 This book was all done. No, if you're gonna write about assassinating, better get assassinating. She even uses the word non-plus correctly. Perhaps not even gray, just morally black things. At long, long last, I finished Jade War by fondly. This book was all done. Oh my God. It took me way longer to read than I wanted it to take me and way longer than it should have. If I didn't have a channel and had no obligations in my life, I would have read this, finished it much, much sooner. But anyway, I finally managed to finish it. And it's so good. It's very, very hard to talk about that in spoilers. So I'm gonna do a very brief non-spoiler section here in the beginning. So you can stick around for a little bit longer if you've not read this. But then I'm gonna need to dive into spoilers because one, it's the second book in a series. And two, it itself has just so much to unpack about what goes on in it that it would be so, so, so, to say anything meaningful or useful or interesting without talking about some of those specifics. So is it worth the hype? Yes, a thousand times, yes. Jade City was worth the hype. And everyone said Jade War is even better and Jade Legacy will blow your mind. So like, I am still, I have not yet read Jade Legacy. I am ready for it to blow my mind. My heart is not ready for it to be broken, but that's going to happen, I'm sure. But Jade War was so good. It built so well on top of what Jade City did. It expanded and developed and furthered character arcs, plot lines, the world, the magic, the politics, the physical world, not just like knowing more complexly what's going on in the world, but sort of expanding the scope of like where this is taking place, spreading out the characters across the sort of landscape so that we are not just sort of in one place anymore that it's expanded in every way. It did such a good job with those things. It did an amazing job of staying true to characters while allowing them also to grow and change. Some years past during the course of this book and you can see those characters changing over time, not in a way where they're like completely different from who they were before, but they aren't static. They grow, they change. They are shaped by what happens to them, shaped by the decisions that they make, shaped by who they are in the company of, where they are sent, where they go, who they see, what they experience. This has an effect on them. This has an effect on how they continue then to react to things or how they shift their approach to life or the world or their own views on things. It's done so, so well. It also does an amazing job continuing to keep you on your toes. You know this is a series where characters can die, where it's like reading Game of Thrones. You know, like no one is safe, things can go awry and therefore every scene does feel more intense because unlike a book where everyone has plot armor galore, you do feel more anxiety because you know that this author is capable of doing away with characters, is capable of making terrible things happen to these characters and is also capable of making these characters do terrible things, which is its own kind of, it's not plot armor necessarily that prevents that in other books, but other authors are hesitant to have characters that are central characters or well-liked characters do things that might make you hate them and fondly is not afraid of that at all. Characters in this book will do things that have you questioning why you're reading about them or should you continue to root for them. And when you're writing about such morally great characters in this morally great world, it would be a terrible choice in my opinion as a writer to shy away from doing that because if you too much kind of like whitewash and give kind motivations to seemingly violent behavior to all of your main characters, it's then it has the window dressing of a morally gray story without actually being one and what makes a morally gray story interesting for those who enjoy those kind of stories is that the characters actually do things that are deeply questionable. If they're not going to, then it's one of the, a lot of YA will do this where like the character is an assassin, but they don't actually assassinate anybody or if they do it's always because that person is like basically like fantasy Hitler and you're like, okay, but like assassins are a morally gray interesting thing because they go around killing people for money and your character that you're telling me is an assassin, maybe they did that off screen, maybe, but really they're not, you know, you're afraid that we wouldn't like them if they actually assassinated people because like that's bad. No, if you're gonna write about an assassin, they better be assassinating. So here, well, what they do is condone to buy the law and nevertheless the setup and feel of these books is that it's about gangsters, that it's about mob, it's about the mafia, it's about Yakuza-esque setups. Even though like, I mean, in this world, it is sanctioned by the government what they do, but they operate the way that you'll see Peaky Blinders, the godfather, sons of anarchy. To shy away from having those characters do morally gray things would be a mistake and it is not a mistake that Fonda Lee makes. She makes the characters make tough calls and do difficult things and it makes it such a rich book with so much for you as the reader to experience and feel because when something's happening, bad to a character that you're rooting for, you know, your heart studying because you know that this could end badly, there is very little plot armor. And if a character that you like is doing something bad, your heart is studying because you're like, oh, are they really gonna do that? Oh my God, they're really gonna do that? Oh, that's, I don't know how I feel about that. So the, it is a rich emotional experience reading these books because she gives it all to you. Stuff that's tragic, stuff that's tough, stuff that's horrifying, stuff that's exciting and