Forest of a Thousand Lanterns (Rise of the Empress #1) by Julie C. Dao - Restarting January 13th 2022

[Alaina]

An East Asian fantasy reimagining of The Evil Queen legend about one peasant girl's quest to become Empress--and the darkness she must unleash to achieve her destiny.

Eighteen-year-old Xifeng is beautiful. The stars say she is destined for greatness, that she is meant to be Empress of Feng Lu. But only if she embraces the darkness within her. Growing up as a peasant in a forgotten village on the edge of the map, Xifeng longs to fulfill the destiny promised to her by her cruel aunt, the witch Guma, who has read the cards and seen glimmers of Xifeng's majestic future. But is the price of the throne too high?

Because in order to achieve greatness, she must spurn the young man who loves her and exploit the callous magic that runs through her veins--sorcery fueled by eating the hearts of the recently killed. For the god who has sent her on this journey will not be satisfied until his power is absolute.

[Amaryllis]

Will start tomorrow :)

[Amaryllis]

8% in (view spoiler)[ I wonder why Xifeng has hallucinations and what she's talking about - what beast is there in her? Guma seems pretty cruel. And what/who is The Serpent King? (hide spoiler)]

[Amaryllis]

12% in (view spoiler)[I'm wondering if Guma really lets Xifeng go, just like that? And Wei doesn't seem all that thoughtfull, and his plans..well. Not sure if he really has thought them through. (hide spoiler)]

[Amaryllis]

20% in (view spoiler)[I wonder who the queen of the tengaru is? And who sent them to help Xifeng and the others? And who's the monk who watched Xifeng? What's happening to her face? (hide spoiler)]

[Lane]

Chapter 9 (view spoiler)[ When a man's body gets graphically cut clean in half you know that a book has just turned completely up out of nowhere. What is even happening?! (hide spoiler)]
Chapter 23 (view spoiler)[ This is like a better Young Elites. Xifeng is so manipulative! But I'm excited to see how she dethrones Lady Swan. 100 lashes is CRAZINESS. (hide spoiler)]
Chapter 31 (view spoiler)[ Xifeng narrowly missed being on the Empress's bad side knowing about the birthday present. But the Emperor seems a little tooooo interested in her. (hide spoiler)]
Finished (view spoiler)[ Well she just went full villain. Can't believe she wanted to be loved by the Empress so badly and then just cruelly sent her daughter away. I kind of want Jade to come after her when she's older. (hide spoiler)]

[Lane]

Marya wrote: "8% in [spoilers removed]"

(view spoiler)[ Guma is the actual worst. (hide spoiler)]

[Abi]

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Restarting November 5th 2018

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[Nicole]

Chapter 2

(view spoiler)[Okay, so I didn't read the synopsis for this book when I started the first chapter, but now I have and I feel like I've been spoiled. This is why I never read summaries anymore! But apparently Xifeng will eventually become the Evil Queen?
I'm not sure how I feel about any of the characters yet. I don't like Ning, the grandmother(?) is a typical, brash old lady, and Xifeng is described as so beautiful that men give her pomegranates (which I'm assuming are expensive even today but I've never actually bought one). I guess now they're going to read some cards… we'll see what they say! (hide spoiler)]

[Nicole]

Chapter 20

(view spoiler)[Xifeng is finally at the palace. I'm at the point where she just met the Empress and is starting her everyday activities as a servant. I'm starting to see Xifeng's evil intentions with how she started trying to manipulate the Empress into seeing her as a daughter figure-- though I'm not sure if Xifeng realizes that she's becoming evil or not yet. (hide spoiler)]

[Nicole]

Chapter 30

(view spoiler)[I'm surprised that Wei came back to Xifeng-- not because I thought he didn't love her anymore, but because I thought Xifeng was destined to fall in love with the Emperor since she's supposedly going to become the Empress. I'm wondering now if their relationship will actually work out in the end because she already had to reject Wei once.
Is the Empress going to die, or will Lady Sun go first? The back of the book says there's a lot of blood and gore in this book, but I haven't read anything about that so far. I'm guessing it'll happen soon, though. (hide spoiler)]

[Nicole]

Finished

(view spoiler)[By the end of the story, Xifeng has become the rightful(?) Empress after a very unfortunate sequence of deaths. It seems too easy that Lady Sun and Lady Meng were killed-- but the whole point of Xifeng's prophecy was that she had to succeed the throne. And the current Empress even died! I can't believe she was the only one who wasn't stabbed to death, but now that I think about it, every death in this book was intentional. Keng was responsible for two of those deaths, if I'm remembering correctly. That whole book was shocking! (hide spoiler)]

[Anna 'Bookbuyer']

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Date changed. Restarting July 7th 2020. Happy Reading ☺

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[Missie ☆]

Today is the day! I can't wait to get into this!! :)

[Dee Dee]

Neither can I!

