As the reviews for this book rolled in, I got more and more worried and the authors behavior became enough for me to notice, which is saying something. Still, I was going to read it since I had an ARC and I rarely DNF ARCs since I feel it is in good faith that I was given a copy. Well, I DNF’d an ARC. The issues that other reviews list are all there, and I am not posting this review on GRs as there are other voices already speaking to the issues who are more qualified than me to speak on these issues. In conclusion, this is not an author I will seek out again.

I was extremely excited to read this ADULT SFF but was sadly very disappointed by the writing style which was off putting and did not immerse
the reader into this world. Aside from that, the story was a mess and felt like the author took on more that they could do. I'm not even going to get into the use of Asian culture to set this world...would nor recommend

My overall take away? Not good. Just...not good.

Granted I was only able to get through the first about 15% of the book and most of that was skimming after the first rather explosive first chapter. There's just so much going on that I knew when seeing a pronunciation guide at the beginning along with random sects mashed together without much explanation that it was gonna be A Lot.

The only reason I'm not giving this a one star review is because the metaphors, while long winded and sometimes not making sense, were somewhat well written. There are good paragraphs in here. It's clear that the author knows something about writing prose but I was so confused at the names and the concepts being thrown at me without any explanation that any good writing got overshadowed by that.

I'll admit that I've seen the other reviews and they weren't wrong. This is a book trying too hard and it trying hard isn't much good. I don't recommend it and I would say to save your money to spend on a good sci-fi/fantasy space opera, because I do love that genre but I just couldn't do it with this one.

Ellor absolutely captivated me with this story! I couldn't put it down. I loved everything about it! It 100% lived up to my expectations!

I want to preface this review by saying I was truly excited about this book when I requested it on Netgalley, and even though I’ve seen some of the reviews that have been posted since, I gave Silk Fire a fair shot. I read the book in its entirety, and I formed my own opinion on it. Unfortunately, after reading it, I am inclined to agree with a lot of other readers, as I didn’t enjoy reading this book at all.

Silk Fire is set in a matriarchal society, in a planet-sized city called Jadzia. The protagonist, Koré, is a courtesan and his life revolves around intrigue, and politics and is consumed by his desire for revenge. As he stumbles into an ancient tomb, thought to be lost for ages, he is bestowed with the power of a dragon - sacred beings that haven’t been seen in thousands of years. He is now grappling not only with power in charge of the city, but his own, as he becomes a wanted man, hunted for a power he can’t yet control. The stakes are high, and the consequences are many if Koré’s secret is found out by the wrong people.

To start off, the writing style wasn’t my favorite. There was way too much info dumping in the first third of the book or so, and while we were given so much information, I was still missing pieces. Now, it’s not that I am simply unable to read adult fantasy, it’s that the logistics of this world are not properly developed. I am sure the author had a clear picture in his head - there are too many details for it to be accidental, but I didn’t really feel like the world was real. This is a world that at the same time has dinosaurs, dragons, hovercrafts (that are pulled by the dinosaurs), and otherwise magic. The feeling of this book is that it’s doing too much, and there is simply no time to establish every aspect in a substantial way.

The whole concept of the essence that is so precious and sought after, that makes or breaks a person in the society, while fascinating, is lackluster in execution. I really liked the idea of it, the concept is really fascinating, but the way it was explained was just leaving me with more questions than answers. Even the lost district that Koré stumbles into, where he gets his powers, which has supposedly been lost for however many years - was right there. I’m finding it hard to believe it was so hidden and lost, and yet so easy to stumble into. Also, the power Koré gets is only explained as much, and I usually wouldn’t have minded this, but with how little substantial world-building there is, it felt like just another thing to add to the list of frustrations. And don’t get me wrong, there are certainly books with convoluted plots, where you know next to nothing and it works, but this was not one of them. Those books either have outstanding prose, characters, or dialogue and more balanced pacing to make it work.

