I unfortunately didn’t get on with this book. I ended up putting it down at about 30%
It was just a lot of world info dumping at weird times so it didn’t go in and just made in between moments drag abit.

I do hope to give it another go in the future.

Netgalley requires a rating so have given it a mid star rating of 2.5 stars

chloe gong will always be one of my fave authors. she never misses. every plot she conjures up is delicious and every character has me in chokehold. 10/10 forever x

Chloe Gong is a well-known name in YA literature so I was excited to delve into her debut adult novel. Advertised as a blend of the Hunger Games and Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, my anticipation grew even more. However, upon reading, I couldn't help but notice the striking resemblance to the Hunger Games, with the addition of some still unclear magic system and a new setting.

The romantic interest in the story also felt all too familiar, reminiscent of a similar dynamic in the Hunger Games. Additionally, a particular death in the narrative evoked memories of Rue's death from the Hunger Games. While these similarities could have been overlooked, the major issue I encountered was the difficulty in engaging with the prose. The book was filled with excessive descriptions, to the point where, around 30% into the story, I found myself skimming paragraphs and envisioning the city according to my own imagination and not entirely based on her descriptions.

Furthermore, I felt the characters were very unnatural and underdeveloped. Despite my appreciation for strong and compelling heroines, the protagonist's sole motivation for seeking revenge felt bland and overused, making her the most interesting yet insufficiently explored character in the book.

I want to attribute these shortcomings to the author's transition from YA to Adult fiction, but it seemed that the entire novel suffered from an unnatural rushed pacing. Numerous crucial points were left unexplored and underdeveloped, leaving me yearning for a more thorough expansion of the key elements.

While this book may find its target audience, I personally did not have the mind-blowing experience I had anticipated. Nevertheless, I must confess the cover art is truly remarkable.

This I felt was good for a Chloe Gong novel. Her first foray into adult literature, and I can honestly say that she's trying her best.

The book follows characters from the tech-worshipping twin cities of San-Er, and we are thrown into the perspectives of three central characters: Calla, Anton, and August. The story follows the typical Battle Royale plotline, but has more in common with the Hunger Games, as it follows the same beats. Also do not think of this as an Anthony and Cleopatra retelling, it adds absolutely nothing the experience - this story is better without that marketing.

I liked the story, and I liked the idea of the world, I did not like how long it took to get to the actual plot and where the plot twists happen. I think it could have done with more character-building and less world-creating in the first 80% of the book. To be honest, I kind of have some issues with the world-building because it's not explained very well - maybe I'm just dumb and couldn't understand the magical system and its rules (as the rules tend to contradict the magical system at times???), but I don't understand how it works and I still don't understand the purpose of the games or how it works. It was hard to follow - it felt like Gong formed this world in her head and found it hard to translate into words; I understand the intention, but the execution was a little off. Also I could barely root for the characters until maybe the last 10 pages of the book, where the plot and the characters themselves actually start to pick up and the story doesn't repeat itself for the tenth time.

It's hard to make a Battle Royale book interesting, I know, but the first 20 chapters of this book could have been summarised into maybe 10 chapters and it would have been just as dense and confusing. I wish Gong focused more on the twists - she has great potential to just write good and original stories, but she needs to focus on her pacing, especially when it comes to fantasy. It would have been better if Gong wrote the twin cities of San-Er as its own character, giving us the city's perspective rather than it just being the backdrop of a story, an after thought, a background character if you will - I feel like San-Er didn't have enough time to shine despite being so integral to the plot.

I also think Gong needs to work on creating chemistry between her characters - it felt like they had nothing in common and they don't really trust each other, and it makes what happened to them fall flat. The twist was good though, I will give it that, I just wished I felt what Calla was feeling. Other than that, it's Hunger Games on crack.

But overall, I liked it, just didn't enjoy the pacing. I'm excited to read the next part of the story! I liked this more mature, dark, tone that Gong has taken - it really beats These Violent Delights duology for me. I'm looking forward to the next one!!

Ah, this book was SO hard to rate! It had flashes of brilliance with the odd part I didn’t much get into and then a plot twist would open up and I’d wonder where it was going but it’d bring me back round again and then I’d be hooked. It felt messy and scrappy and hectic but did help add to the frenzy of reading and wanting to know what would happen at the end.

It was an intriguing plot, with a dystopian, other worldly feel. It was a great set up with the concept of ‘jumping’ a clever one once you got into it.

