Fairyloot Adult #37: February 2025
For a very, very brief moment, I considered skipping my February Fairyloot box – just like the one from Illumicrate. The theme of the month sounded interesting and the guesses about what the book might be didn’t sound bad either, but I didn’t exactly feel all that excited either. But because I was so madly in love with the January Fairyloot edition and because – I reasoned – I would already be getting one less book box this month, I decided to let it come anyway. Would I regret it or not?
The theme for February was Divinity’s Descent for a book full of political intrigue, magical trials, demons and immortals.
This book was The Scorpion and the Night Blossom, a first book in a new duology by author Amélie Wen Zhao.
Nine years ago, the war between the Kingdom of Night and the Kingdom of Rivers tore Àn’yīng’s family apart, leaving her mother barely alive and a baby sister to fend for. Now the mortal realm is falling into eternal night, and mó—beautiful, ravenous demons—roam the land, feasting on the flesh of humans and drinking their souls.
Àn’yīng is no longer a helpless child, though. Armed with her crescent blades and trained in the ancient art of practitioning, she has decided to enter the Immortality Trials, which are open to any mortal who can survive the journey to the immortal realm. Those who complete the Trials are granted a pill of eternal life—the one thing Àn’yīng knows can heal her dying mother. But to attain the prize, she must survive the competition.
Death is common in the Trials. Yet oddly, Àn’yīng finds that someone is helping her stay alive. A rival contestant. Powerful and handsome, Yù’chén is as secretive about his past as he is about his motives for protecting Àn’yīng.
The longer she survives the Trials, the clearer it becomes that all is not right in the immortal realm. To save her mother and herself, Àn’yīng will need to figure out whether she can truly trust the stranger she’s falling for or if he’s the most dangerous player of all . . . for herself and for all the realms.
This was indeed the book that was predicted for this box and like I said, it doesn’t sound bad, but also a bit like the many other books that are still unread on my bookshelf, lol.
From this author I got Song of Silver, Flame Like Night in my Illumicrate subscription, which was such a beautiful edition that I also bought the sequel from Illumicrate without sampling the first book. In the meantime, I still haven’t read this duology, so the fact that I would now have three books from the same author, without knowing if she would suit me, was another reason why I briefly considered skipping this box.
But yes, FOMO struck again, especially because the Fairyloot editions are getting better and better in quality and I know that I would be very disappointed if I skipped a gem. So there is still work to be done on my resolution to learn to resist FOMO.
And yes, based on the cover I’m not immediately convinced that I made the right choice. Not that I don’t like it, on the contrary. The artwork is by the same artist as for the standard cover, DongQiu (@diamonster09), which can be seen through a few recurring elements. It’s mostly the choice of colours for the Fairyloot version that I don’t like as much, because I find it a bit monotonous. The original cover has so much more depth because of the choice of colours, which makes the Fairyloot version look a bit dull and safe.
On the back of the cover we get another alternative cover, by illustrator Yingting (@cyt_draws). The style looks quite cartoon/manga-like, which makes it look a bit young in my opinion. It’s a nice illustration, but it doesn’t immediately blow me away or evoke any emotions (like this one from last month, lol)
The hardcover design also doesn’t do much for me. I don’t know if I’ve become desensitized to it or overly critical, but while I can see that the individual elements are beautifully done by Kelly Chong (@afterblossom_art), I find the combination of everything a bit chaotic and busy. There’s just way too much going on, especially the repetition of the purple flowers feels like she was a bit overenthousiastic in the duplication of Photoshop layers? It even took me a long time to notice the scorpion in the middle of the cover, precisely because there’s way too much going on.
I can’t complain about the coherence of the different parts of the book. The sprayed illustration on the book block comes directly from the cover, which makes it all fit together nicely.
The illustrations on the endpapers are also by Kelly Chong (@afterblossom_art), and since I’m not immediately drawn to them either, I think the artist’s style just isn’t for me. She’s definitely a talented person, but I’m not a big fan of the characters’ faces. It’s weird and I can’t explain why. And I’m clearly in the minority in thinking this, because online enthusiasm for this issue is so high.
Maybe I just jinxed myself to be less enthusiastic and I’m now a bit overly negative about this book, but in the end this just feels like an okay edition to me, that doesn’t immediately invite me to dive into the book itself. Lesson learned to trust that first gut feeling more!
Cheers,
Charlotte
