What Was Mr. Fukaiã¢â‚¬â„¢s Reason for Running Back Into the Burning City?

553 reviews 81.5k followers

October 9, 2017

I liked this a lot! It was one of the most unique books I've read in what feels like a while, and the concept was super cool. I loved the added element of a murder mystery, it made it the perfect Halloween read. I was fascinated by the illusions and the magic of the circus, it constantly kept me guessing as I explored this new universe and tried to solve the mystery alongside the MC. Speaking of, I really enjoyed our MC! I liked how driven she was and how despite all the devastating things that kept happening to her she continued to strive to solve the mystery and keep her family safe. Overall a really weird, creepy, and all in all entertaining read!

fantasy

mystery-thriller-paranormal

owned

Author 3 books 21.9k followers

Edited December 8, 2017

This was dark and murderous and magical, so basically all of my favourite things. It was so so good, peoples! It was complex and the characters were just incredible (10/10 my favourite new characters) and, even though I guessed the big finale plot twist, I seriously enjoyed this one.

Why aren't all books full of murder and magic. I ask.

+ So it's set in basically a moving circus/carnival.
It's called Gomorrah, which pleases my nerdy heart because that's like a wicked city out of the ancient Bible times AND there's even mention of the lady-turned-pillar-of-salt. This is so so cool, ok!?? But I freaking ADORED the setting. You can see and taste and smell it all. It explodes off the page with such detail. Although I kind of question how Sorina lives off kettle corn and liquorice cherries. Would totally try it tho. It sounds nice. But definitely a new favourite setting ahhh.

+ Moment of appreciation for fantasy standalones!
Because they are rare! And they need cheering!

+ The plot was REALLY twisty.
There's conspiracy theories and murder mysteries! Sorina (an illusion worker) discovers her illusions are being murdered...which is odd because they don't, um, exist. So I totally adored that like genre-mash-up, if you will, of magic + murder mystery + circus shenanigans.

+ But the actual BEST THING EVER? The characters.
I can't even. I adored them all. Sorina was amazing! She's an illusionist, adopted by the proprietor of the carnival, and she is mega powerful. I mean, she MAKES PEOPLE and they function like real people. And they're also her family...so the emphasis on family love here was so amazing. I also think Sorina is bisexual (?) and has anxiety/panic attacks, so like just excuse me I'm overflowing with appreciation here.

And let us not forget the truest cinnamon scone, Luca. Whom I ADORE. And he's ace!! This is so rare to read about and I'm so happy!! I love how snarky and vain Luca was. He's a gossip worker and TOTALLY full of himself and wears terribly fantastic vests. Everything about him is excellent and devious. Plus their relationship is so so well done. I rooted for them so bad. But like here is to complex characters who feel so real.

+ THE WRITING IS THAT GOOD, OK.
It is just that good at all times. Sensory and emotional and beautiful.

+ Did I have small doubts? Well yes. But they are very very small.
It is a pet peeve of mine when disabilities are turned into superpowers. Sorina has no eyes, but she can see perfectly fine. There's actually a plot twist behind this as well, which I appreciated, so I don't think it was done disrespectfully at all! It didn't hinder my enjoyment, BUT it is a trope I don't personally enjoy. I also got confused that Sorina gets really tired making up some illusions, but her people illusions are constant and she like CAN'T keep them away? Maybe I just missed the explanation for that lmao. I want to reread like right now. That is a normal solution right.

ALL IN ALL: If you are looking for a deliciously wicked story of magic, mystery, and mayhem...this is for you. I'm totally in LOVE with the setting and I'm craving kettle corn right now so thanks for that. And Sorina and Luca totally and absolutely won my heart. <3

(Now I'm just freaking out waiting for Ace of Shades. AHHHHH.)

5-star

epic-fantasy

read-2017

317 reviews 114k followers

Edited August 13, 2018

4.5 stars!!!! I REALLY REALLY LOVED THIS BOOK.
Daughter of the Burning City is a really fabulous debut full of magic, murder, and mystery. It's absolutely a high-suspense "whodunnit" that kept me enthralled from page one.

I was most fascinated by the concept of the story; a girl without eyes who creates illusions that are being killed off? IM SOLD. I also really loved the setting. I think I was expecting the carnival to play more of a role than just the setting, but it wasn't as significant, though I'm not complaining. Gomorrah is more of a travelling city of magicians, thieves, and sex workers as opposed to what we would consider "performers." If anything, I think the interpretation of a "dark carnival" was executed very well - just don't go into the story expecting a magical story of circus performers. I personally liked the actual content more than my expectations.

