My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Next up on my Reading Books I've Wanted to Read for Ages binge is this wicked tale. A story that fits between the third and fourth Lunar Chronicles books, and features the villain in this series.
Levana is Lunar royalty and her sister has just ascended to the throne. She's the scarred, abused ugly duckling no one sees or hears. All she cares about is the one man she can't have. The one man she will do anything to possess...
This is such an awesome book!
Although it's labelled as Book 3.5 in the series, it takes place before the series begins. Yet, it does a great job showing us who Levana really is before she became the cold and evil mastermind who destroys so many lives.
And wow, she's quite a lot. 😳
Where do I start? Well, I felt sorry for Levana for about five seconds. It becomes very clear early on why she's so weird and emotionless. Even though the neglect by her parents and abuse by her sister rouses a degree of pity, spending time inside her head quickly reveals just how screwed up she really is. She's twisted. Demented. Obsessed. Self-destructive. A total bitch.
OMFG, the way her obsession for the Guard she's fixated on since she was a kid is truly awful to watch. Disturbing in its cruelty.
It starts as a harmless crush, but soon morphs into something dark and dangerous. It was so terrible to watch what she does to this poor man. And because I already know where this was going... it's also devastating. Nothing she does is for anyone but herself. Even when it outwardly seems like she's about to perform a selfless deed, inwardly we see that everything she does is for herself and no one else.
The deterioration of this character is both slow and fast. It hits simultaneously. As much as I disliked (hated) her so very much, I couldn't stop reading because it's such an interesting story. The writing style hooked me in, the familiarity of the world kept me there, and the trainwreck about to happen ensures I raced through the last half.
I also despised her older sister Channary. She was cruel and gross, and very much responsible for helping make Levana into the delusional monster she becomes. I liked how this glimpse into the cold, scheming heart of the Lunar royals helped us understand so much about what happened in the three previous books.
The mention of so many familiar characters is also very cool. This is definitely a brilliant prequel that works perfectly with all the others installments.
As far as genre goes, I really liked that while this is definitely a SciFi series, this one has a fantasy vibe as well. That the story takes place entirely on Luna is also great, and kept things fresh.
I seriously loved this. And now I'm ready to read the final book! 😁
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