Exploring 'Six Crimson Cranes': A #FantasySeries Journey

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hey, book lovers, Welcome back to shelf Addiction, the podcast
where we dive deep into the pages of thriller and
fantasy reads. I'm your host, Tamara, and today we are
discussing the first book in our new duology, The Ya
Fantasy Six Crimson Cranes. But first, quick heads up. If
you crave the full visual experience and want to ditch
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(00:24):
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Want even more bookish banter, join our community on the
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us a review wherever you are listening. Speaking of community,

(00:44):
I'm thrilled to welcome back my fantasy series Besty and
co host Casey from Heart full of Ink. Welcome back, Casey, Yay.

Speaker 2 (00:51):
I'm so excited to be here.

Speaker 1 (00:53):
Yes, are you excited to talk about today's book? I
am actually okay.

Speaker 2 (00:59):
Yeah, I know you aren't, but I am.

Speaker 1 (01:03):
Well, I don't know, and we'll see how it goes.
You can find links for both of us below in
the show notes. So go ahead and click around do
all the things follow us. We appreciate you for doing that.
So before we get started, I just want to remind you,
as always that with book chats we talk full spoilers here,
so spoiler alert you've been warned. Today we are discussing

(01:26):
six Crimson Cranes, written by Elizabeth Limb. The audiobook is
narrated by Emily wu Zeller. Published July sixth, twenty twenty one,
by NOF and Listening Library. The hardcover is four hundred
and fifty six pages. The unabridged audio is twelve hours
and fifty four minutes. Casey, would you kindly read the synopsis?

Speaker 2 (01:45):
I'll read both because there's two of them.

Speaker 1 (01:47):
Oh okay, yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
So on the hardcover there's a short little synopsis that
says a princess in exile, a shape shifting dragon, six
enchanted cranes, and an uns speakable curse. It will take
more than magic to find their way home. Now, let's
see if I can read the long one just as well. Okay,

(02:08):
shori Ama, the only princess of Kata?

Speaker 1 (02:12):
Was that how you pronounced it? You know? I don't know.

Speaker 2 (02:17):
Kaita Shoriyama, the only.

Speaker 1 (02:21):
Kyota. There's no oh in it oh Kyota. Hey I
a t a Kyota. I think that's how at the
narrator pronounced it okay. I think girl don't know anyway.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
Shoriy Ama, the only Princess of Kyota, has a secret.
Forbidden magic runs through her veins. Normally, she conceals it well,
but on the morning of her betrothal ceremony, Shorey loses control.
At first, her mistake seems like a stroke of luck,
forestalling the wedding she never wanted, but it also catches

(02:55):
the attention of Rokyama, her stepmother. A sorcerer in her
own right. Rakiyama vanishes the young princess, turning her brothers
into cranes. She warns Shory that she must speak of
it to no one, for with every word that escapes
her lips, one of her brothers will die penniless, voiceless,

(03:17):
and alone. Shory searches for her brothers uncovers a dark
conspiracy to seize the throne. Only Shory can set the
kingdom to rights, but to do so, she must place
her trust in a paper bird, a mercurial dragon, and
the very boy. She fought so hard not to marry,
and she must embrace the magic she's been taught all
of her life to foreswear, no matter the cost.

Speaker 1 (03:40):
Okay, well those are two very different. I wonder why
they went with the short one on the hardcover. I
don't know, it's just like right there on the blurb,
it's yeah interesting. Okay, So as we do high level,
what'd you think about this book?

Speaker 2 (04:00):
It was very cute, m but I almost wish it
was like a middle grade rather than young adult, like
it gave off middle grade middle grade vibes. It did
give off middle grade You're right about that. It felt
very young, like she felt way younger than seventeen.

Speaker 1 (04:20):
Yeah, it felt like in my mind, I was like
visualizing almost a cartoon, just like how the cover art
is like very cartoonish, very whimsical, very I mean to me,
it felt like I was reading a fairy tale.

Speaker 2 (04:38):
Oh absolutely, Like it was really cute, very mythology fairy
tale es, like it was giving off all the cute vibes.

Speaker 1 (04:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (04:49):
But like, so she was seventeen, which means her oldest
brother's probably close to thirty mm hm, and he wasn't
married didn't have his own kids, Like, none of her
brothers were married. I was like, I kind of wish
this thing they were. I wish your brothers were younger.