thrilling, stuff that's good as well. Sometimes good things happen and that's exciting as well. So overall, just I can't say enough great things about it. I can't think of a single criticism for it. She even uses the word non-plus correctly, which if you know me at all, that's something that irritates the biz out of me and people use non-plus incorrectly. So basically, like I said, I can't think of a single bad negative thing to say about this. The only negatives about it would be things like, if this is not to your taste, this is the kind of book where there's some books where I'm like, I find it difficult to believe that there are many people that wouldn't like this because it has such broad mass appeal. This isn't like that. I mean, if you're, it is really morally right, it is quite violent, it's highly political. So if those are things that don't appeal to you, like I can absolutely get why this wouldn't be your cup of tea. But if it is your cup of tea, if that's the type of story that you like, then this is some of the best there is out there. So if you like a gangster story, if you like a morally great story, if you like a highly political story, this is fantastic, this is about as good as it gets. So definitely, definitely recommend the series so far and I can't imagine Jay Legacy will fumble the landing after everything that I've heard about it. So spoilers, this is your final warning. If you've not read Jade War, we're doing spoilers now. So for me, I read this book kind of half and half, I read a good 50% of it a couple of months ago and now I read the other half of it basically. So it does feel to me like I read two books, like some of the beginning of it, like I forget, like it doesn't feel like that happened in the same book. And when I realized and I reminded myself that no, that all took place in Jade War, there's so much that happens in Jade War. So one of the most morally great things that happens probably in the entire book. I don't know, you know, mileage may vary, you might think something else is worse, but one of the most morally gray things, perhaps not even gray, just morally black things that happens in this book is Hilo, the fan favorite, killing his dead brother's wife and taking the child, taking his nephew. I had a really long conversation about this with Hilary from Book Born, she was ahead of me, we were ostensibly buddy reading it and then, you know, she finished it and I didn't. This scene happens, I believe it's chapter 21, but let's say, if it's not, let's say that it is. It's somewhere thereabouts. So she was like, have you gotten to chapter 21 yet? And I was like, no, I haven't. And then I made some progress, she's like, have you read chapter 21 and not told me? I was like, you will be the first to know when I've read chapter 21. So I did finally read chapter 21. And I was like, well, so that was a lot. I could see why you were like, have you read this chapter? Because of the way that that happens and because of the way that I found myself, I basically victim blaming, because I wanna be clear, I was not defending Hilo's behavior, I was not defending what Hilo chose to do, if we can even say chose to, because it was pretty reactive and instinctual what he did, like I don't think that if he had like sat down to plan what he was gonna do, I don't think he planned to do that, but nevertheless, he did do it. But that said, like reading that scene and everything that leads up to it, I was like, you know, not to victim blame, but I am about to victim blame. There's so many choices made by his sister-in-law, who he kills, that I'm like, lady, like it's not, what Hilo does is not fine. Absolutely upfront, we agree, what Hilo does is not fine. That is a crime, both like morally and legally, like that's in no way is that okay that he did that. But that being said, you kind of a little bit brought this upon yourself, because it's not like she doesn't know what Hilo's like. It's not like she doesn't know what green bones are like. It's not like she doesn't know what the no-peak clan is like. She knows exactly what Hilo is like, and she knows what the clan is like. She knows what green bone life is like. She has said that this is the very reason that she wants to keep herself and her son away from all of that. So that being the case, her knowing full well how they behave, how they think and how they react to things, the fact that she specifically thinks that Hilo is worse than all of them, that like this lifestyle in general is bad, but that Hilo, more than most, is just like a violent monster that reacts with violence at all times. And the things that she does to seemingly intentionally provoke him. I'm like, it's not like you didn't know he was like this. You're telling us that that's why you don't like him. You're telling us this is why you don't want your kid around this, because he is like this. So why are you provoking him? You know, I'm not saying, oh, you provoked him, therefore you deserve to die. You don't deserve to die. What he did is wrong, it is wrong 100%. But knowingly provoking someone that you are calling a violent monster, like you know that can't end well, right? Like you know you're kind of asking for it, right? Like you shouldn't be dead, that's wrong and Hilo is wrong to have done that. I was like, what did you expect? Like what did you think was gonna happen when you did that? When you, you know what I'm saying? So like again, to be absolutely 1000% clear, Hilo killing her is wrong. She should not be dead. But she didn't help herself any in all of the things that she was saying to him, that she was disclosing, that she, the way that she was reacting and behaving. I was like, this really could only have ended that way. And even you yourself should have seen that coming from what you said he's like, like you know this. Like why are you doing this? Like they're gonna, it's been a minute now because I did read the first half longer ago. But I believe they agree to have dinner to discuss, you know, some kind of like arrangement