Zenith Skibidi (Zenith)

First ever review let's hope it goes well 🔥🔥 SPOILER-FREE I was strolling through my library and my eye caught onto Emiko Jean's "Empress of All Seasons." Once I checked it out, I read the entire book in under twelve hours. Empress of All Seasons is well crafted and simply, yet beautifully written story... with it's coherent plot slowly becoming incoherent as it's storyline is blemished by the rushed writing in the climax and everything after. WRITING — Emiko Jean writes very simple. Empress of All Seasons is a story that can easily be comprehend. The pacing was nice and steady, and then quickened a bit. Near the climax, the pacing of the story quickened a bit too much. The climax was more like a stone wall slamming itself in your face of anything, which is truly a shame, because all the events prior to it were AMAZING. WORLDBUILDING — The worldbuilding is nicely done. It gives you insight on Japanese culture and mythology. The story is beautifully crafted. The Imperial Japan vibes + yōkai blend together well. The addition of Japanese mythology really adds onto the book's "fantasy-ish" aesthetic. CHARACTERS — The characters were all uniquely written. However, they were not that consistent in their desires, motives, etc. Especially near the end of the story. Some characters should have been fleshed out much more. Even the main character, Mari, has some inconsistencies in her traits. However, the characters are not terrible. In fact, the cast is quite enjoyable. My favorite character is Akira. He stayed the most in-character throughout the story. It's truly a shame that Empress of All Seasons, a book with an initially great plot, was tainted by it's hasty writing near the end. But it's still not a bad book, by all means. You should give it a try if you'd like to read a bit about Japanese culture and mythology! Empress of All Seasons gets a 3/5. I'm Zenith; thanks for reading my review! Zenith out.