The story with Calla was also an intriguing one and as you got to know more of her character, it was easier to get to like her. I continuously cycled through 3 to 4 back to 3 and then ended with a four star rating for that ending. I was unsure whether I’d follow anymore in this story but after how it concluded, it was almost written in a fashion where you wouldn’t be able to end it there. Having got this far, I kinda need to know how it’s going to follow up as it can no way end like that!!

A few days ago I finished Immortal Longings, the new Chloe Gong book, the author of These Violent Delights that will be released this July, and here I am talking about it with you!

Let's start by thanking Netgalley and the Publishing House so much for sending me this ARC in exchange for my honest review! A thousand thanks!

First of all I would like to start by saying that Immortal Longings was one of my most anticipated release of this year 2023, because I have been following every update since the first moments the author spoke to her audience about this new book, which was an Antonio and Cleopatra retelling. Now, follow me, I've read Antony and Cleopatra and I've lost my head...

"Calla Tuoleimi, Princess of Er. She couldn't do anything on a throne, but she can do everything with a sword in her hand."

Well, one thing is certain in this book, which is that you will find Chloe Gong in her writing, her style! The beginning and the introduction of the characters reminded me so much of These Violent Delights!
The plot of this book is very interesting: Every year, thousands flock to San-Er, the perilously dense twin capital of the Talin kingdom, where the palace hosts a series of deadly games. Those who are confident in their ability to switch between bodies can enter a fight to the death - for the chance to win unimaginable riches. Princess Calla Tuoleimi has been in hiding for five years, ever since she killed her parents to free the people of Talin from her tyrannical family. Only one person prevents her from finishing the job: her lonely uncle, King Kasa. However, she knows that she always congratulates the winner of the games. If she wins, she will finally have the chance to kill him. Enter Anton Makusa, whose childhood sweetheart has been in a coma since they were both kicked out of the palace. He's in deep debt trying to keep her alive. Which means her last chance to save her is to play the games and win. When Anton proposes an unexpected alliance with Calla, they quickly find their partnership turning into something all-consuming. But before the games are over, Calla must decide what she's playing for: her lover or her kingdom. No matter what, only one of them can make it out alive. . .

I think that from here you can already see how politics and a kind of Hunger Games intertwine.
Let's start from the first point. From this point of view it is very interesting because we know our Calla (who would be Cleopatra) is a princess who decided to end her privilege status and kill her parents, to bring down the tyranny they were carrying on - which goes wrong given that Uncle Kasa enters (I interpreted him as Cesare but I don't think it's confirmed) that at this point we can consider him the Villain of the situation. In fact if she wins these famous games she will be able to get close to him and thus finish him off ...
Well well well, what can I say.
Already here you can understand how I too actually found many, even too much, similarities with the Hunger Games: the game, the tyrannical power to be defeated but only by winning, the fact that to win you have to give up a great thing ... All elements that if only had they been changed a little I would have crooked my mouth less. Because let's say that the book follows this whole line, that I found myself at the end and I thought "let's see" and track, I found it. Let's say that when this happens it's not a great thing, because I want to be amazed by a book, not being able to predict every single thing!
This is a sci-fi fantasy (I don't know if it has been defined like that but given the setting and themes we'll call it that) in which there are very interesting fantasy elements (which I don't know if I can say because I don't know if it's a spoiler) that make this point of the unique plot and which also lead to some very nice reversals within the story.
If you can read between the lines you can spot some romance in this plot. Well there is. Little but there is. Personally for what I've seen for now I would have reduced it even more, because it's definitely not the focal point of the story, or at least for me it was.

"Better to draw blood before it can be drawn from you; better to exert power and hold control - to seize power and maintain control."

What more to say?
Overall I wasn't bored, but I didn't find it as amazing as I hoped it would be. Understand me, for me it had to be the book of the year, that's it! There are a lot of internal plot-twists (and no, the final one is nothing compared to another) that make the story interesting but for me it was missing that little pinch that made it unforgettable for me.
Then, in my opinion, there was also another factor: the story begins with a bang as a rhythm, then stops in the central part and then restarts at the end. I've noticed that a lot of Asian retelling books have this narrative dynamic, which I don't know if I appreciate, so it definitely slowed me down in reading.
What can I say, in the end I gave this book three stars, so without infamy and but also without praise, it entertained me but it wasn't a bomb for me. I think anyway, even if the final cliffhanger didn't make me hot or cold since it was predictable in my opinion, when it comes out I will read the sequel, because I loved Chloe in TVD and therefore I trust another good book!