where the kid can visit with his family in Keckon. And she agrees to do a dinner like that. But so before the dinner happens, she's now gonna like run away with the kid before that dinner is even able to happen. And I'm like, why? Why would you do that? You know he's gonna come looking for you. You know he's gonna be pissed off. And you know he's gonna be like livid that you're trying to trick him and now like take the kid away that he wanted to see. It's not his right to have the kid. It's not his right to have the kid visit. But you know that he feels that it is and you have agreed to have dinner with him. So just go have dinner, do the dinner. And then after the dinner, you can agree to whatever. You can say, yeah, sure, we'll do visitation. We'll work it out. And after you've worked it out, then leave. You don't need to leave before the dinner happens. That's stupid. You're asking to piss him off. You're asking for him to lash out. And then when he does find out, everything that she says to him when he shows up and he's like, what the heck? Everything that she says. She's like, yes I'm running away and you're a monster and you're like, I forget exactly what she says because it's been a minute. But like she's just like provoking him. And I'm like, do you want to die? Like this is a terrible idea. What are you doing? Stop it. What are you doing? Like anyway, so yeah. What Kilo does makes it very hard to continue to root for Kilo. But you know what she signed up for. So it is what it is. Now that we've moved past that and you know, Kilo does, just he takes good care of his nephew and treats him like one of his own. And for the kid himself, like I'm guessing there's going, it's like, you know, that's Chekhov's family drama right there. Like, you know, the kid is gonna find out what Kilo did and how that all went down. It's gonna come back to bite him. There's no way that doesn't. But for now, Kilo is a good dad to him and he's raising the kid. Perhaps, you know, the mom didn't want him raised in the Green Boat Life. But if he is to be raised in the Green Boat Life, he's being raised very well with a lot of care and a lot of love and a lot of family around. The kid is okay, all things considered. But anyway, that was quite an opener. Not actual opener, obviously. It's not like the first chapter, but quite a way to start Jade War. And then many moral great, morally great decisions later, when we have the end where I was ready to be mad and then I wasn't. But I was upset. This is a very weird state of emotions. This book just makes you feel kind of weird things. So at the end, when Wynne, the stone eye, is able to get the revenge that she wanted on the person that killed her brother. She was not willing to wait. She was impatient and she wasn't gonna let this chance slip by. So she's gonna take the vengeance that she's able to take. And she succeeds, she kills the guy. And then when they're ambushed by these other criminals and they're all getting like suffocated and choked and killed, I was like, so this is, I'm guessing Wynne's gonna die because this is her sort of the, she got her revenge, she did it, but this is the punishment for having been impatient, for just taking the revenge instead of waiting when there was maybe a better opportunity. This is, you know, that's coming back to bite her in the ass. She's gonna die now. She doesn't die. So for a second, I was like, oh, fake out death, resurrection trope. Like that's not something that I was expecting to see from Fonda Lee, but that scene forced Ann to use Jade again, which I knew at some point, something like that would have to happen. So I liked the way that that happened and the way that he was like, I'd used Jade to kill before, but experiencing what it's like to use it to heal makes me want to use it again. So I liked that. But when he managed to revive Wynne, and he was like, it had been a few minutes, but he finally got blood pumping again in my head, I was like, well, if it was on a fiction book, they should probably have brain damage, but you know, she'll be fine. And then she did have brain damage, which is like such a weird thing to say with a delighted smile. So I was, it's a weird thing to say, I was relieved that she had brain damage. But you know what I mean? I was like, okay, I'm relieved that Fonda Lee made it, you know, realistic in a world with magical rocks that make you have superpowers. But yeah, there are consequences. It's not like you can be basically clinically dead. And then for several minutes and be revived and not have, and then be like totally fine. She does have brain damage. So yeah, for the next book, I'm guessing there's going to be some kind of repercussions or Niko, Lance's son, who Hilo killed his mom and stole him away. I'm guessing there will be, that will be found out and it will cause problems. I'm guessing the fact that Hilo's own son is a stonai will cause problems. Not for Hilo personally and how he views his son, but this will create problems, it will. The fact that Wen is now paralyzed, at least as far as we know that she's paralyzed, that how this is going to affect her and Hilo's relationship and affect her ability to help the clan and her place in the clan and in being back is gonna create both opportunities and problems. There's just, there's just so much. She's like continued to complicate all these threads that she put in place before. And there's just so much to resolve and also so many different ways this can go and so many new, so many fresh horrors can be visited upon the characters and by extension the readers. It's so well done, it's so well done. And I am hyped to read Jade Legacy and be broken. So let me know in the comments down below. Hopefully you hear at this point in the video you've read Jade War. Maybe you've read Jade Legacy, you know spoilers. We can talk spoilers about the Jade Legacy when I finish it. But yeah, let me know your thoughts about Jade City, Jade War, Green Bone in general. 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