this was okay, but read a little juvenile and i didn't feel connected to the characters or what happens to them at all. i can see other reader enjoying this a lot tho!

— thanks to the publisher and netgalley for the free digital ARC.

3.5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫
An innocent and sweet fantasy with mild peril. There’s a back drop of beautiful settings with vivid descriptions, this is down to flowers and food that just immerse you in the world building.
The book is rich in legend and myth.
The main characters are lovely and you root for them throughout. The coy flirting is very cute. The fact the FMC is a sucker for romance books and finds herself in one is great.
This book could easily be a Disney film.
Thank you to NetGalley and Titan Books for an E-ARC. This is a voluntary review of my own thoughts.

Wow! What an amazing book!!
Would love to read more from the author.
Thankyou netgalley for the Arc!

ZHARA is the first book in a power-filled YA story about protecting your loved ones - and going up against demons to save the world.

There's a lot happening within this book - action, romance, betrayals, and people finding their people. I really liked the relationship between Han and Xu, the sense of brotherhood tying them together. Yuli is such an engaging character and I look forward to more of her in later books.

I got a real sense that what we see in this book (pretty much just one city and one mountain) was only a small part of the world. Likewise, the tales told seem like only a fraction of the folklore within it. Not only does it make me excited for later books to explore more, but it's also the sort of expansive world building that makes a place feel real.

The story has its own fiction books within it, from magic tomes to a romance novel that becomes a recurring topic of conversation. The book (which feels like it has strong Hades and Persephone tones!) is a way for Han and Zhara to connect, a shared interest that helps build the relationship between them. It's also fun to see more stories normalise romance books and their massive popularity.

There are hints of Cinderella in this tale - an evil stepmother forcing her step-daughter to work in the kitchen, rather than being part of the family, the shoe left behind at the ball for the prince to find. It's not the main focus of the story - I certainly wouldn't call it a Cinderella retelling - but it was fun to spot the elements.

— 𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰 —

𝐓𝐢𝐭𝐥𝐞: Zhara
𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬: Book 1 of the Guardians of Dawn series
𝐀𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫(𝐬): S. Jae-Jones
𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: YA Fantasy
𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐏𝐮𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐝: 1st August 2023
𝐑𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠: 4/5

”But she knew—had always known—that tolerance was not acceptance. It was not love, yet she had starved herself on the barest morsels of approval, afraid of never feasting again.”

This book has been approximately five years in the making! It was originally supposed to come out in 2019 I believe but that was pushed back due to the authors mental health which she has been open about on Goodreads.

So, people have waited a long time for this.

I, on the other hand, stumbled across it on Netgalley and thought that it was one of the most delightful covers I have ever seen. Once I’d clocked the Chinese and Korean cultural components and the description of Zhara being a Sailor Moon meets Cinder vibe, my interest was immediately piqued!

I loved both the Sailor Moon and Cinder components that I found in the novel, the Guardians with unique (to that world) power to vanquish evil, the lighthearted feel of the story that is congruent with Sailor Moon, the strong friendship between the characters that blossomed, and the romance between Prince and Poor Girl that is congruent of Cinder, and the evil stepmother who wears a facade of best interest but has malevolent intentions.

I was a little worried it would suffer from what other YA asian fantasies such as A Song of Silver, Flame Like Night and Shanghai Immortal have fallen victim to with direct translations of words being jarring, immature, and vulgar by using ‘pissfarts’ ‘rotten turds’ constantly but I am so pleased that this wasn’t the case here! I thought that the writing was really good. I was immersed throughout the entire story, though I did find it a bit confusing at parts. I actually wish it was a bit longer to allow the reader to truly get to grips with the world building.

Saying that, I think that some parts of the story were inadequately explained while other plot points were repetitive and obvious and on the nose yet read like they were supposed to be twists in the story, but they absolutely weren’t. This did not take away from my enjoyment of the novel because I found it amusing that the characters were too busy flirting with each other to do any proper sleuthing.

I enjoyed the characters. Hans is juvenile but also lovable, and Zhara as a heroine is great. My book before this one was also a YA fantasy and I found the character so immature so Zhara felt very refreshing to me. I actually struggled to put this one down and I could easily have kept reading until 2am.

Overall, this is a joyful and lighthearted YA fantasy topped with forbidden magic, child demons, and overtones of amusement and friendship. It definitely did not take itself too seriously and whilst there are some plot flaws and some dubious editing, I really enjoyed this book and look forward to the rest of the series.

Thank you to Titan Books and NetGalley for providing an eARC to review!

It's been a while since I've really just not gotten along with a book, and unfortunately Zhara is that book. I was really not meshing with the writing, but it was the overall tone which rubbed me the wrong way.

The protagonist is very juvenile - not my preference but fine - but within the first 30 pages she has 1) kind of infantilised her vision impaired sister, and 2) sexually harassed the male protagonist 3 times with crude jokes that don't even make much sense in the moment. Like it's a REACH for her to be taking their interactions to the gutter. It's very jarring to be reading this very young seeming main character immediately come out with a joke about showing the male character a good time and depriving him of his innocence. In a YA book too...