I really wanted to love this book😭 unfortunately this is just a complete miss for me.. the execution just fell flat and the world building had me extremely confused.

I’m genuinely saddened that I didn’t enjoy this book, I had high hopes and was excited for it. Disappointed.

DNF at 36%. Yeah I’m not finishing this book. I tried for two months. I was mostly just really bored. The plot was so slow and I couldn’t care less about the characters. It’s just the same problem I have with many Chloe Gong characters, because she’s so obsessed with making them morally grey and badass that she forgets to make them actual people. The story’s also just very unoriginal. Yes, I realize that Suzanne Collins did not invent the battle royale trope, but the games in this book are too similar to the Hunger Games. An author can take inspiration from other books, but I want them to improve upon the ideas or use them with a twist. Gong takes a lot of ideas from other works in this book, but never really does anything with them. In the end it just wasn’t enjoyable to read so I stopped.

I wanted to like this so bad, and at the beginning I did. The premise is interesting and my friend is a huge Chloe Gong Fan so I wanted to give this a try although I DNFed these violent delights.
I think mainly it's her writing style that I can't get into, mainly the fact that she uses dialogue sparsely, and if she does there are several sentences between each character saying anything. I don't want to read half a page before getting the answer to a question.
Now to the story:
The games felt entirely too easy. Calla can kill anyone and Anton can jump into anyone, making them an unbeatable team, although Calla didn't even struggle once before teaming up with him. The only time the games were interesting was when they were chased in the hotel, otherwise it felt like the stakes were never high.
The romance...was I supposed to ship them? Why? Because Anton got an erection when Calla sat in his lap? I didn't feel any chemistry between them, there were a good team, but fighting together doesn't equal love. There was no bonding moment, nothing that would make me understand.
And lastly the monologues, so many...the amount of times I had different characters go one about what a shithole SanEr was felt infinite. If I wouldn't have skipped some parts I would've gone insane.

Thanks so much to Netgalley and Hodder & Stoughton for an e-arc copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

This was my first read of any of Chloe Gong’s books (I have them all, just not read yet 😂) and I’m so glad this was my first.

First of all, I loved this book and cannot wait for the second one. The ending really got me excited to see how this series is going to play out.

This story focuses on multiple POV’s of people living in a ‘twin city’ and their struggles of living through the yearly games. Every year the palace throws a set of games and in this competition eighty-eight people race to be the last one standing, either by killing
or eliminating other contestants in order to receive
unbelievable riches.
The main characters you focus on during this story is Calla - the cities ‘lost’ princess and August - the heir to the throne. You watch them try to figure o it how they can save their cities from the throne that crushes them.

I loved the ‘magic system’ throughout this book, where people with strong enough qi energy can ‘jump’ into someone else’s body - completely taking them over and pushing them into a corner of their own mind. This is shown only through a flash of light, and if the victim is pushed back for long enough they can fade and their body can become an empty vessel.

My main thought throughout the book was ‘this makes me think of the hunger games’ - it’s like hunger games but with more freedom I think as they are able to apply (even if most are doing it as they have no other option) rather than being forced. As Gong herself has said, it’s described as "Antony & Cleopatra meets Clove and Cato in a 90s Wong Kar-wai film”.

The first part of the book was a struggle for me, the pacing and the language were just a bit meh and it did take me a while to get into the book. However, the pace really did pick up towards the end of the book and I couldn’t put it down. The budding love sorry between Calla and Anton was such a good addition to the story. You get to see them as people using each other for their own gain, but slowly see them become obsessed with each other.

I cannot wait for the second book, and will have to occupy myself with reading anything else by Chloe Gong in the meantime.

Chloe Gongs books just get better and better, she has honed her craft to produce incredible books. This book is a triumph and I can hardly wait until the next episode.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for a free ARC in exchange for a review.

I loved Chloe Gong's These Violent Delights and Foul Lady Fortune series, so I was so excited to get this ARC! This is a very Hunger Games-esque retelling of Antony and Cleopatra with a lot of world-building to wrap your head around.

Like most of Gong's novels in my opinion, it's slow to start but once it gets going, it doesn't stop.