I really fell in love with each of the characters. I think Sorrina is a very down to earth protagonists. She's hellbent on finding the person killing her family, worrisome in regards to her father's expectations for her future, and coping with her own insecurities of being "a freak." She's a real teen girl who just wants to find love and be with her family, though they are palpable figments of her imagination.

Luca is my newest book boyfriend. I think his character strikes an interesting balance between the stereotypical arrogant bad boy love interest with a dark past, and an actually compassionate individual. He's witty, he's aloof, he's adorable. It's easy to fall for his character and I NEEEEEEED more about him and Sorrina in the future (please give me a sequel, Amanda).

I also didn't realize how much I loved each of Sorrina's family members until they began getting killed off. They somehow snuck their way into my heart and it's painful to think of how small it's gotten from the beginning of the story. Even though they are "not real", they feel real and you begin to feel for them as you would for any "real" character.

The one issue I had with this book that made me dock half a star was the magic system. I understand it's a debut and I also recognize that I could actually just be misinterpreting the issues I have, but I think Sorrina's form of jynx-magic was just way too complicated. Sometimes I thought I had identified a plothole within her own brand of magic, it felt like there were a lot of exceptions to the rules established, and it just seemed as if there were too many different ways her magic could manifest as compared to other types of jynx-magic (I also recognize she is the first illusion-worker in like centuries, so that's a valid factor as well!) Essentially, I think it may have just been OVER-developed? It really wasn't that intrusive to my reading experience though, because I enjoyed this read so much. (But I still just do not understand how this girl sees without eyes, man.)

Additionally, there was definitely some obvious rep for diverse sexualities in this book which I really enjoyed! The labels we use today are not used in this world, but it's absolutely not heteronormative and does not contain virtually any homophobia. I'm pulling from this review for this but it's suggested that our main character is bisexual, her sister is a lesbian, and our love interest is somewhere on the ace spectrum (demisexuality seems to best fit his descriptions in text, but don't quote me). I obviously cannot speak for the rep, we will have to wait for reviewers with more knowledge to comment, but I was glad to see this novel was fairly inclusive and made efforts to display these sexual orientations as compared to other books.

I have to say I really really loved Daughter of the Burning City more than I had anticipated. 70 pages left in the novel and I was legitimately unable to read because I was so consumed with finding out who the killer is. It's definitely a page turner full of unique magic, dark secrets, and exciting mystery. I would definitely recommend to all my fantasy lovers, and I even think non-fantasy lovers would enjoy because of how subtle the magic is woven into the world. Daughter of the Burning City comes out on July 25th, so be sure to get yourself a copy from your local bookstore/library!

I received a copy of this book from Harlequin Teen at Book Expo 2017. I had no obligation to review this book and all opinions are my own.

1,260 reviews 72.2k followers

Edited July 25, 2017

Bravo! Well done! Seriously, I can't think of a more unique book in the Young Adult sphere that has felt so relevant in quite some time. How can a fantasy be relevant you ask? Well, this particular story, while clearly a fantasy set in another time and place was completely allegorical to our world today. I was blown away by so many aspects that I think I'll list below the things I loved most about this book, then you can be the judge of whether it may be the right read for you as well.

It's lack of major cliches - It was SO refreshing to find a book geared toward the young adult/new adult age range that didn't contain all of the tired, outlandish cliches that most novels in the genre feature so prominently. There are no nauseating love triangles, no sparkly white, beautiful, and unaware lead females, and this certainly isn't erotica being touted as a "fantasy". No, this story was complex, well thought, and equal parts subtle and exciting. I felt the lack of all the cheap tactics that so many books push ended up making me connect early on with the story and stay invested throughout.

The romance isn't the plot focus - Again, it was incredibly invigorating picking up a fantasy that had an intriguing and mysterious plot that wasn't overshadowed by instalove. There is a budding romance that takes place, but it is by no means the main focus and it also contains a deeper meaning and purpose to the overall story, which I found incredibly genius.

The writing was to be savored - You could catagorize the first half of the book as a slow burn; the author found a fantastic way of including the proper world building without forcing an info dump on the reader. There was a subtle, slow build in the beginning which intrigued me and made me want to read further to find out just how everything would play out. Props to Foody for producing a story that was creative and original while including aspects of mythology and the Bible (with her own spin) to weave together a reading experience so unique I'm hard pressed to find another like it.

