general

• quick summary - while investigating a series of murders, eighteen-year-old palace nurse (uinyeo) hyeon navigates royal and political intrigue and becomes entangled with a young police inspector.
• key themes - political intrigue, mystery, loyalty, familial relationships, classism.
• fav character - lady hyegyeong— I wish I knew more about her motivations, secrets and fears (and what she thought of the conclusion of the story).

interests

• what i found interesting - the dark and tense atmospheric tone of the book is amazing. the research on joseon dynasty that was put in the making of the story is obvious. I thought that hyeon's behaviour was very much like what you expect from a teen, and I believe it was very realistic how the fear of her own relationship ending up like her parents was portrayed. nurse inyeong's relationship with her mother and everything that happened around it was heartbreaking, and I wished it had been explored more.
• what i learned - while I already had an understanding of joseon dynasty and its social dynamics, it was fascinating to learn about the royals and their troubles, as well as about the existence of uinyeos.
• fav quote - "yet the ordinary, i realized, became like cherished treasure when taken (...)"

books it reminded me of

• the girl who fell beneath the sea - while one is a historical book and the other a fantasy one, the ya tone and the setting reminded me of each other. nevertheless, I think that oh's book was better overall.

rating

• 3.75/5 - I wish I had been the editor of this book because the idea is so good but some things took me out of the story lol firstly, the setting and the mystery plot are great, and I think the book deserved to be longer so we could delve even deeper into the history that is behind it. the writing was often too ya for me too. I often felt that things flowed way too easily for the sake of the plot—how come so many side characters told hyeon exactly what she needed when she needed it without any trouble? why did the author use "gossip" multiple times to make characters know certain information? I was really into the mystery until halfway through the story, and then everything felt too easy to be believable. also, I wish we had known more about eojin; he was the love interest and it seemed like the reader had no insight into how he was. if I had read this ten years ago, I would have absolutely loved it, but maybe I am too old for the genre now.