The absolute shock I felt at that Calla reveal was magnificent, and the ending reveal?? Oh my god. I am desperate for the next book and I'm so interested to see how this retelling turns out.

I feel weird about <spoiler> Calla and Anton having sex with him in someone else's body but I also get in this world, bodies are viewed very differently. I'm working through it. </spoiler> Also, <spoiler> at the end, couldn't they have just pulled their chips? Before they got to the coliseum anyway. They had an agreement and then were like "damn no way out of this" even though there clearly was. Oh well. </spoiler>

Please can I have the next book now. 4.5 stars rounded up to 5.

In Chloe Gong’s first adult fantasy, inspired by Antony and Cleopatra, we are introduced to the tech-worshipping twin capital cities of San-Er. These built up cities are smog-filled and poverty stricken, and as people live in built-up high rises and can jump into different bodies as easily as changing an outfit, life is dangerous.

Once a year, desperate citizens can win a fortune by entering a lottery to play in the games; a televised event where 88 participants fight to the death to be the king’s victor…

Princess Calla Tuoleimi has been in hiding ever since murdering her tyrannical parents and is the reason that the King will not leave his palace. This year, Calla has managed to trick her way into the games under a false identity, and will carve her way to victory - and into the king’s presence - to finish what she started.

Anton Makusa has tricked his way into the games, too. It’s his final chance to save his childhood love, but when Anton faces Calla and proposes teaming up, their tenuous alliance will spiral into something with the power to consume them both…

My thoughts:

I love the world that Chloe Gong has built here, and the chaotic mix of dystopian urban fantasy with elements of tech, the Roman Empire and The Hunger Games oddly worked for me. It did take me a while to get into, but the last third had me truly hooked. Antony and Calla’s slow burn is well played and I even found the villainous August compelling reading!

Immortal Longings is a definite must read for Chloe Gong fans and is out on July 18th. Thank you to Hodderscape and Netgalley for the e-ARC - I can’t wait for book two!

🔹Forget your name and adopt the title instead. Calla. Soon, people will be saying it just as they whisper God."🔹

💫 Immortal Longings is @ adult debut in which the story Antony and Cleopatra meets the Hunger Games ! Initially ,as in her other books, I struggled to get into the story especially because of the world building and the info- dumping.. But then I just say wow! The story is pretty much set in a world inspired by Kowloon city with 90's technology and people with mind jumping ability which made me totally immerse in its dark atmospheres!

💫The best part is the characters: there are no heroes or villains, they are all very morally gray and willing to do anything to achieve their goals. Calla is brilliant and strong but I also enjoyed the scenes where her more human and insecure side also appears. Anton has my whole heart: he is ruthless, funny,also full of trauma and caring. The alliance between the two begins as a necessary means to achieve their own ends , but then in a natural way it turns into attraction and finally into love. But will love be enough to make Anton and Calla change their priorities ?

💫in essence Cong did not disappoint : she managed to create a claustrophobic and dark atmosphere with real characters perfect in their imperfection in a story with dark tints, full of blo!d,d£ath, spicy,political intrigue and plot twists !

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the arc copy💫

🔹 And what fine daylight we have today to ensure its longevity in their memory.🔹

Thank you Netgalley and Hodder & Stoughton for this arc in exchange for an honest review.

"Immortal Longings" by Chloe Gong takes place during a game very similar to the Hunger Games following main characters Princess Calla, Prince August and Anton who each enter in this mortal game where only one can win for their own reasons.


I would give "Immortal Longings" by Chloe Gong a 2-star review because, there were parts that were intriguing but I felt everything else was very cliche.

DNFed at 40%

There were lots of aspects that I enjoyed about this book. I was intrigued at an Antony and Cleopatra retelling, I loved the worldbuilding with the twin cities under a brutal dictatorship, the qi based identity magic I love, every conceptual aspect of this book, I liked. But there's something about Gong's writing style that I struggle to engage with (and I had a similar issue with These Violent Delights where I enjoyed everything about it except the actual writing). There's murder! Body heist magic! Revenge plots! It should be pacy and un-put-down-able! Why is the writing so boring to me??

☆☆☆¾
(Rounded up to 4 for Netgalley)

Inspired by Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, Immortal Longings is a fiery collision of power plays, spilled blood, and romance amidst a set of deadly games.

Intrigued by the premise and the fact that it was adult I decided to give Immortal Longings a chance (I also knew this would be a certain book boxes monthly pick and wanted to see whether or not it was worth the money). Overall I'd say it was worth it, I enjoyed the book and I'll definitely be buying that special edition!