Speaker 1 (05:06):
All of the brothers or the princes, they all seemed
kind of juvenile. Everyone seemed juvenile. Yes, yeah, I don't know.
It was very young feeling, and it did. The author
had like one major thing in this book that I
couldn't quite figure out. So at first I thought, well, well,

(05:28):
I guess I should say I couldn't figure out why
she didn't do the curse appropriately, Like she made this
curse and it didn't really follow through on anything, which
annoyed me. M hm. So I'm like, okay, that's the
youth of it. That's kids, you know, you don't want
to But then there's a scene where sure he is
getting like tortured. So I'm like, well, I don't quite

(05:52):
grasp why she did have some consequences for her making noises.
You know, she had lots of lots of like at
least two warnings in this book and then that loud
yell of like I don't know, three distinct words, yeah,
and there was no consequence. Yeah, So that bothered me,
like because this whole book is like rooted in the

(06:15):
curveset was given to her. Absolutely, yes, so that was
my biggest hang up. I'm like, you gotta be kidding me. No,
it was.

Speaker 2 (06:24):
Too sweet of a book, if that makes sense, Like
only the bad guys died. Only the bad guys got
their come up, and one of the brothers probably should
have died, if not three of them because she spoke
out loud. And even then at the end when she
was talking to her stepmother about it, which plot twist,

(06:46):
the stepmother was good after all. Her stepmother was like, yeah, no,
the dragon heart promise said like, it would have killed
your brothers if you'd spoken. So that was again annoying
because You're right, she spoke those three words, so three
of her brothers should have died immediately.

Speaker 1 (07:05):
Yeah, because in that scene, so the bull on her
head cracked after she said the words. Yep, So to me,
the bull should have cracked first, then she kiss beak
the words and not injure her brother or kill her brothers.
But that was not right, And I'm like, well, m hm,
stick to your own rules, ma'am.

Speaker 2 (07:26):
Yes, seriously, that was Yeah, that bothered me too.

Speaker 1 (07:32):
Yeah, so I think and you know, to me, I
found so again it was fine, it was cute, it
was light, but I found everyone kind of dull at
the same time. I just the brothers were kind of bland.
The brothers all felt the same. Yeah, I couldn't tell

(07:52):
them apart. Really. I actually had to have Gemini. AI
helped me out with the name of the brothers so
I can remember. I said, hey, just tell me the characters,
and it made a list for me. I said, thank
you so much, because I don't remember half these names,
Like I just remember like Soto, I think who's has

(08:15):
I don't know.

Speaker 2 (08:16):
I know it was the oldest.

Speaker 1 (08:18):
He was the second.

Speaker 2 (08:20):
Then there was Rashi or Raji somebody yea than the twins.
Then Hot Show was last.

Speaker 1 (08:29):
Yeah. And I think those are the ones that she
she had, like I think actual relationship on the page
with like three of the brothers. It seemed like, you know,
she talked to them more. Yeah, and the other ones
were kind of just there around. Well.

Speaker 2 (08:45):
The older two were again like probably mid twenties at least,
if not pushing thirty. Yeah, because I hope their mother
did not push out seven kids in seven years, like
I hope they spaced them out a little bit.

Speaker 1 (09:01):
I don't know. I mean, it's not what they were
doing back in the day. They were trying to push
out babies back to back, like as soon as you
can start a getting pregnant again, that's what you did, probably,
but I.

Speaker 2 (09:13):
Hope for her sake they spaced it out just a little.

Speaker 1 (09:16):
Yeah, because this felt also back in time to me.

Speaker 2 (09:21):
Oh yeah, they're definitely historical fantasy.

Speaker 1 (09:23):
Yeah, and even though so, I guess that kind of
leads to my second thing. It's like, I feel like
the world building it was fine, Like I felt whimsical,
I felt the dragon, I felt the markets, I felt
like all of that was fine. But me, I guess
I was using context clues to say, oh, this is
back in time because there were no you know, newer things.

(09:47):
But it just felt.

Speaker 2 (09:50):
She could have done a lot more with the world building.
And Yeah, when I talked to my authors about this,
I talk about like the upside down triangle where you
want the broad overview first and then arrow down into
the tiny detail points.

Speaker 1 (10:03):
She flipped it.

Speaker 2 (10:04):
She just did the tiny detail points but never went
down to like the broad overview of the world. It
was always like in this scene she's going to explain
what you need to know for the world building right now,
like when she was in the different villages and talking
about the boats or the diner restaurant, whatever you want
to call it.

Speaker 1 (10:23):
Like it was very just in that moment kind of detailing,
which I wonder, like you mentioned earlier, is that like
the middle grade way to do things?

Speaker 2 (10:34):
I think so, I think that is definitely more of
a Again, like this felt like it was written for
really little kids. We probably can't pay attention or don't
really understand a lot of like the big world building stuff.

Speaker 1 (10:51):
Yeah, that's what it seemed like. So you know, it
was fine to take a break from what I was
reading to do something like this. But on the flip side,
I don't really see the hype like it's fine, Yeah,
it's really.

