Month: April 2022

Grass for His Pillow

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Grass for His Pillow
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, Book # 2
Riverhead Books
August 11th 2003
Paperback
344
English
February 2, 2022 February 6, 2022
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Praised for its epic scope and descriptive detail, Across the Nightingale Floor, the first book in the Tales of the Otori series, was an international bestseller and critical success, named by the London Times as "the most compelling novel to have been published this year." With Grass for His Pillow, Book Two, we return to the medieval Japan of Lian Hearn's creation—a land of harsh beauty and deceptive appearances.In a complex social hierarchy, amid dissembling clans and fractured allegiances, there is no place for passionate young love. The orphan Takeo has been condemned to work as an assassin—an enforced occupation that his father sacrificed his own life to escape. Meanwhile, Takeo’s beloved Shirakawa Kaede, heir to the Murayama and alone in the world, must find a way to unify the domain she has inherited, as she fights off the advances of would-be suitors and hopes against fading hope that Takeo will return to her...

About the book

Second book in the Otori Saga series. Here, we find Takeo and Kaede divided after their night together. He followed the Tribe and is hidden for a while because he was wanted by Arai. She returns to her feud, meets her grown-up sisters together with her father and tries to establish her dominion over her lands. But she is a woman, she cannot rule for her husband. And she isn’t married or maybe she is? To hide Takeo’s pregnancy, she claims that she is Shigeru’s wife and that immediately after the wedding he was killed.

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Unravel the Dusk

LauraLeave a Comment on Unravel the Dusk
Unravel the Dusk
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, Book # 2
Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers
July 7th 2020
Hardcover
355
English
January 28, 2022 February 1, 2022
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Maia Tamarin’s journey to sew the dresses of the sun, the moon and the stars has taken a grievous toll. She returns to a kingdom on the brink of war. The boy she loves is gone, and she is forced to don the dress of the sun and assume the place of the emperor’s bride-to-be to keep the peace.

But the war raging around Maia is nothing compared to the battle within. Ever since she was touched by the demon Bandur, she has been changing . . . glancing in the mirror to see her own eyes glowing red, losing control of her magic, her body, her mind. It’s only a matter of time before Maia loses herself completely, but she will stop at nothing to find Edan, protect her family, and bring lasting peace to her country.

YA fantasy readers will love the sizzling forbidden romance, mystery, and intrigue of Unravel the Dusk

About the book

Short review this time, too.

I liked this second book less than the first. I understood the ending way before the actual finale even if I didn’t have idea who would become the emperor.

I liked the story between Edan and Maia, I liked how Maia is described and what she does. Even if I liked the first book more, I recommend this series. I didn’t find anything that I disliked, I just find it a little bit slow in the beginning and the middle and too fast the ending.

Anyway, I liked the world built by the author and the characters, too.

And, here, too, I like the second cover more than the first, the one with the palace.