So what did I like and dislike about the book and why? Lets get into it!

The plot:
The plot was obviously focused on the games but that wasn't the only focus of the book which I was surprised by as the books synopsis only really focuses on the Games aspect of the book. The focus was mainly split between the characters (their motivations and personal conflicts), the games and politics (or rather general things related to the royals / the King (like rebellion)). I thought that the book had a good balance of everything though I wanted to see more of the Games especially as going in I thought that they would be like the main focus of the book which wasn't the case. All that said I still enjoyed the other plots.

The writing:
I thought the writing was okay, nothing special but not awful either though I did have one major issue with it that almost put me off the book completely; the info-dumping. The first few chapters were just filled with constant info-dumps and because of it I didn't really start to enjoy the book until the 30% mark. Like we were just thrown straight into the world and had all this important information thrust upon us, it made me feel like the whole book would be a struggle (which it fortunately was not). A guide to the world, like the Jumpers, how it worked and those who had special abilities and what they were would've been beyond useful and made the book a little easier as I kept forgetting what the powers were and whatnot.
What I also enjoyed was that the writing didn't feel too YA-ish as I feel Adult debut books by authors who normally write YA tend too. Quite a few Adult (and New Adult) debuts I've read in the past have felt like that and this didn't which was a pro for me. (Though it did sort of have a YA vibe to it, it was obvious that this is adult and not just because of the gore and smut - that said I felt this felt a little New Adult to me or at least what New Adult should be more like).

The characters:
I thought the main three characters were interesting and I liked seeing them all work towards their goals and I liked how we got all their point of views, one of my only issues with that was that the way PoV changes were presented (or not presented) in the book was very confusing as their was no extra large paragraph break or flourish or symbol to show that the PoV had changed it just changed with nothing more than a normal paragraph break leaving me confused when I'd go from one PoV to the next without realising though I'd assume that was more to do with it was an E-ARC like I assume it will be fixed or different in finished copies. I also wanted to see more of August (and Galipei) because despite being a main character he sort of took a backseat to Calla and Anton. One of the things about the characters I did enjoy was how they felt their age and not just like 17y/os aged up to thier 20s (like I find happens in most debut Adult / New Adult books from YA authors).
I didn't really care too much for the side characters (other than Galipei), like I didn't really get the point of Calla's old maids, sure she needed their identity or whatever but other than that they didn't really serve much of a purpose in the book and there was a (minor) side character death which felt like it was meant to be more impactful than it ended up being, like maybe if it had been saved til a little later in the books or we'd gotten a little more conflict around it, it would've been more impactful, but who knows? Maybe the death wasn't meant to be impactful because it was just another death in the twin cities of San'Er.
I also found it interesting how despite having a large impact on the characters in the book the King was hardly in the book, like it wasn't necessarily a bad thing but like he had maybe 3 scenes in the whole book set in the present like it was just a little odd I guess.

The relationships:
Let's start with the obvious relationship to start with: Calla and Antons. I wanted to enjoy their relationship more than I did, like don't get me wrong, I was sold on them by the end but I felt the getting there wasn't the most enjoyable. I found a lot of their dialogue felt either cringe-y or like it was made to be like screamed about online or put in edits or whatever. It made me not care too much for them and their relationship especially as their relationship felt a little rushed / Insta-lovey, like they could've done with a lot more development, like one minute they were enemies / rivals and the next they were confessing their love, like dudes I don't even think you've known each other for 3 months, slow it down maybe?
Now onto a relationship I enjoyed and wanted to see more of: August and Galipei, I felt the way their relationship was presented was very interesting and it left me wanting to read more though unfortunately we didn't get it.
I also wanted to see more of Anton and August, they used to be close and then everything happened so now they are where they are and Anton's in the games like I felt they could've at least been given one or two more scenes together.
I was also interested in the relationship / bond that Anton had with Otta like I definitely feel it could lead to some interesting things.

The ending:
Wow I absolutely loved that ending, it's the sort of ending I look for and want from book and Immortal Longings gave it to me. It sold me on reading the next book too!