Speaker 2 (11:11):
Cute, But I enjoyed it for its cuteness because my
brain has been Swiss cheese. My brain is not working.
I recently had surgery, so like brain is gone, and
this was just like so light and fluffy, and I
didn't have to do a lot of thinking. It was
just very easy to follow along. It's like I feel

(11:32):
like I'm in a fairy tale. I feel like this
is really cute. Yeah, so I enjoyed it for what
it was, obviously like it could have been so much more.
There could have been a lot more to it, but
just for a light, fluffy, very young read.

Speaker 1 (11:51):
It was good. What was the dragon's name? I do
not remember that? Cirio? Is that right? All right? Syriu?
I think it starts maybe, Yeah, I think it's him,
I think. But my thing with Okay, so I thought
at first the author was going to have us in

(12:13):
some kind of you know.

Speaker 2 (12:16):
Love triangle, love triangle. I think that's coming in the
next book.

Speaker 1 (12:20):
Because obviously he is very jealous of the prince.

Speaker 2 (12:22):
He's very jealous of the prince, and the prince is like,
you get to go be with the.

Speaker 1 (12:26):
Dragon, and I think we should have had more time
with him on the page, the prince or the dragon
the Dragon. I'm pretty sure that's the next book. But yes,
but the prince is going to be well, no, she
left to be left. I think it's going to be
her and the dragon, so I guess flip flip the

(12:46):
situations and now she'll have time to fun over the
dragon guy. I guess. I don't know, but I kind
of wanted more of that like forward in the story
because she was like all in love with the prince
like a mediately immediately it was.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
Very fairy tale. Here's a cute boy. I mean, he's
kind of plain, but I want to look at him
and think about him and talk to him like it
was so so fairytale.

Speaker 1 (13:14):
Ya mm hmm. And like again we're kind of lacking
the details a little bit, like tell me why the
prince aka she's patrolled to him. They're supposed to get married.
Why does he like her so quick? You're telling me
some soup isn't key? That's it.

Speaker 2 (13:34):
He cannot That's the key to a man's heart, is
a good soup.

Speaker 1 (13:38):
Yeah, Because he can't see her face, she cannot speak
to him. And actually, I'm glad she was able to
speak at things. I'm like, I don't know if I
could read another book of this chick like mouthing words
and people can just understand her, most of them. Some
of them couldn't. But he seemed to understand just fine.

Speaker 2 (13:58):
Well, he thought she was the princess from the start, and.

Speaker 1 (14:03):
He kind of explained that he did.

Speaker 2 (14:05):
She did the little dance and he was like, I
noticed you do the dance and you have to same
dimple that supposed to be like fairy tale cute.

Speaker 1 (14:13):
No, he saw her stuff like so many years ago.
They were children the last time he saw her. Yes,
people look very different ten years later.

Speaker 2 (14:25):
Except your dimple is going to be the same. Okay,
I'll let it go. No, you're you're right. It was
very It's so I don't want to use the word superficial,
but it doesn't have like the adult depth were used
to in stories. This is very much to sixteen seventeen

(14:47):
year old kids going, hmmm, you're cute.

Speaker 1 (14:50):
I like you.

Speaker 2 (14:51):
I think I'm in love forever and always.

Speaker 1 (14:53):
The sheltered sixteen and seventeen year olds, because this wouldn't
have been enough for me as sixteen or so.

Speaker 2 (15:01):
There are and princesses.

Speaker 1 (15:03):
You know, I don't think I was ever into princes
and princesses. I think that's why I'm not the audience.
I don't think I ever was, even in my younger state.
I never really I'm not the audience. But I wanted
something like, you know, really fantasy. This is true fantasy,
I think because we got you know, curses and dragons

(15:26):
and snakes and you know, all these different things we've
got spinning gold thread, and we've got you know, poison,
poison and bags that hide things inside and people can't see,
like all kind of magic. It felt very magical. So
that's kind of what I wanted. So I guess technically
I got what I wanted, but with my personal lens

(15:48):
on it.

Speaker 2 (15:51):
Oh yeah, no, I wish, yeah, I wish we could
find this in an adult format like this vibe, I guess,
but with more in depth world building, adults doing shit
like it would just I would give this book to

(16:11):
a twelve year old and be like, you can enjoy.

Speaker 1 (16:13):
This and make the stakes higher, more serious. But yeah,
you're right, a twelve year old would enjoy this immensely.
It's just enough cuteness, right, just a little boy crazy,
just a little bit, yeah, just a little taste of it,
like ooh, they'll be so excited to see who she
ends up with. Do I care? No, I think she

(16:37):
should end up with the Prince, though I kind of
want her to go with the Dragon. Something seems off
about him. I don't know what, Like he's the Prince
or the Dragon, Like something's not quite right, and like
there's something he's not saying to her and I knew
that that early on. I'm like, what secret is he keeping,
you know or something? Oh? Definitely mm hmm. But knowing

(16:59):
how this book when it is probably going to be
something that doesn't even matter.

Speaker 2 (17:04):
Or it'll be like, my grandfather wants me to kill you,
so now I have to pretend to try and kill you.