I'm sure this has its audience, and maybe gets better as it goes on, but I'm going with my gut on this one.

- 3.5 stars -

✔️(Forbidden) Magic
✔️ Monsters
✔️ Magical animal companions
✔️ Sailor moon-esque

“It was your wanting that made you beautiful to me. Your desire made the world bigger with possibility.”

I love sailor moon so seeing this being compared to it I just knew I had to read it.

Overall, it was an entertaining read, with good writing and plot. There were certain aspects which weren’t developed enough or which put me off, but generally it was interesting, though not that memorable.

The writing is good but it was slightly repetitive, and certain phrases and aspects put me off, the most notable being “The Good-Looking Giggles”, which are mentioned a LOT throughout the book. Also, I’m assuming the Bangtan Brothers is a BTS reference, so it was a bit wild to just see that.

Zhara is definitely more plot driven, rather than character driven. I feel like the characters don’t get built or expanded as much as they could have as we don’t really learn much about them apart from their generic things quirks - E.g. Han not being the brightest, liking to work out, and liking romance novels, being his main personality traits that get mentioned constantly. Xu is one of my favourite characters in this and he could have been developed into such a good character, but instead he’s just kind of there to make sure Han doesn’t die.

Big thank you to NetGalley for an arc of this - all opinions are my own 💗

This is a hard review for me to write despite actually really enjoying the book - possibly because it’s pitched as “Cinderella meets Sailor Moon” and I’ve never watched Sailor Moon (stop judging me) so I can’t speak to the strength of how well it meets that pitch. I can tell you that we watch our heroine grow - from wanting not just to survive, but to thrive. You as the reader will work things out way before our gang of hapless, adorable heroes do. I unexpectedly loved that the Prince is a sweet and clueless himbo who has to be directed by his long-suffering and fashionable non-binary BFF. I appreciated the feisty animal companion. I actually think I liked most of the side-characters even more than Zhara, despite being the titular character. It was a fun read if not particularly deep, and I liked it more than most YAs I read as there were multiple POVs- there are action scenes and comic scenes and best of all, good food descriptions. It did feel quite like watching an anime, despite my confession about Sailor Moon.

Featuring
- Family relationships and sibling bonds
- Secret magic
- Animal companions
- Comedy and action
- Romance (forbidden)
- Queer rep

This was a wonderful story, I enjoyed every second I was in this world and what a world it is, the magic system is so interesting , great characters, fantastic world building, an absolutely riveting Asian inspired fantasy with beautiful writing, I can’t recommend this enough, definitely a five star read for me

I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the arc copy. While I did enjoy the world the author created along with its intriguing magic system, this one didn't work so well for me as many of the characters had traits which made them feel very juvenile rather than close to adulthood. The insertion of a k-pop boy band equivalent very late into the story also broke the immersion for me personally. Several of the plot points were quite predictable. Overall I did enjoy but would not come back to it myself. I would recommend for younger readers who like Asian inspired fantasy.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for this eARC of 'Zhara' by S. Jae-Jones.

'Zhara' is the first book in the Guardians of Dawn series by S. Jae-Jones. My goodness, was it the perfect starter book. From mindblowingly beautiful writing to the characters you could fall in love with and root for, Jae-Jones didn't disappoint with this book. I feel like it was obvious this book was going to be a five star from the blurb being right up my alley to this GORGEOUS cover. I am excited to read the next one whenever it comes out.

3.75 stars

I always like pieces of media that involve the elements in some way, which is why I was really excited to read Zhara . From the summary itself, I could tell why it had been compared to Sailor Moon. I quite enjoyed the world-building, especially the way the magic system was introduced. Zhara herself was introduced in such an interesting way and I loved reading her perspective. However, the pacing of the story was somewhat slow, at least for me. The writing style in this book felt more like I was reading an upper middle grade, early YA novel; which is fine, but then some of the character's personalities felt a little juvenile. And the BTS references? I liked them, but after a point there were far too many. I also feel this book just needs one more, small round of editing because some dialogues and descriptions felt a bit stilted to me.

Overall though, I was sufficiently intrigued by the premise and I am definitely going to be picking book 2 when it comes out!

This book was absolutely enchanting. I knew I would enjoy it as I loved Sailor Moon growing up but this has exceeded my expectations. Wonderful and so well thought out. Loved the world building and adored the characters. Highly recommend it.

