There were things I liked about this book (the fashion! the sombre realities of colonialism!) but they were largely outweighed by clunky writing that’s simultaneously too verbose and too brief. Not to malign youth, but I upon reaching the author bio and seeing that Gong is currently a student at UPenn I definitely had a moment of “ah, yes, makes sense.” These Violent Delights is not, as I initially thought, a retelling of Romeo and Juliet in 1920s Shanghai. It’s obviously not not that (all the characters make an […]
Delight in Violence for sure, but not entirely the book I was looking for
These Violent Delights by Chloe Gong