Speaker 1 (17:09):
Will I actually help you solve whatever? Yeah, I don't know.
She's got to get the pearl back to the original
owner or someone who can take care of it, and
that's not the dragon's grandfather or grandfather. I don't grandfather
grandfather because he wants it, but he's not the one

(17:31):
that's supposed to get it, and that's keeping him from
killing her apparently for now. For now, I wish I
could feel more excited. I really do.

Speaker 2 (17:48):
I'm actually excited to see more about the dragon world. Yeah,
I'm hoping she's going to do a lot more world
building with it, and not just kind of like pointed
out in scenes, but more because our princess here is
going to be learning about the world too, like it's
not her world. So I'm hoping there's going to be
more depth to the world building.

Speaker 1 (18:10):
I hope. So I want you to explain to me
how she's able to breathe underwater magic. I still want
an explanation. He's probably just just saying, oh, it's the pearl,
part of the pearl I gave you. It's fine, But
is it.

Speaker 2 (18:23):
In her heart anymore? I thought it was. She doesn't
have it.

Speaker 1 (18:28):
No, I think it came it's not. I don't think
it's in there anymore. But I think she put it
in the same bag or whatever with the other I
don't know. I feel like something happened. Something, something happened.
I think it was when they were trying to burn
her to death. It came out or something. I don't know.
I didn't go back to reread that scene. Now I

(18:48):
probably should have.

Speaker 2 (18:50):
Yeah, I don't remember.

Speaker 1 (18:53):
She probably she has it, but I don't know if
it's still like embedded in her.

Speaker 2 (18:57):
I don't think it's embedded. I think was taken out.
But I might have to reread this book before I
read book two, because I don't remember.

Speaker 1 (19:07):
I'm not. I'm gonna ask my buddy Jim and I
to tell me how the book ended. We'll see how
it said it says.

Speaker 2 (19:12):
I know it ended with her like leaving her brothers
and her betrothed, and she's like walking into the water.
It's like that's a good a good cliffhanger because it's
not a scary one, but it's definitely like, Okay, we're
walking into the next adventure right now.

Speaker 1 (19:28):
She holds her breath like, okay, girl, how you gonna breathe? Okay,
maybe when she gets in the water, a big bubble
will just surround her head and then like we'll have
another fake bowl on her head, but it's a bubble.

Speaker 2 (19:42):
At least people can see through a bubble.

Speaker 1 (19:44):
Yeah, I don't know. I'm very curious to see what
the author does with that, because if suddenly she can
just breathe because of magic, I'm like a twelve year old.
Give me a reason, you now say it, Give me
a little something. That's what I needed sprinkled throughout this

(20:04):
whole book, like a little bit more of everything. M m.
You know, some of the stuff was good, Like you know,
when she was on the island and she couldn't figure
out how the hell will get home? You know, the
little time she spent at the bar, I don't know,
what do you call that? Like attel slash restaurant. She's
like cooking for this lady. And okay, may I just

(20:28):
say mm hmm again, how is the print so attracted
to someone that says she smells like fish half the time.

Speaker 2 (20:36):
And her fingers are so swollen and engrossed and cut open, and.

Speaker 1 (20:42):
Yeah, because she's been trying to weave this net out
of like this material that like is like metal hands. Yeah,
so she's not cute. She got this bowl on her head,
messed up hands, smell whit fish, can't speak? What about that? Says?
Fall in love with me?

Speaker 2 (21:02):
It's the fairy tale, last of it all.

Speaker 1 (21:06):
Okay, I guess.

Speaker 2 (21:08):
To her looks, there are so many fairy tales about,
you know, the pretty princess looking ugly and the prince anyway, Like,
it's the fairy tale.

Speaker 1 (21:18):
Can't even get her personality because she can't spake. He
could do. It's just eat her soup. That's a good soup.
A you know what? I get that if if she
was able to talk or you know, there was something
that connected them. I mean, she did save his life.
Maybe it's that. Maybe he it's like, oh, you saved

(21:39):
my life.

Speaker 2 (21:40):
Well, you know, even.

Speaker 1 (21:41):
Though he sewed me up looking like a.

Speaker 2 (21:48):
She hangs out with his sister. She's nice to his sister. Yeah,
she's I don't know, helpful around the opposite of the
princess he betrothed to, who was flighty and bitchy and
ran away from him.

Speaker 1 (22:06):
What you know, I guess I'll just take it as
it is. But still, like if you just think about
it even, I mean, you don't even have to dig
deep to find this stuff. It's like right on the page.
Like some these things make her very unattractive period somebody.

Speaker 2 (22:24):
I guess her fairy tale is that he falls in
love with.

Speaker 1 (22:26):
Her anyways, I guess.

