1st book in the Foul Lady Fortune series
It’s 1931 in Shanghai, and the stage is set for a new decade of intrigue.Four years ago, Rosalind Lang was brought back from the brink of death, but the strange experiment that saved her also stopped her from sleeping and aging—and allows her to heal from any wound. In short, Rosalind cannot die. Now, desperate for redemption from her traitorous past, she uses her abilities as an assassin for her country.Code Fortune.But when the Japanese Imperial Army begins its invasion march, Rosalind’s mission pivots. A series of murders is causing unrest in Shanghai, and the Japanese are under suspicion. Rosalind’s new orders are to infiltrate foreign society and identify the culprits behind the terror plot before more of her people are killed.To reduce suspicion, however, she must pose as the wife of another Nationalist spy, Orion Hong, and though Rosalind finds Orion’s cavalier attitude and playboy demeanor infuriating, she is willing to work with him for the greater good. But Orion has an agenda of his own, and Rosalind has secrets that she wants to keep buried. As they both attempt to unravel the conspiracy, the two spies soon find that there are deeper and more horrifying layers to this mystery than they ever imagined.
CW: Violence, murder, blood, war, injury details
Rating
Review
It took me quite some time to read this book, but in the end, I was engrossed in it.
In this new series, we follow Rosalind, a character present in the previous series. As it’s not a new character, returning to this world is more manageable, even if the political side of the story and the city are different. As the action happens four years after the last series, we have a ton of snippets of what happened between the two books, either about Rosalind or the world as a ton has changed. We discover a new Rosalind who works as Lady Fortune, even if she prefers to be called Fortune, and her speciality is poisoning. For her, she is an entirely different person from the teenager we encountered in the previous duology. After her fever, she is reborn as a woman who is unafraid of anything and feels vengeful. With her, we have Orion, her exact opposite, where she is serious and has a tendency to love being alone; he is a social butterfly who knows how to play his charms. They strangely complete each other, even if she is exasperated most of the time by him.
This book is politically heavy. Sometimes, I struggled to follow everything; I was re-reading some parts between the betrayal, the attack, and who did what. Even if it was a slow book, it was compelling and an excellent base for the second book. As always, we have revelations upon revelations near the end, and every time, I was surprised. Can we talk about the epilogue? I couldn’t believe it, but at the same time, it makes so much sense.
I will wait a little to read the second book, but it will be one of my first books to be read next year.
(I still think that Juliette and Roma are not dead)
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