WARNING: Do not read this review if you love this book because I know I'm very much in the minority with how I felt about it. Don't @ me if you love this book and still read this review because I have a lot of feelings lol.

This book made me so angry. That was my first reaction when I finished the book. I just sat there and seethed because what in the ever-loving bloated, pretentious, purple prose that said nothing at all did I just read? If this wasn't a book that someone lent to me, I would have set it on fire. (Not really because book burning is bad, but I might have considered flinging it out a window!)

I truly could not really tell you very much about what this book was about. I got the general jist - two enemies from opposite sides of some sort of war writing letters to each other and falling in love, but that was...about as far as I got. I couldn't tell you anything about this war or why it was happening, the setting/world-building, the way that things work in this setting, what the characters were really like, or tbh, why they even fell in love. It seemed like one of the characters suddenly decided she was in love with the other one and it just went from there. There was no believable development or buildup to it at all. I didn't care about either of the characters in any way because the authors never gave me a path to care about them. Basically, I have nothing I can really write about in review because the authors gave me nothing except for pretty words that barely made sense.

This book basically just ran on vibes rather than anything solid and I feel like the authors should have just written a poem if that's what they wanted to do rather than put this out as a story, because it barely felt like a finished novel. The last...maybe 25% of the book got a little better (which isn't saying much given how I felt about the whole thing) just because stuff actually was happening rather than just vibes. tbf, all that stuff was still written in the most pretentious way possible, but at least something happened.

As I'm writing this review, I think that maybe this book made me this angry because of how pretentious it felt. It felt like the authors were flaunting how clever and lyrical their writing was rather than focusing on writing a readable or engaging book. Clearly, most people do not agree with me on this, given the largely high ratings this book has, but I really do not get the hype at all. Overall, I was mostly confused, bored, and so ready for it to be over.

Another fun entry in the Noodle Shop Mystery books! I really enjoyed that this mystery included the various characters in Lana's life so much more, since Megan, Kimmy, and Adam were much more present in helping to solve the mystery (and they weren't as present in the book before this one). I especially loved Megan and Lana's friendship with each other and the way that they clearly feel so comfortable with each other. And of course, Adam and Lana are adorable together. Protective boyfriends are catnip for me in books! However, once again, I would like to humbly request more sister scenes with Lana and her older sister in the next book.

Like the other books in the series, this was a pretty quick read in terms of the plot, but it was still enjoyable. I was really sus of a couple of the characters early on, and I feel like the author did a pretty good job with the red herring. And I actually read this book so quickly that I didn't spoil myself and look up the ending midway through, which is an accomplishment for me! While I found the motivation for the murder to be a bit weak and sort of silly, the mystery itself was interesting and kept me engaged (I love mysteries having to do with authors, for some reason), which is really all I can ask for in a cozy mystery novel.

On on a side note - at this point, I'm pretty sure that pretty much every single store in this plaza has been involved in a murder. They're driving up the murder rate in Ohio to 300% all on their own!

See my Noodle Shop Mystery series reviews:

Death by Dumpling (#1) | here Dim Sum of All Fears (#2) | here Murder Lo Mein (#3) | here Wonton Terror (#4) | here Egg Drop Dead (#5) | here Killer Kung Pao (#6) | here Fatal Fried Rice (#7) | here Hot and Sour Suspects (#8) | here Misfortune Cookie (#9) | here Peking Duck and Cover (#10) | here The Chow Maniac (#11) | here Crime Rangoon (#12) | here Five Spice Fatality (#13) | coming soon