Speaker 2 (22:29):
But also he guessed that she was the princess and
was like trying to figure out and being like, oh,
I guess it is her, and maybe she is cute,
and maybe she's learning to be different than what she
used to be and all that fun stuff.

Speaker 1 (22:45):
Well, yeah, he kept trying to get her to say
who she was and where she was from. You know,
he kind of knew. He knew.

Speaker 2 (22:55):
I think when she made him the six cranes, he
figured it out, because like that was so obvious. At
least I hope that's when you figured it out.

Speaker 1 (23:04):
But that's me. That would have been another little cute
edition if he could say, I know he said it
was the dimpler cheek or whatever, but maybe if it
was something more believable, like you know what else telling
you this story or something I don't know, just a
little more, like again, a little more of everything, just

(23:25):
a little yeah, I don't need the whole story be written,
just a little more.

Speaker 2 (23:30):
There's a little more death to everything.

Speaker 1 (23:32):
Yeah. I think that was my biggest thing that keeps
me from like really enjoying it. Mm hmm. That's fair.
All right, let's take a quick break. Check out these
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We appreciate you for doing that, and we'll be right back.

(23:53):
We'll finish our discussion, we'll rate it, and I don't know,
maybe we'll have something else I don't know, come back
and find out. Welcome back, guys. Okay, Casey, did you
have any things that we should hit like, did you
make a list or anything? I did not make a list.

Speaker 2 (24:15):
But do you want to talk about all the different
villains in the book, because at first there was only
one and then all of a sudden, there's like ten
at the end, not telling me, you know, like all
of a sudden, there's so many villains, and I was like,
what is happening?

Speaker 1 (24:29):
Yeah? So okay, so the wolf was a villain.

Speaker 2 (24:33):
H the friend who used to be her maid and
was shape shifting, and she was a villain, Like she
was the obvious villain.

Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yeah, I knew something was bad about her, but I
didn't think it was a shape shifting made I didn't either.
That was a fun plot twist. I didn't expect that.
Who else? Oh yeah, but that one guy was a
villain pretty much the whole book. His cousin, yeah, the
cousin of the It's yeah, that was weird. There was

(25:04):
a lot going on there. There wasn't so much.

Speaker 2 (25:07):
Okay, so with the wolf obviously, like my brain is
Swiss cheese, I'm forgetting so many details. Did the wolf
ever come up early on in the story, Like, I
know they had kind of mentioned the battle between kingdoms,
but I don't really remember him being a villain or
talked about or anything. And then all of a sudden

(25:28):
he's there at the end, and like the main villain.

Speaker 1 (25:31):
I don't remember it, honestly, I don't remember them talking
about the wolf, and then all of a sudden, it
was like the wolf was behind everything from that beginning,
and I was like, why, Well apparently okay, So from
what I understand he is the wolf is actually like
a demon. I thought he was becoming a demon. Well,

(25:53):
I thought he was. Well, he was a sorcerer, that was.

Speaker 2 (25:57):
I killed his master at the end. That's when he
became the demon.

Speaker 1 (26:01):
Yeah, but he wanted to unleash the bad stuff, the
bad juju when people demons out of them Holy mountains, right,
holy mountains. And I guess she alreadys magic is what
he needed to do it because she had her blood.
Because there's magic in her blood, right, it's something old
that hasn't been seen in a while, or something is

(26:23):
rare or some mess y. I don't know. So what
was he gonna do? Is he gonna take her up there?
And just like there were blood all over the place.
What was I think?

Speaker 2 (26:30):
So okay, because they're at the like that final chapter,
he has a little bit of blood on his fingernails
and like that starts to build a crack or something.
It did not make sense. So for the first what
three fourths of the book, which is again most of
the book, we think her stepmother is evil. Her stepmother

(26:51):
is every villain that she has to face, Like there's
some minor antagonists around, but it's just the step mother
who's bad. And then all of a sudden it just
flips on its head.

Speaker 1 (27:04):
Yeah, And I know the author was kind of trying
to plant these seeds as Shori was kind of thinking, well,
maybe it wasn't bad. Maybe, you know, I think she's
trying to remember things. But I felt like it was
like on the nose. I'm like, it was.

Speaker 3 (27:20):
Us.

Speaker 1 (27:21):
Yeah, so obviously she's not bad. You're trying to force
us to understand she's not bad pretty quickly. M m.
But then why I still don't quite understand. So I
guess she knew the wolf was looking for the power
that she had was she displays she had the power,

(27:41):
so the stepmother puts the curse on her, trying to
protect her. Yeah, but I don't I don't understand what
the oh is that because she told the brothers she
had met told.

Speaker 2 (27:53):
The brothers and that was the only way to like
kind of protect all of them at the same time,
which again does not really think so like, how does
she know the wolf is coming? How does she know
the brothers are better suited as Craig.

