Fairyloot Adult #29: July 2024
My July Fairyloot was delivered at the end of July, just before I left on vacation, so I couldn’t unpack the book until much later. This was a bit of a bummer when I finally got to take a closer look at the book in my box.
The theme for July was Living Legends and would feature a fantasy retelling with secret identities and a forbidden romance.
This book was The Night Ends with Fire by K.X. Song.
The Three Kingdoms are at war, but Meilin’s father refuses to answer the imperial draft. Trapped by his opium addiction, he plans to sell Meilin for her dowry. But when Meilin discovers her husband-to-be is another violent, ill-tempered man, she realizes that nothing will change for her unless she takes matters into her own hands.
The very next day, she disguises herself as a boy and enlists in her father’s place.
In the army, Meilin’s relentless hard work brings her recognition, friendship—and a growing closeness with Sky, a prince turned training partner. But has she simply exchanged one prison for another? As her kingdom barrels toward destruction, Meilin begins to have visions of a sea dragon spirit that offers her true power and freedom, but with a deadly price.
With the future of the Three Kingdoms hanging in the balance, Meilin will need to decide whom to trust—Sky, who inspires her loyalty and love; the sea dragon spirit, who has his own murky agenda; or an infuriating enemy prince who makes her question everything she once knew—about her kingdom and about her own heart.
This sounds like a lot of fun and immediately reminds me of the Disney movie, which seems cute and cool, but hopefully the author did a bit more with the story!
The Fairyloot edition comes with a completely new cover illustration by @kuri_huang and @micaelaalcainodesign. Considering the title, I thought it was strange at first that the cover was completely in cool tones, but with the mention of a sea dragon, I’m assuming this depiction will be more fitting with the story.
On the other side of the dust jacket we find the original cover illustration, but in a different colour scheme.
Although here again the blue probably suits the sea dragon better, I do like the original colour scheme a bit better, because the dragon stands out more with its green-blue colour in an orange-yellow background.
The book block is decorated on all three sides with a digital illustration, matching the newly designed cover.
Underneath the dust jacket we find a hardcover in a colour matching more with the title of the book. A very nice flaming effect on a linen-feeling cover. The board is also decorated with gold foil and this is the part that really annoys me, because in my case the design is not centred at all, on any side, which gives the whole thing a very crooked impression. And although I think the design is very beautiful, I cannot unsee the skewed printing. And because I was only able to look at the book properly more than ten days after receiving it, I could not really complain to Fairyloot. Really a pity…
Anyway, luckily my sulkyness was calmed when I saw the endpapers. What breathtakingly beautiful illustrations by @carissa_s_art! Really super beautiful and impressive. The characters jump off the pages. And then they also come with gold foil accents. Wow, I am really impressed.
The book also comes with bonus content and a letter from the author with a digital signature.
Another extremely well thought out Fairyloot edition, which unfortunately lost some of its shine due to the sloppy execution. In itself it is not a disaster, it remains a beautiful edition, but the perfectionist in me still has a bit of a hard time with it, lol.
Anyway, I especially hope that the content can convince me if I ever get around to reading this!
Cheers,
Charlotte
