I’m back! I know I was gone forever, I plan on writing a bunch of reviews soon and I read seven books this week. 😂
One-Sentence Summary:
In this Romeo and Juliet retelling, Roma Montagov and Juliette Cai must set aside their past and overcome their family rivalry to stop a madness spreading in 1920s Shanghai.
My Review:
First of all, my favorite parts! One thing I loved was that in some ways, there were two Romeo and Juliets, one pair being Roma and Juliette obviously, and the other being Benedikt and Marshall! Roma and Juliette obviously had the gang rivalry, but I liked Marshall and Benedikt much better, and they took a few Romeo and Juliet tropes, but the biggest one is a horrible spoiler. The main positives of the book are just that it’s well-written and enjoyable! My favorite character was Marshall because he’s perfect, then Benedikt, then Kathleen!
The ✨negatives✨: Well to start it off, the reason I originally DNFed this book! There are extremely graphic depictions of madness-induced suicide by tearing out throats, which is less than pleasant! There are also lots of bugs, and the combination of those things put me off of the book for months. It’s mainly in the first 100 pages, but it’s pretty bad.
This one is more of a story issue; I thought it was predictable. Not the retelling part, lol, but just the “who’s the villain” bit, any foreshadowing was pretty obvious, things like that. It wasn’t a huge problem like it has been in other books (side-eyes review I wrote that I’ll post soon), but it was worth acknowledging.
Anyways, I would totally recommend this to people who like retellings! These Violent Delights is great with politics, some of the history, and lovers to enemies to lovers! Go read it!
⭐️⭐️⭐️💫/5
The Fiction Feature 