Misc. / Other:
I don't know if it was just me but I felt the descriptions of clothes (like in general and like what everyone else outside the main characters wore) were a little lacking which made it a little hard for me to imagine what side characters -and even what August - wore.
There was this one betrayal that happened and it came out of like nowhere, like we didn't even see hints of it then BAM, there's this betrayal, like the scene left me a little confused. It definitely would've been better saved for book 2 or at least given more substance in 1.
Like I said earlier, I finished the book with the feeling that I wanted to see more of the Games, like it was said that San'Er was a big place so there could've been nothing happen for ages or the Games went on for a while yet it felt like it was just an excuse so it could focus on the other things in the book too.
Sort of related to the last point, I expected the Games would be a little more, not dramatic but like exciting I guess? Like I thought we'd see more drama and tension from the event, especially with there being 86 other players.
San'Er had all this amazing technology, they had cameras and trackers and wristbands and computers yet you're telling me they didn't have any audio whatsoever, that the palace didn't have some sort of top secret, expensive devices to listen in on people? It made no sense and felt like a bit like an easy way out of dealing with if people could hear what they were saying.
As you know I really enjoyed the reveal / twist at the end of the book but there was also one a little earlier in the book which took me off guard, like I wasn't expecting it but it was so good and added to the story like bravo to chloe Gong for that.
I'm excited for the next book, to see the story further unfold, to see more of the characters and how they act and how they handle all these new things. I am also excited to see the use of Qi and Jumping will carry on from this book and how we'll see it develop and grow (at least in our Main Characters eyes).

Anyway that was long and this is the end of my review!

Thank you to Netgalley for the ARC.

4.5! Tahnk you Netgalley, Hodder and Stoughton for this e-arc!

I WAS UTTERLY SHOCKED (in amazing way) CHLOE GONG DID THAT AGAIN!
All the plot, the settings, and characters set in the most purrrfect way I can’t get enough of it? But the ending!? When will it RELEASED PLEASEEEEE.

Review to be continue

If there's one thing Chloe Gong is gonna do is give me an exciting fun read. The beginning chapters were pretty slow, it was a bit of a struggle to get through, but it picks up pretty quickly and then it's just action after action!

With how much I liked the These Violent Delights duology but sorely disappointed with its successor series Foul Lady Fortune, I was hoping Gong's adult debut would re-spark what initially drew me to her.

Unfortunately, this was not the case.

I was curious of how different Gong's writing would be in adult fiction than her YA works, but that curiosity was for naught because it's barely any different. The only real difference I pinged was that there were a couple more 'fuck's thrown in the prose than in her other books. There's gore and violence, sure, but I've read much more brutal stuff, especially in YA books. Besides that, there are so many descriptions, so many minuet details about Talin and San-Er that were just expositions dumps rather than concise world-building. My eyes started glazing over those paragraphs by the half-way point because I felt they weren't important for me to digest, whatsoever.

As for our leads, Calla is practically Juilette-lite and Anton is just an asshole. They were more the bones of characters rather than fully fleshed out ones. Much about them was kept away to keep the air of mystery, which normally is fine, but the time that should of been used to build up their characters was dedicated to the aforementioned Talin-world dumps. So, when our leads finally met and team up after the forty-percent mark and declare themselves in love around the eighty-percent mark, it feels so robotic and unnatural. It made the one sex scene feel really weird, too.

Also, I just have to talk about the magic system. It's called "jumping". Basically, it's a person psychically invading another person's body completely. It's supposedly outlawed in San-Er, but people do it, anyway? I understand it's a likely a commentary about the double standards of the up-holding of the law, of how the rich can get away with it more than the poor, but these abilities made me question a lot of things. For example, Anton frequently jumps because his birth body (the one he was born in) was taken from him when he was exiled. In order to live, he has to bounce body-to-body. He's never the same person twice, but it is noted that he tends to choose bodies closest to what he originally looked like, and his eye color remains the same no matter the body, as with all jumpers. But my main problem with this is he uses all these people only to leave them in confusing places; consent is not a factor, whatsoever, especially when he jumps before he's killed along with the body or having sex with Calla. It's just so weird. Despite describing in-depth how jumping works, we barely see the social ramifications of using another body and the constant violation of bodily autonomy. I just don't get how this flew over Gong's head while she was writing this. Maybe this will be explored in the sequels, but I don't plan on continuing the series to find out.

Overall, this was a disappointment. Since finishing These Violent Delights, Gong's work has been gradually losing my interest. I don't know if I will continue following her. Maybe I'll read Foul Heart Huntsman just for the sake of finishing the series, but probably not.