The characters are diverse in a natural way - I won't harp on this, but I'm always pleased to find a plethora of diverse characters in a book and there are more than enough here to keep the pickiest reader satisfied.

There are illustrations included throughout the book - So my ARC didn't include the actual illustrations, but from the pages that describe what the final copies would feature, I think you'll be blown away. Personally I'm going to find a finished copy so that I can see what they look like because that just adds an entirely new layer of awesome to these illusions that Sorina created.

The cover is purple - Purple=Gorgeous!

So there you have it folks! I don't know about you, but that's more than enough reasons in my book to give a novel a try. I think we'll be seeing a lot more from Ms. Foody in the near future; she has another book coming out in 2018 and I already have my eyes peeled for it. If you enjoy young adult fantasy that is plot driven with light romance and spectacular world building, pick this one up. I think readers of magical carnivals will be more than pleased with this novel, and this is the type of book that can be enjoyed by all ages, as it doesn't really have that cheesy teen feel that so many young adult novels tend to harbor today.

*Many thanks to the publisher for my copy; it was a pleasure to provide my honest thoughts here!

from-publisher

netgalley

1,354 reviews 4,510 followers

Edited April 4, 2018

"The smoke is part of Gomorrah's legend: once upon a time, we were burned to the ground. But we did not die. Instead we kept burning, kept moving, kept growing. The smoke surrounds us, even if we no longer burn."

I am such a sucker for books that offer up synopsis phrases like "traveling circus city" and "carnival of debauchery". Like, SIGN ME UP PLEASE? When I first added this one to my TBR several months ago, literally, all I could think was "I AM SO PUMPED" (and also "please don't be another Caraval").

PLOT ➳➳
Gomorrah is more than just a traveling circus; it is a city, full of over 10,000 citizens, bustling with markets and families, sins of every variety, and at its core, a Freak Show, run by the proprietor's daughter. Sorina is a jynx-worker, but more than that, her abilities are special: she can create illusions of people, complete with their own thoughts, feelings, and actions. These illusions are her family, and life is as grand as it could be for an eyeless "freak" like Sorina - until a mysterious assassin begins picking off her family members, one by one.

CHARACTERS ➳➳
I loved Sorina as a narrator. Though she's only sixteen, she's definitely an old soul, and she is fiercely protective of her family. I loved the idea of her having been born with no eyes (she describes herself in one chapter as having nothing but a plain expanse of skin between her nose and hairline) - that was a character design I hadn't seen before.

Luca, the love interest, is pretty entertaining as well. He's such an immensely flawed character, with his arrogance and general rudeness, but somehow, it works? I just found myself kind of laughing at a lot of the shade he threw. I enjoyed the fact that Sorina put him in his place whenever she could, and that she acknowledged liking him despite his flaws rather than for them. (Plus, no insta-love! *choirs sing*)

There are a lot of minor characters as well, like her family/illusions, her father/the proprietor, and a handful here and there who we get to learn a bit about. Most of them feel like pretty fleshed-out individuals, and I loved how each one of them had their own flair to their designs and personalities (like Tree's beast-like behavior, Hawk's bravery despite her youth, or Villiam's need to dress fancy as hell for everything).

WHAT I LIKED ➳➳
The setting is fantastic! Gomorrah is a city brimming with magic and it shows in the smoke and smells of burning that have never faded since the attempts to burn it to the ground many years in the past. There are endless references of a religious nature that kept reminding me of the old Bible story of Sodom and Gomorrah, plus a handful of them made some pretty strong points regarding our own modern world:

"It's not fair that the Up-Mountainers get to storm our Festival and then call us the criminals. They get drunk, and they buy drugs, and they pay for all sorts of sins and call us the sinners for giving them the business they want."

I will say, if you're a religious person, you may find offense in some parts of the book, because there's a distinct "us versus them" mentality between the citizens of Gomorrah and the religious people of the Up-Mountains.

I also loved the mystery shrouding the murders of Sorina's family members, and while I had a feeling I knew who the killer would be, I didn't quite expect it to go the way that it did in the end.

WHAT I DISLIKED ➳➳
I think my only real complaint was with Sorina - she references herself more than once as "The Girl Who Sees Without Eyes", but I never really understood why she could see while being eyeless. She chalks it up to her jynx-work, but it was almost like one of those things where it was written off as "because I said so", if you know what I mean.

FINAL VERDICT ➳➳
I had so much fun reading this book! I loved the representation in it: there's a tremendously diverse cast of characters, plus one of Sorina's illusions/sisters is a lesbian, and one character is very openly demisexual. I felt like all of the rep was done really well and never felt like a prop or "checking off the diversity boxes" to me.