The characters felt two-dimensional, and for all the book tried to convince me, I couldn’t find them interesting. The dialogues seemed forced and unrealistic, and I didn’t enjoy them at all. Everyone has approximately one personality trait, and that’s it! Koré’s internal monologue consists entirely of self-loathing, and it gets tiring pretty fast. I do absolutely understand what the author was going for, but him calling himself a monster can only be read as something new a certain amount of times before driving me insane. My favorite character of the book was Ria, as she had the most well-rounded personality, and therefore was the most interesting and loveable character. She was the most multi-faceted person of this novel, as she had both good and bad moments, she was a bit messy but all in all a pretty good character. However, some of Koré’s internal monologue regarding her was not my favorite - given that he was just as messy, if not more, he passed a whole lot of judgment.

The pacing of the book was uneven - we were given a million facts every two sentences, and a lot of scenes felt rushed, so while most of the book was extremely fast-paced I still had the impression that the book was dragging and taking forever. We find out things alongside our main character, Koré, but it doesn’t feel organic - it feels like Koré infodumps on us everything he knows, and then other people, conveniently infodump a bunch of things to him. Even the dialogues, and the intrigue was lacking. Koré is supposedly trying to help politically undermine his father, but he does so in a way that makes zero sense. At the very beginning, he is trying to get close to this very powerful woman, and he does so at a function - by just walking up to her and offering political help, even though he has no experience in the matter. So, this leaves me pretty confused - politics and intrigue usually mean some more diplomacy, some more scheming, more convoluted plots, and less just going up to the person and straight up offering to help. Even outside of politics, the dialogue felt so on the nose, and not even the banter made it feel better.

Lastly, I wanted to touch on the language, and subsequently how sex workers, and the matriarchy were portrayed here. It was not established in which way Jadzia is connected to the real world, if it’s our same world set in the future, or if it’s the Earth’s population moved to a different planet tens of thousands of years into the future. And I mention this, as a lot of modern terms for sexuality were used, such as queer and lesbian, and no link to how those words came to be in that world was established. In one instance, characters would say something akin to Tolkien’s characters (by which I mean something you would expect in your average epic fantasy), and the next moment they’d sound like someone you would meet in a 21st-century club. Sex workers (Koré in particular) are being thrown every insult under the sun their way, approximately every six seconds. Koré was referred to as ‘whore’ and ‘slut’ every other sentence. And while I understand the point this was making is how marginalized sex workers under oppressive regimes can be, it felt like overkill, very fast.

The matriarchal society presented here was, at best, not imaginative enough. And at worst, the book comes off as misogynistic. The way it’s written is perhaps not lazy, but without nuance. It is quite literally just genderbent patriarchy, but with a lot of loopholes. What I mean by this is, I don’t personally think a matriarchy would in every instance be universally beneficial to everyone. But I also don’t think that turning women into villains, but then also basing the whole system off of values of patriarchy shows much nuance. I think the book fails to explore what a real matriarchy could be, both good and bad. You can fully choose to write about a corrupt government, but this does not get your point across. It put men in a subordinate position but it is exactly the same as patriarchy - women strong, go to war, men weak, take care of children. But it fails to understand why in patriarchal societies gender roles are such, and who benefits from them. In this instance, women are still the ones birthing children, and I’m failing to see who’s benefiting from the gender roles here. There was also an instance where a trans woman was told she chose to transition so she could escape the subordinate position of a man (to be fair, this is not said by any of the main characters, and is considered offensive in the book - I just think it illustrated how harmful this narrative is). And if we look closely, there are many men in high positions, such as Koré’s father. It seems as tho the system is debilitatingly oppressive, but only until it’s not. Men are not forced to sit at home, they can still solicit courtesans - which I think is much more freedom than women would have in such strict patriarchy. There are many more reviews that talk about this with more nuance, so I would suggest looking through them if you want more details!