Speaker 1 (28:06):
There's a loophole. There are men at night who can talk.
They're not unable to talk like Shory, so if they
could say at any time, mm hmm, what's going on
at nighttime?

Speaker 3 (28:19):
Uh huh exactly, I said. The stepmother, who was not
evil yea, Evilly told the father and all of the
guards to kill any and all cranes that came close
to the castle.

Speaker 1 (28:31):
Which is strange. Why would you do that if you're
not an evil person? It does not make sense.

Speaker 2 (28:36):
And then hire castle to sleep so they don't go
to battle.

Speaker 1 (28:39):
Yea, what And they're sleeping for a long ass time too,
like the next season, Yeah, that next freaking season. They're
just gonna sleep for months, very sleeping beauty. That is
so weird. Like, dude, so she is a villain in
my opinion.

Speaker 2 (28:56):
Oh absolutely, yeah. No, that whole time, at the very end,
I kept expecting her to like Evilly laugh, Like there
was that scene where she's like, help me give me
your powers because I'm too weak to do it. I
was like, no, don't do it. She's gonna take your powers,
and then she didn't, And then she said something else
about like meld with me or something and I was like,

(29:18):
don't do it, She's gonna be evil again, and then
she wasn't.

Speaker 1 (29:21):
I was like, okay, this is weird. It is weird.
It's giving, Like, okay, so did you ever watch Once
upon a Time?

Speaker 2 (29:30):
Oh my god, Yes, it's giving, it's giving.

Speaker 1 (29:33):
Reina like she is bad, but she wants to do
some things good, right, she wants to be good, but
she does everything the wrong way. But yes, because she's
inherently bad. Yes, She's like, this is a good thing
I'm doing, but I'm gonna do it in the baddest
way I can because I'm bad. That's how this stepmother acts,

(29:55):
like oh I'm doing yes, yes, what are you doing?
What is happening? Yeah? Yeah, No.

Speaker 2 (30:00):
I was expecting plot twist right there at the end.
I was expecting her to like steal the magic, steal this,
steal that, but instead we got this really long drawn
out villains story origin arc something I don't know. I
think we were supposed to cry, but I was just

(30:22):
way too confused.

Speaker 1 (30:23):
Crying and I'm like, what, I'm sure.

Speaker 2 (30:26):
I was crying over her stepmother and like sad, and
I was like, I think we're supposed to feel sad.

Speaker 1 (30:30):
But I don't.

Speaker 2 (30:31):
Again, it was giving like middle grade vibes. Yeah, Like
if you're twelve, thirteen, fourteen reading this book and you've
been having issues with your step mom and then you're
reading this and you're like, oh, maybe you're not a
bad person. Maybe I do love you all along, even
though you changed my memories, curse me. Did all this

(30:53):
evil stuff.

Speaker 1 (30:54):
Made me hate you? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (30:57):
Like none of it made logical sense.

Speaker 1 (31:00):
No, it didn't. And then there were like little mini
villains throughout the whole book, like the innkeepers. Right.

Speaker 2 (31:10):
Whatever she was, she was mean, but also a little
bit protective, like she wouldn't let any men touch her,
which was goods eat these scraps, you can't leave, you
can't day, I'm gonna treat you like trash. But I

(31:34):
guess because she won't let the men attack her, then
she must be good. Nah, she's I don't know good.
I'm just saying that was a good thing she was doing.
Like I'm I'm glad we didn't go because if this
was an adult book, that could have gotten very very bad.

Speaker 1 (31:50):
Yeah, I don't know. So she's every person like she's
kind of run into is kind of negative. I don't know.
Like the Prince's mom. She was a total bitch. I
did not like her at all. What is gonna happen
was she realized that was her daughter in law the
whole time. She's probably gonna be.

Speaker 2 (32:11):
Like, oh no, you're to get burned at the stake.

Speaker 1 (32:15):
Oh yo, oops, I was listening to what's her face?

Speaker 2 (32:22):
The evil bitch. She's so obviously evil and definitely poisoning
my daughter with her specialty teas.

Speaker 1 (32:28):
Yeah, she's going around poisoning people and no one can
figure out it's her, And she so obviously set her
up like that was a clear setup, like everyone, look
look what's coming out of the bag.

Speaker 2 (32:40):
Look here, everyone's.

Speaker 1 (32:42):
Like, just these adults are dumb af like you just yes, ah,
I just yeah. I don't understand why the Queen Lady
could not see that clearly something was hot mm hmm.

Speaker 2 (33:01):
And but she kept making excuses for her, like, oh,
her parents died, so obviously her personality.

Speaker 1 (33:06):
Is going to change. So I'm like, not that much.

Speaker 2 (33:08):
Uh uh you really you can't say somebody's personality changes
that much?