I would totally recommend this book to anyone who enjoys YA fantasy stories, especially those revolving around a carnival setting! I can't wait to read more from Amanda Foody in the future.

Thank you so much to Harlequin Teen and Edelweiss for providing me with this ARC! All opinions expressed here are entirely my own.

You can also find this review on my blog!

fantasy

mystery-thriller

owned-e

1,266 reviews 22.5k followers

Edited February 9, 2018

I NEED TO SCREAM FROM THE ROOFTOPS THAT I DON'T KNOW HOW TO FEEL ABOUT THIS BOOK AND THIS IS THE CLOSEST I CAN GET TO "SCREAMING" OR "ROOFTOPS" WITHOUT ENTERING THE HORRIBLE WINTER AIR OUTSIDE OR GREATLY STARTLING MY ROOMMATE.

There's a lot to unpack here, in terms of my emotions. Not in terms of the book - that would be way too close to your actual purpose in reading this am I right???

Emotion number one on this book was EXCITEMENT because CIRCUS BOOK CIRCUS BOOK CIRCUS BOOK. I added this book to my TBR a full MONTH before release date which...is now just sounding like a normal thing to do but seemed like a big deal for me at the time.

But then...this wasn't very circusy at all??? Maybe festivaly. But more MURDER and DARKNESS and BLOOD and CONFUSION than anything else.

You know. That classic dark high fantasy stuff.

This book was full on bonkers. So props for that I guess?? I kind of want my fantasy to be completely bananas? At least then it's creative. But also this book was soooo confuuuuusing and there was so much world-building that it felt sloppy and just. Ugh.

To try to wrap up a massively complicated world and story into a cute lil package with a neat lil bow: Sorina is an illusionist who creates, like, people-illusions? She makes family member illusions with actual personalities, who you can see and touch and all that.

Which is cool, but also the most complicated confusing thing I've ever heard in my life.

This only becomes more insane when you hear what the plot of the book is: ONE OF THE ILLUSIONS GETS MURDERED. WHAAAAAT? They're illusions! How do you murder an illusion? If you want to punch your brain into submission for 384 pages in order to find out, this is the book for you.

I, for one, didn't love that plotline. Especially because I thought the way the murder was handled by the characters and the story was UBER WEIRD. And not like the ride sharing service my guy!!!!

Honestly I admire the author's strength in attempting to fit this much info into a standalone under 400 pages……...especially because my reading challenge & TBR LOVED it thanks……...but this was a looooot.

To get down to brass tacks I'm just not sure I liked reading it. Or that I disliked it.

Here are some parts that I like:
- bisexual protagonist/asexual demiromantic love interest/lesbian side character (+ general diversity all around)
- this is like the most creative thing of all time, even more creative than my 2009 short story about the people from the song Don't Stop Believing going to Candyland
- impressive setting
- a whiff of a circus concept, as if someone spoke the words "acrobats, elephants, popcorn, big top tent" in another room while this book was being written

And here are some parts that I don't:
- the main plotline
- the ending
- the twist
- a bunch of the characters

Murdery magical circus high fantasy sounded SO IDEAL and then...look what happened. It broke everywhere.

~~And broke my heart right alongside it.~~

WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE.

Bottom line: This book was the weirdest thing ever. Which I thought would be more definitively A Good Thing than it was, but...at least it wasn't definitively bad.

3-stars

couldn-t-wait-to-read

dark

604 reviews 3,774 followers

Edited June 1, 2018

I WOULD DIE FOR MY DEMIROMANTIC ASEXUAL SON LUCA VON RASKE WHOMST I LOVE

"The smoke is part of Gomorrah's legend: once upon a time, we were burned to the ground. But we did not die. Instead we kept burning, kept moving, kept growing. The smoke surrounds us, even if we no longer burn."

MAGIC? check
MYSTERY? yes
MURDER? got it

BASICALLY ALL THE GOOD STUFF IN ONE. Daughter of the Burning City was a book I was supposed to read last year and didn't get to and I'm soo glad I did now because it's dark and delicious and has such good characters and atmosphere.

Daughter of the Burning City follows Sorina - a "jynx-worker" who can create illusions that look like people. When one of her illusions is murdered, she needs to work out both who the killer is, and how they killed her illusions.