While I really enjoyed the concept of this book - a bisexual courtesan fighting the system stacked against him, with a side of polyamorous romance, the book didn’t deliver what I was hoping it would. I had many more notes on this book, delving into detail, but since there have been so many detailed reviews, I felt it might be redundant. I have struggled writing this review, and postponed posting it, simply because I didn’t want to bash this book just for the sense of doing it, and I fully tried to find some good aspects, but this book simply has not worked for me in any way.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with an arc in exchange for an honest review!

Look. Its complicated. The world is huge, and even though there are huge infodumps it doesn't always have enough context. It falls heavily into misogynous tropes, but because it is a matriarchal setting, its men who are at the bottom of the rung.
That said, if you like a backstabby, political, family drama thats 9 layers deep and the twists keep on coming this will certainly fit the bill.

#SilkFire #NetGalley

I will unfortunately not be finishing my copy of this title due to reading about certain problematic aspects that this book contains. Thank you for the opportunity though! I appreciate it!

Tw for lesbophobia,
This book was not for me personally, and the author has been outwardly disrespectful to reviewers who have a poor opinion of their book. Regardless of what I thought, now they don't deserve any positive recognition or praise. You don't abuse the people who basically do your advertising for free.

I was looking forward to this book but I felt that the plot lines were disjointed and messy. The characters actions made the story feel jumpy and I find myself rereading certain parts and its not like Kushiel's Dart (K.D.) where its coming together as a political chess piece. Side note i do admit to being salty about the whole "Bi's being hoes stereotype" mainly cuz I was looking for more KD but with Dragons however I felt some of the sex scenes felt unnecessary to the plot

1.5 stars

I hate leaving bad reviews but this was just not good. It took me fooooorever to finish and I have no idea what I read. Nothing made sense and it just felt incomplete. This will be my last book by the author.

This book was a lot! A lot to take in and understand and remember, which I think hampered my enjoyment some, but there were still things I enjoyed about it. It was difficult at first, but I got more into the book as it went on.

There was lots of world-building*, lots of politics, lots of fantasy cities and concepts and words, lots of very long names full of k's and z's and x's. (*Maybe I should say it was less "world-building" and more just "world" since some things weren't very explained.) There was magic and dragons and dinosaurs and necromancers. It was a hard book to get a handle on at first. I listen to ebooks with a screenreader/TTS, and I will admit that probably made it even harder. (Unfortunately the audiobook isn't available to request from my library, or I would've waited once I realized.) I hate to make a big deal out of names, because what if there are real cultures out there with names like this? But this book isn't about an actual culture, which means they didn't need to be like this, and I have never struggled with names before the way I did with these. Eventually I was able to remember all the most important characters, but there were some I lost track of. Others I'm not even sure if they were names or honorifics. And sometimes you'd get something like, "Akizeke Shikishashir Dzaxashige," (that's a real example, I didn't make that up) and it just became white noise in my head. Even with my eyes, I would've just skimmed over a name 29 letters long.

But after rereading some sections and getting more used to all the names and words and fantasy elements, I started to struggle less and understand more. I don't know that I fully understood everything, but I understood enough to generally get what was happening in the plot.

Speaking of the plot, as I mentioned, there was A LOT of politics. I guess I thought there wouldn't be quite this much and that there would be more romance. But this book is very much about the politics as Kore tries to make alliances and sway people in power to one candidate's side in order to make sure his father doesn't get the position of leadership. There are lots of twists and turns and betrayals and secrets revealed. The author clearly put a lot of thought, detail, and complexity into the plot, which I can appreciate! It's just a book you really need to pay attention to.

The matriarchal society aspect of the book wasn't exactly nuanced, it was basically just sexism, misogyny, and gender roles swapped, and more extreme because of the brutal fantasy world. But it did highlight how pervasive, ridiculous, and arbitrary the misogyny and gender roles we have in real life are.

There were so many terrible people. And, to be fair, a lot of the characters in this book were people of power, and, in real life, many people with power are terrible. But still, it felt sort of overwhelming, so be prepared for that.