Speaker 1 (33:14):
No, I mean she goes from loving sweets to hating them,
hating them and yeah, it's like so obvious something is
wrong with her. You know she you know, she already
hears that this woman, this girl really loves these cakes,
monkey cakes or whatever. So she makes her these cakes

(33:34):
in the year, put it in the snow an stuff,
and she's like, what are you doing?

Speaker 2 (33:41):
And it's like this used to be your favorite and
she's like, well, I'm not a child anymore. And I'm like,
that doesn't mean you don't like sweets, right, it was
an adult does not change your taste buds like that.

Speaker 1 (33:51):
Yeah, it was very weird. It was very obvious that
something was wrong with her, but no one could see it. Yeah,
I don't know, She's not to me. That character wasn't
that good of actress, not at all. She was very
clearly a villain.

Speaker 2 (34:08):
And again, like, this is why I think this was
meant for like twelve year olds, because it's kind of
teaching that lesson of sometimes you see somebody clearly for
what they are and everybody else around you won't, and
you have to be you know, when you're twelve thirteen,
learning that lesson of like, okay, sometimes you just have

(34:30):
to deal with shitty people. Yeah, yeah, you got to
deal with shitty people. Hopefully they won't try to burn
you at stake, but like, yeah, it felt like that
kind of lesson for a young child. Whereas we're past that,
we've dealt with that, we're at that point where we
want to read the book where we see this person

(34:50):
get their come up ands right away.

Speaker 1 (34:53):
Yeah, I know. So what other villains? Did I miss something?
Did we miss any? I think that was it? Okay?
Mostly I was confused about the Wolf. I did not
remember anything about him in the first half of the book. Well,
there was that one letter, but that was mostly just
like I don't know. The battle between kingdoms, oh yeah,

(35:20):
but I don't think they mentioned the wolf in there,
and there's something else, So if okay, So if magic
is supposed to be like forbidden in the area that
Shuri is from and pretty much everywhere, but yet magic
is clearly in this world. It's not even hidden, it's
like just out in the world. That doesn't make I

(35:44):
don't know.

Speaker 2 (35:45):
I were building like.

Speaker 1 (35:47):
Your whole world is magical. You had dragons coming out
the lake. I don't understand, But yet how is I
don't know. I wish I'd had a better understanding of
why magic was forbidden. What happened that made people want
to hide I don't know, I more information that was missing. Yeah, yeah, no,

(36:11):
it was.

Speaker 2 (36:11):
It's just the lack of the world building at this point.

Speaker 1 (36:15):
It's just, Yeah, the stepmother's character could have been so
much more evolved if she, I don't know, kind of
helped her hide her magic or something instead of just
wiping her memories planting memories. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (36:33):
Honestly, that felt more evil than anything else she did,
like giving her fake memories of time with her mother cooking,
and then to be like, no, that was me all along.
You love me more than your actual mother, like that
do that?

Speaker 1 (36:51):
Yeah? Why do that? I don't understand. I mean, she
tried to seem like she couldn't get out of her
without getting memories of her mother, like that was the
trigger for she already to kind of get over losing
her mother. But then why haven't bring it up? Why
have exactly?

Speaker 2 (37:12):
But also apparently at the same time, she loved her
new stepmother from the moment she got off the boat,
because she's like, wow, you look like a pretty princess
who lived on the moon or whatever. Like it was
just so contradictory and none of it made sense.

Speaker 1 (37:28):
Half baked man half baked. That's all I gotta say so.
And I again, I always never failed, never failed. Do
I ever go with the crowd? Do I ever go
in the same directions everyone else? Rarely?

Speaker 2 (37:44):
Rarely? But I mean, okay, So if I look at
this as a middle grade book meant for twelve to
fifteen year olds, yes, this book is super cute.

Speaker 1 (37:59):
It works for them.

Speaker 2 (38:00):
There could have been more world building, but like, twelve
year olds aren't going to pay attention to that much
world building.

Speaker 1 (38:07):
And honestly, if it were served up as middle grade
as it should have been, we wouldn't be reading this.
Oh absolutely not.

Speaker 2 (38:15):
No, I thought too, ye be she's sixteen, almost seventeen.
So yeah, Now in the beginning, I do want to
say she has some of the best character growth. She
really does. Like for her character the way the author
showed her in the beginning, how flighty she was, how young,

(38:35):
annoying and bratty, Yes, spoiled, spoiled, And then she went
through all of that labor, she went through all of
those issues, she did all of that shit, and she
did come out better on the other side.

Speaker 1 (38:49):
She's hardened.

Speaker 2 (38:50):
Yes, when we read the Pirate Duology, she went through
not as much growth, even though she probably had just
as much trauma.

Speaker 1 (39:04):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 (39:05):
She went through a lot of shit but just stayed
the same. Yeah, whereas our princess here changed. And I
do want to acknowledge, like, I appreciate that. I appreciate
the character growth where you actually change and you're a
different person at the end.

