This book tries to ride the wave of tea-related fantasy books and Six of Crows praise but fails badly. There is hardly any teahouse stuff in it. Not much in this book makes sense. The criminal masterminds are all kids, the heist whose planning dominates much of the story turns out to be totally pointless, and it's written in an annoying, overly verbose style. In summary, totally frustrating. In our bookclub, we make a friendship bracelet for each book with a word/theme from it. This is the only one I couldn't even be bothered to make one for.
This book tries to ride the wave of tea-related fantasy books and Six of Crows praise but fails badly. There is hardly any teahouse stuff in it. Not much in this book makes sense. The criminal masterminds are all kids, the heist whose planning dominates much of the story turns out to be totally pointless, and it's written in an annoying, overly verbose style. In summary, totally frustrating. In our bookclub, we make a friendship bracelet for each book with a word/theme from it. This is the only one I couldn't even be bothered to make one for.
Irgendwie bin ich mit dem Vampier-Thema ja durch, aber ich mag nun mal Tee, deswegen habe ich dieses Buch doch gelesen. Ich bin froh, dass diese Geschichte im ersten Moment nicht so umfangreich daher kommt, denn sie fühlte sich trotzdem langwierig an.
Das Teehaus hat mir als Handlungsort sehr gefallen, aber die Charaktere und alles drum herum hat sich sehr bemüht angefühlt. Irgendwie war das alles zu glatt und stimmig. Ich weiß das klingt komisch als Kritik, aber besser kann ich es nicht beschreiben. So als wäre die Geschichte genauso angelegt, weil eine bestimmte Zielgruppe das genauso kaufen möchte.
Die Handlung kam auch ewig nicht in Gang, weil alle ständig damit beschäftigt waren sich bedeutungsvoll in die Augen zu starren und dabei ganz erregt zu atmen. Ich weiß nicht, ob ich vorher jemals so viele tiefgründige Beschreibungen von Augenfarben gelesen habe. Vor lauter Atmen und Starren blieb die …
Irgendwie bin ich mit dem Vampier-Thema ja durch, aber ich mag nun mal Tee, deswegen habe ich dieses Buch doch gelesen. Ich bin froh, dass diese Geschichte im ersten Moment nicht so umfangreich daher kommt, denn sie fühlte sich trotzdem langwierig an.
Das Teehaus hat mir als Handlungsort sehr gefallen, aber die Charaktere und alles drum herum hat sich sehr bemüht angefühlt. Irgendwie war das alles zu glatt und stimmig. Ich weiß das klingt komisch als Kritik, aber besser kann ich es nicht beschreiben. So als wäre die Geschichte genauso angelegt, weil eine bestimmte Zielgruppe das genauso kaufen möchte.
Die Handlung kam auch ewig nicht in Gang, weil alle ständig damit beschäftigt waren sich bedeutungsvoll in die Augen zu starren und dabei ganz erregt zu atmen. Ich weiß nicht, ob ich vorher jemals so viele tiefgründige Beschreibungen von Augenfarben gelesen habe. Vor lauter Atmen und Starren blieb die Handlung ganz lange auf der Strecke.
Ich habe auch nicht ganz verstanden, warum im Laufe der Geschichte irgendwie noch der Jack The Ripper-Mythos mit verwurstet werden musste. Das wirkte Recht bemüht.
Zum Ende hin nahm das Ganze noch etwas an Dynamik zu und wurde recht spannend, aber dann war die Geschichte auch schon so halb vorbei, denn der Rest wird im zweiten Teil aufgelöst. Naja.
Werde ich den zweiten Teil lesen? Ja, weil ich einfach zu neugierig bin und jetzt natürlich wissen will wie es ausgeht. Mist.
Content warning
I just have to spoil some things in order to actually talk about the few interesting elements in an otherwise obnoxious book.
I find this book... frustrating. The ending it has just feels like it comes out of nowhere, like the story just... stopped because the author was over it, like it was the last chapter in a fanfiction that someone wanted to stop because they were tired but kept persisting because someone else bothered them to do so.
And I find the use of the characters' secrets a bit... boring. Many are predictable in ways that kind of make me want to roll my eyes, while others are predictable in a manner of it not being telegraphed well in advance but the expected response is still, "Oh, of course that's what happens."
If anything was less frustrating it was the fact that liberal-coded values weren't upheld as being inherently positive. The final plan that the main cast enacts fails completely because they are... too beholden to doing justice that is just so toothless. "We'll call for a press conference and drag every media outlet into one place!" They even invite someone who claimed she was 'used' by the villain, telling her exactly what the plan was! Just so she could "also face some justice" that would never come, and that person works with the villain to help slaughter every person in the room so they could never report on it. The plan is an entire failure, and I kind of wish there was some kind of conversation around that point...