[Dee Dee]

Just finished Ch 2. A very intriguing start. I wonder what (view spoiler)[her aunt is hiding, if anything. Her cards are very thought provoking. (hide spoiler)]

[Missie ☆]

Just started, and WOW! Guma sort of freaks me out

[Dee Dee]

Yh she's definitely hiding something

[Dee Dee]

Ch 8 (view spoiler)[I wonder what her 'vision' in the mirror means...and poor Wei has no clue what he got himself into lol<\spoiler> (hide spoiler)]

[Missie ☆]

Ch 23- Wow, once I started I couldn't stop! (view spoiler)[Lowkey love Xifeng, though I can see how her character may not be loved by others. She's a struggling person trying to figure out who she is, and she relies on the promise of a good future, even though she is often told that her future isn't set in stone, and the good fortune she is promised may not come to her. She strives for that future anyway, and I find it very admirable. Though she is afraid of the darkness that may take hold in her, she is willing to risk it anyway.
I can't wait to learn more about this darkness, though! It's sort of still a mystery and I can't wait to uncover it!
I loveeee court and how Xifeng is smart and wicked. Often I find myself reading about beautiful characters who don't have much substance up there, and only use their beauty as a weapon. But Xifeng uses her beauty and her cunning mind, though I'm not entirely sure if she realizes that her mind is a great weapon. She commonly only thinks of her beauty in that way. (hide spoiler)]
So far I am loving this read, and can't wait to read more!

[Dee Dee]

Oh my. I'mma have to do some sprints to catch up to you!

[Dee Dee]

Ch 22 - I really like the Empress in this bit. (view spoiler)[Xifeng played her cards right by showing her kindness where Lady Sun clamoured for power. I wonder how the Empress goes out in order for Xifeng to take over...<\spoiler> (hide spoiler)]

[Dee Dee]

Ch 31 - What do those nightmares/visions mean?! I'm so curious!!! (view spoiler)[I haaaaate Lady Sun with the fire of a thousand lanterns!!!!<\spoiler> (hide spoiler)]

[Dee Dee]

Missie I see what you mean about not being able to stop once you get to a certain point. I've finished it and following a villain's story is a very intriguing idea to me. I'm definitely interested in continuing this series but I can't find where I could fit it in this momrh at all. Which makes me sad.

[Missie ☆]

Finished- Wow, why am I somewhat satisfied with that ending?!

[Missie ☆]

Dee Dee wrote: "Missie I see what you mean about not being able to stop once you get to a certain point. I've finished it and following a villain's story is a very intriguing idea to me. I'm definitely interested ..."

I know right! I actually really enjoyed it, and you don't see many more books like that. And awww, well if you ever get to reading the second book I'd love to read it with you!

[Dee Dee]

I'll definitely let you know ☺️

[Melanie]

Chapter 6

Sorry everyone! My computer has been glitching out this week so I wasn't able to post but I wrote all of my chapter updates as I was going so I'll guess I'll just post them all at once haha

(view spoiler)[ At this point I am not really loving Xifeng's character and I am not really into the story yet. I am really glad that Xifeng left Guma though. (hide spoiler)]

[Melanie]

Missie✨ wrote: "Ch 23- Wow, once I started I couldn't stop! Lowkey love Xifeng, though I can see how her character may not be loved by others. She's a struggling person trying to figure out who she is, and she rel..."

I also started liking this story more when they reached court!

[Melanie]

Chapter 32

(view spoiler)[ I HATE LADY SUN SO MUCH!! (hide spoiler)]

[Missie ☆]

Melanie wrote: "Missie✨ wrote: "Ch 23- Wow, once I started I couldn't stop! Lowkey love Xifeng, though I can see how her character may not be loved by others. She's a struggling person trying to figure out who she..."

It's no problem at all! I'm so glad you are enjoying the book so far!! And I felt like we got to see a lot more of her character when she reached court.

[Melanie]

Finished

(view spoiler)[ I was also somewhat satisfied with that ending. The Great Forest being lite with the thousand lanterns felt like a full-circle moment for me haha (hide spoiler)]

[Dee Dee]

It really was a full circle moment.

[Jenn]

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Date changed. Restarting January 13th 2022. Happy Reading ☺

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[Lindsay]

I'm super excited for this one! Do we want to have a chapter schedule?

[Lindsay]

Schedules work well for me so here is the one I will be following :) I put lighter page expectations on the days I would be busier.

Jan 13: Chapters 1-10
Jan 14: Chapters 11-27
Jan 15: Chapters 28-33
Jan 16: Chapters 34-42

[akacya ❦]

Hey sorry just saw these comments! I just started a little bit ago, have you started?

[akacya ❦]

Chapter 5
(view spoiler)[I’m really glad she’s escaped from Guma. (hide spoiler)]

[akacya ❦]

Chapter 16
(view spoiler)[Whoa, Wei is getting a bit scary… (hide spoiler)]

[akacya ❦]

Chapter 28
(view spoiler)[I think Xifeng and Wei needed that time apart…Though their relationship still isn’t perfect, it seems a little better than before. (hide spoiler)]

[akacya ❦]

Done
(view spoiler)[Ahhh omg that was so good…her rise to power was so interesting to read about and I’m excited to see what she does now that she is Empress. The ending made it really clear that she did actually did love Wei, which makes me feel kinda bad for what could’ve been there. (hide spoiler)]