The mystery of this book absolutely compelled me to finish it. I became so invested in who the killer is, especially because this book contains sketches of the killers plan on how they want to kill each illusion - it's super creepy and I LOVED IT. The ultimate killer reveal is also done REALLY WELL and I was sooo confused on who to trust and what was going on which is, honestly, ideal.

But what I really ended up becoming invested in is the characters and, surprisingly, the romance! Sorina and Luca, the central characters, are both so interesting in their own regards and I was super into their romance. It was genuinely SO GOOD TO GET SOME OWNVOICES DEMIROMANTIC ASEXUAL REPRESENTATION and I personally thought it was well done. The main character is also bi and while I think that representation could have been made more obvious it wasn't bad rep.

Okay, I was so fucking invested in the romance like, I was so into this ship and usually that DOES NOT happen.

I also liked that the author fleshed out the side characters, especially Sorina's family of illusions, because it definitely made the stakes feel higher and I really didn't want them to get murdered.

Finally, the diversity really was excellently done. Beside the main characters sexualities as mentioned above, there is also a side lesbian character, and the main character is physically disabled (she has no eyes) I feel like there is some more I forgot to mark down, so sorry if true and I'll add more if I remember it.

"But you're an illusion," I say. "I created you."
"That doesn't mean I'm not real."

Overall I really liked this! I had to take the rating down because the side poplitical plot didn't interest me at all, and I do think a section dragged a bit, but generally I really liked this and I ADORED THE ROMANCE WTF IT WAS SO GOOD. I'm outta here to think about my kids and cry

2018-reads

bi-mc

fantasy

561 reviews 529 followers

Edited February 4, 2019

IT IS FINALLY DONE!

This is without a doubt a mind boggling experience, but honestly I really enjoyed this story and how different this was! It was unlike anything I've previously read. Four stars for Daughter of the Burning City

The basis of the story is that we follow the main character Sorina and her "freak show". This is set in the magical Gomorrah festival. Sorina isn't an everyday character and she creates different illusions to represent her family. Throughout the book we get to see a lot of illustrations of her family which was 100% an added bonus. A member of her family is murdered, so it's her job to find out what exactly is going on!

When we first meet Sorina I was a bit taken aback, Sorina has no eyes... YET SHE'S ABLE TO SEE?! This really threw me off. I wasn't instantly drawn to Sorina, but as the story continued I found her so much more likeable and there's a lot to her character. She was one of th most intriguing characters I've come across in a while!

LUCA IS SO SWEET! Lucas work is very different... I'll just leave it at that. He tells reallllly bad jokes, but I like it!

What I liked?
- Seriously, I was continually trying to figure out what was happening, trying to piece things together and constantly trying to think of theories.
- It was so ODD but like I said, it made it sooooo unique.
- The use of Sorinas illusions were so clever.
- Honestly the last 100 pages were SO gripping!
- The twists were so good, I didn't even realise until it was actually happening!

What I didn't like?
- I feel like something are left un-answered so I'm not really dealing with this right now!
- I wanted to know more about her other illusions, we got to know some of them but not

all of them.

Overall I did really enjoy this, just a few things that for me personally let it down, there were some really smart things in here, and I loved the last few chapters!

If you like circuses, constantly questioning things and like to try and solve things this book is for you :)

I ALSO GUESSED CORRECTLY!

2017-reads

4-stars

book-subscritpions

133 reviews 4,903 followers

Edited January 11, 2019

I've seen reviews giving this book 1,2, 3, 4, and 5 stars so I waited a while before finally picking this book up. The book starts off pretty slow and continues at that pace till about the 17th Chapter, which is a lot considering the book only has a total of 26 chapters. But even though the plot doesn't really move forward for a large portion of the book it allows us room to see more of Gomorrah and learn more about it's struggles as a city most people refer to as a festival of sin.

Sorina, our 16 year old protagonist, is an Illusion Worker who has created her own family from her own imagination and jynx powers. In this book, her illusions are being killed, which should not be possible because they are illusions and supposedly not real. Sorina believes they are being targeted for a specific reason she intends to find out with the help of a gossip worker, a boy who seemingly can't die, Luca. As Sorina navigates the city she calls home, she realizes that she didn't truly know the nature of Gomorrah and maybe she was an outsider all along...

This book was a pleasant read, but you definitely need to be patient to see where the story takes us. I figured out most of the twist in the story as most of it was pretty clearly laid out for us and you only need to connect the dots to figure it out, but there were one or two instances where I was slightly taken by surprise. Overall I enjoyed the book and I rate it 4 stars.

fantasy-read

399 reviews 1,830 followers

Edited January 12, 2021