There were some good, kind, compassionate characters too though! Kore had a hard time trusting people and believing they actually cared about him, and he was willing to do almost anything for revenge on his father, so that led him to do some unkind things sometimes. But I felt more for Kore the more I learned about his past. It made sense why he was the way he was, why he closed himself off, why he felt broken. And I liked the growth he had over the book. Faziz could also do things that hurt people, but he did so because he cared so much about the less fortunate in the city who needed him, and he would do anything to help them. Ria may have struggled with drinking and losing focus, but she was understanding, loyal, and willing to risk her life to do what was right.

Rather than a triad, this was a polyamorous romance, one character with two partners who both just wanted him to be happy. I felt the romance more between Kore and Faziz. Ria was good for him, but Kore and Faziz had chemistry, a spark, that Kore and Ria just didn't.

The characters talked pretty to each other. The kind of pretty that's not realistic but is nice to read, romantic and swoonworthy. Things like, "I know who you are. The same stardust birthed both our souls. Nothing you do can hurt me, not in any way that lasts. You're all the healing I need."

Overall, I am struggling to choose a rating for this book. There were a lot of good things here---the thought and imagination put into the world, the complexity of the plot, some pretty writing, Kore's character growth---and I want to give the author credit for that, but I feel like I was so overwhelmed in trying to keep up with the world and names and politics and plot that it left little room for me to focus on and connect with the characters and relationships, which is what I crave most in books. Still, if it sounds good to you, and especially if you read about a lot of complex fantasy worlds and are used to that sort of thing, you may enjoy it even more!

Unfortunately, I could not get into this book. It felt a bit all over the place, almost like it had no set direction. I had to DNF half way through. I appreciate the early copy though

Unfortunately, I am not able to promote Silk Fire on my platforms in good conscience, given some of its problematic content. Specifically, the orientalist themes that are found in much of the book have led me to determine that it is not something I want to share with my followers. Thank you for selecting me as a reviewer for Silk Fire, and I look forward to reviewing future titles.

This book is a lot of things but good is not one of them. This is not a dystopian/fantasy book is an "i hate women" book that is the main theme of book because is not the first time the author did the same thing, the writing style did not flow well, and I had a hard time keeping track of what was happening. I was confused all the time and many characters that it is literally impossible to keep them all straight one of the worst books of 2022

It's disappointing when you want to love something but it doesn't work out that way. Unfortunately this is the case for Silk Fire. From the stilted dialogue to the over burdened worldbuilding, I could not grasp enough of the characters or the setting to love it. There are many detailed reviews I've seen since finishing the book, many well articulated with constructive criticism. So rather than regurgitate, I'll leave it here.

This book was many things but good wasn't one of them. That was not at wall what I was expecting. DNF at 25%. The book was all over the place. Unfortunately it wasn't for me. Maybe the next one will be better.

I've never DNF'd a NetGalley book before. Unfortunately, Silk Fire will be my first. I stopped reading at 6% because I did not enjoy the author's writing style at all. It did not flow well, and I had a hard time keeping track of what was going on. Some of the concepts did seem interesting, but there was a lack of focus, even in just the first couple of chapters. So much happened so quickly before I had even figured out who everyone was, and it just left my head spinning. I read a lot of adult fantasy, and the writing was just not up to par with other books in the genre.

I DNF'd this originally as I was struggling to get past the 30 page mark but I was going tro come back and try again... However I've seen a lot of controversy regarding this author so I'm just going to put it down and not attempt again.

Sad, as I was excited for the poly plot but ... nope. :(

When fantasy and sci fi work well together I love it and this book done exactly that. A slight slow burner but once you’re in it, you’re in it. Strong writing and characters. The second half of the book very strong and is what made me enjoy this one even more than initially thought.

i have dnfd this book pretty early on and that combined with the other reviews i've read havinig the same issue has convinced me to not pick this book up again and try to continue reading. so yh