<i>I received this ARC thanks to the Publisher and NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.
Full review to come in the future after book release. </i>

2.5⭐

➕Unique mash up of loved traits – although in a bit underwhelming way, the book indeed delivers promised mix of sailor moon, cinder (lunar chronicles) and I'd say Avatar TLA. But in a way you're sadly left with hunger for more, as it's not in a way you'd possibly expect the similarities to come as promised in the blurb.
➕World building seems like an okay opening for the series, but it's definitely lacking deeper exploration for now as whole book happens in two locations at most.
➖Slow paced for the most part – expect two bigger action packed scenes and that's it. For the most part the story uncovers quite slow, and repeats its own ways.
➖I do enjoy K-pop myself, but putting literal BTS into your historical-fantasy world is a bit extreme, and what can I say, cringe 🙈. Especially with all the simping around them included, and having them play major role in the peak events of the book.
➖This is a ya book, about 17-18 years old, but for the most part it felt more middle-grade than necessary. All characters had a bit infantile trait, which even thou it did make it more similar to Sailor Moon, it felt really unnecessary as simultaneously we got some adult-like jokes and tension among them, so it felt just wrong to have them act a bit childish in the meantime. To sum it up, you get twelve-year-old kind of jokes from young adults, which makes you think were the jokes too childish, or the characters too old for them.
➖Villains got to explain the most important things. Like suddenly main villain shares most crucial abilities of the main lead, never mentioned before, as if it's the most convenient way to info-drop all the upcoming signs of mary-sueness for our lead. And the fact that a freaking villain was the one to tell main lead she was gaslighted her whole life, not one of her friends.
➖Talking about gaslighting, I think we're all aware how original Cinderella story goes. But at least in the end she's aware of her situation and gets to find her justice. Here I feel like it and overall abuse is romanticised instead, enough that she never accepts what's wrong with her mother and sister relationships. They literally say to her they don't care about her, and'll never put her above their own stakes. But she's still as 'good kid' with them as ever, because love, even if only one sided, conquers all.
➖In the end everything just... worked out, like there wasn't much plotting happening for the happy ending to come, as their plan got screwed up anyway. Instead our mary-sure suddenly pushed into oblivion found her own way out with the magic of love and friendship. Why.
➖ Disability representation felt just wrong, should've been definitely taken care of more careful way because at one time it's villanized, the other second glorified, and in the end you don't get anything good about mentioning it at all at this point.

Thank you Titan books and NetGalley for providing me an e-arc in exchange for an honest review. My review is my own and not influenced by others.

The beginning started really good and I was hooked from the first page, I liked the world building and the characters were nice overall.

The banter between Han and Xu was really funny and I loved the first part in every start of Han’s POV. The dry comments of him were something I liked forward to.
I had less with the FMC, Zhara. I found her the typical naive female teenager who wants to be the decent, well manured stepdaughter with the evil stepmother. I think I outgrown this kind of characters which made it hard to feel anything but annoyance toward her.

The ending made me decide to keep this book as a standalone and not to read the epilogue with the cliffhanger I know its going to have because I’m not feeling engaged enough to read the next book in this series and the paging was too slow for my liking.

Overall, I enjoyed it enough to give it 3* and consider it a standalone instead of the first book in this series.

Having fallen in love with Wintersong and Shadowsong, I've been so excited for Zhara since SJJ started talking abut it on Twitter and I was over the mood to be approved for the ARC on NetGalley.

Zhara is a strong fantasy book with a Cinderella spin. With magic banned in the Morning Realms, Jin Zhara has been hiding her power for years but as rumours of Abominations returning, she finds herself part of the liberation organisation Guardians of the Dawn who is not only looking to stop the blight affecting Magicians in hiding, but also protect her sister.

This is a very different read from Wintersong and Shadowsong; this is a bright book by comparison with humour, positive dialogue and a contrast to the dark tale of the Goblin Prince.

This is a great Young Adult fantasy and I'm excited to see how the rest of the series plays out.

Thank you NetGalley and the published for an e-ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I was very excited to read this book as I am loving all these fantastic East-Asian inspired fantasies out there at the moment. Unfortunately, Zhara fell a little short for me.

What I liked:

- the setting was interesting and well-developed, I could easily imagine the locations as they were described
- the lore and world-building was mostly easy to follow with lots of cool magic
- most of the characters were pretty fun and loveable, particularly Xu

What I didn't enjoy:
- while I appreciate a little light-heartedness in a read, and love fantasy books that don't take themselves too seriously, at times it felt a little juvenile
- the plot was VERY slow to kick off, with the first 30% of the book not grabbing my interest enough to keep me reading in long bursts
- there were so many nicknames for characters that at times it felt really confusing and was hard to follow some conversations

My biggest problem with this book was the seemingly random and utterly bizarre inclusion of BTS - and I'm not talking like, a little suggestion or hint, a little fun nod for fans, but it was literally BTS in a fantasy setting as troupe of seven performers who suddenly became important to the plot in the last 15% of the book. Like, I'm sorry what? Just having one mention of a performing troupe called the Bangtan Brothers was fine - a bit cringe, but I could overlook it. But to have them super included? It was like something from WattPadd.

Overall, what could have been a hugely entertaining read steeped in cool magic and mythology was let down by a strange k-pop cameo and some confusing plot points. This wasn't for me.