The only reason this book was a 4-star read for me, rather than 5 stars, was that I wasn’t as into the competition as I hoped it would be. I felt like I sometimes got a little lost in the trials, and I feel like this was partially due to Teo’s wavering motivations. While he was always technically motivated, his goals seemed to fluctuate, sometimes even within one trial. He shifted between wanting to win and do well for himself, to perhaps even be the winner, to wanting to make sure he focused solely on making sure all his friends made it. I feel like these two goals could’ve been blended better, as instead I sometimes felt lost as to what I was actually supposed to be cheering for. Did I want Teo to smash the competition and win? Or wait, was I supposed to be hoping he’d turn around and help his friends first? There often didn’t feel like there was a singular outcome to support, which makes sense because this was also a struggle for Teo himself too, but it ended up removing some tension from the trials for me.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book, and I’m anxiously awaiting the sequel to see what happens next after that cliffhanger!