... but you can't have a conversation when it feels like you just threw the book at the publisher because you didn't want to write it anymore. I don't even want an explicit conversation, but having at least one scene where there is even a glimmer of recognition for the failure that could happen... Sometimes you need that, especially when that failure might be the point.
It's so annoying. I love the concept for what this story is, but I also just... kept feeling like I didn't know why I should care about anything. I wasn't invested in the relationships I was told to be invested in; I wasn't invested in the characters that I probably should've been (especially when they're going to be outed as being the most terrifying of vampires and the person who was made into the reason for a huge part of the plot)... I could barely care about Jin and Flick's little blossoming romance because I just... couldn't really see why I should care about them? And part of it is just that everyone felt so flat and boring and tedious.
Edit: Oh, I see. It has a sequel, which explains its poor ending. But even for a sequel, this did not make me have a desire to read the next one.
The largest part of the book is about an elaborate heist, so if you like heists, knock yourself out. However, it's embedded into a larger major story, which doesn't really need that heist - it would work just as fine without it. Then again, the Spindrift Tearoom & Bloodhouse concept is pretty cool. And: coconuts!
The largest part of the book is about an elaborate heist, so if you like heists, knock yourself out. However, it's embedded into a larger major story, which doesn't really need that heist - it would work just as fine without it.
Then again, the Spindrift Tearoom & Bloodhouse concept is pretty cool.
And: coconuts!
This book was an odd experience for me. On one hand, there were a lot of things about it that I liked. On the other hand, the way they were presented/put together kept me… detached? disengaged? throughout the story. I just couldn’t connect properly with anyone, even though the character have exactly the archetypes I often fall for and a really cool web of relationships. Another member of the book club I read this for suggested that perhaps it was hard to connect with the characters because they spent so much observing each other and commenting on each other. You read a chapter in Jun’s POV, he’s reflecting on Arthie’s or Flick’s recent actions. The next one is in Flick’s POV, and she’s focused on Jun. This kind of thing. It didn’t happen all of the time, and each of the …
“You don’t have to trust me.” “I don’t.”
This book was an odd experience for me. On one hand, there were a lot of things about it that I liked. On the other hand, the way they were presented/put together kept me… detached? disengaged? throughout the story. I just couldn’t connect properly with anyone, even though the character have exactly the archetypes I often fall for and a really cool web of relationships. Another member of the book club I read this for suggested that perhaps it was hard to connect with the characters because they spent so much observing each other and commenting on each other. You read a chapter in Jun’s POV, he’s reflecting on Arthie’s or Flick’s recent actions. The next one is in Flick’s POV, and she’s focused on Jun. This kind of thing. It didn’t happen all of the time, and each of the three POV characters did have some introspective moments or personal confrontations where they were focused on their own goals. But I feel like this approach contributed to the overall sense of being outside looking in instead of getting pulled into the story.
I did like the setting a lot. It’s a Victorian-inspired world with some low-key 1920s vibes; a city filled with complex agendas, glittering mansions, and dark slums; constant nods at a larger world that has magic and elves and who knows what else. Somehow, I kept thinking of this world in terms of tabletop rpgs. Vampire: Victorian Age meets Blades in the Dark. I also enjoyed the prose, but also kind of had an ambiguous relationship with it. There are so many snappy one-liners, both in the interactions and in the characters’ inner monologues. Multiple paragraphs that are very cool and memorable in isolation, but all together they almost distract from the story.
Speaking of things that I found distracting: what was the deal with those vague nods at the Arthurian myths? When we have an MC named Arthie who wields a mystical weapon called Calibur and that weapon is an object of a “whoever manages to wield this will save the country,“ I instinctively start searching for more allusions and connections. But I don’t think I’ve really found any? Was it just for flavor? If the aim was to create a vague association between the MC and King Arthur, maybe it was enough just to have the plot with the weapon without making the names similar.
I think in general, the book suffers often from a sort of heavy-handed, on-the-nose approach. All the contrasts are very stark. All the important points are as good as highlighted. This character is keeping a secret about X. That character needs to achieve Y to find inner peace. There’s going to be a plot twist right about now. Here are characters who are clearly struggling against imperialism and racism, but let’s not trust the reader to get it, let’s make them have a conversation where everything is spelled out. Perhaps it was this lack of subtlety that kept preventing me from getting truly engrossed. When I read a book that’s all about secrets and lies, I expect the style to reflect it. I expect not only the plot, but the narrative in general to keep secrets and lie to me and make me guess and figure things out. Unfortunately, I didn’t get that kind of immersion here.