Speaker 1 (39:20):
Well, I'm curious to see if the author is gonna
move forward with that or is she gonna go backwards.
I hope she may grow, because I guess in this respect,
she already has, you know, gone through a lot of
time ers. She couldn't even speak, she was abused, in tortured,

(39:41):
she almost died in fire. You know, she's she's grown
a lot through all of her trials. Yes, so she
does seem and feel much older. She's trying to like
get her first kiss with this guy, and she's like,
it's not our time. It sounds so, you know, some

(40:02):
ways it's like, oh, look at her trying to be
mature and stuff. I have to go save the world.
I can't be messing with this boy. But you know,
I don't know, so I do I agree with you
she has grown a lot as a character. But it
still feels young.

Speaker 2 (40:16):
Oh yeah, I know, it still feels very young, but
like for the growth of a seventeen year old girl. Yeah, yeah, no,
this is amazing growth. This is huge growth. This is
more than we typically see a young adult book. Yes,
the authors are like, oh, my character needs to stay
the same, and I'm like, no, shoes, no.

Speaker 1 (40:35):
But it's only been like five months, right, like something short,
Like it hasn't been that long.

Speaker 2 (40:40):
I thought it was from like last summer through winter
almost spring.

Speaker 1 (40:45):
I thought it was like they thought it actually said
the amount of time that had passed.

Speaker 2 (40:49):
I thought it was like, I don't remember that. My
brain is Swiss cheese. I don't remember.

Speaker 1 (40:57):
When she left. I feel like it was like the
end of summer, because remember the dragon was like, I'll
be back in your winter, your spring, yes, okay, And
so yeah, they were doing some kind of end of
summer festival or something.

Speaker 2 (41:14):
Okay, yes, so she spent the fall on the island
with her brothers and then winter and the place okay.
So yeah, five five six months.

Speaker 1 (41:25):
So I mean that's a lot of growth really short.
That's a lot of traumatic things happening to someone really quickly. Oh.

Speaker 2 (41:30):
Absolutely, absolutely.

Speaker 1 (41:33):
M hm, but hmmm, okay, so all right, we got
the villains down. What else do you think I just
blanked on the entire book? Just fine, it's fine, it's fine.

Speaker 2 (41:56):
Yeah, I think I'm done. I don't I can't think
of anything.

Speaker 1 (42:01):
I would like to taste your as food if it's
so great.

Speaker 2 (42:04):
Oh, absolutely, that would be awesome.

Speaker 1 (42:05):
All of the food made me really hungry. Yeah, like
it sounds like it's cool. Let me go to her
little festivals and eat this interesting food and taste her
amazing cakes that she kind of burnt at first, but
she got it down. But she got it down. Yeah,
I guess that's all I got. I mean, it's not
that much. Honestly, it's really basic. It's a it's a

(42:30):
straightforward story, with exception of the wolf or like what
happened there? When did that? With exception of that, it's
pretty straightforward, and the exception of the stepmother.

Speaker 2 (42:40):
Because yeah, the last chapter does not explain or excuse everything.

Speaker 1 (42:44):
Doesn't it really jive? No? Eh? Okay, I think we
should rate it. Okay, should I go first or should
you go first?

Speaker 2 (42:52):
I'll go first because I don't give it a happy
four stars. I'm yes, I know I'm I'm reading it
for the twelve year olds who will enjoy this book someday. Okay,
Like I'm trying to rate it for what it is,
not what I want it to be.

Speaker 1 (43:09):
Okay, And I will rate it for what it is
and what it should be, and that's why I'm going
to give it a three out of five. I mean,
it wasn't bad. Yeah, you know, it wasn't bad, but
I just want it more a lot more so, in
my opinion, if this were a personal read and not

(43:30):
a podcast read, I will stop now. I wouldn't even continue.
But because it's a podcast and book club read, we
will continue on and hopefully I'll be giving the next
book a little higher for rating. I hope, I hope.
So I feel good that it's a possibility it might
get better maybe.

Speaker 2 (43:52):
I mean, dragon World, it's got to be good.

Speaker 1 (43:56):
Don't say that jinx, I would just jinx it.

Speaker 3 (43:59):
Right.

Speaker 1 (44:00):
Yeah, let's hope it's more evolved and more detailed. That
mean it's dragons. Who doesn't love dragons exactly? Who doesn't
love dragons? Well, you can mess up dragons book, you can.
So not all right? What else? Okay? So next up
we're gonna do book two, which is The Dragons Promise,

(44:22):
Surprise Surprise, that's what it's called. That's appropriate. Mm hmm,
I think that's it. Oh, you guys, you should come
on over to Patreon right now. This this I think
by the time this airs, you'll still have a couple
of days. If you join on Patreon and sign up,

(44:42):
you can submit a suggestion for the thriller mystery read.
So if you have something you really want us to read,
we'll be reading it in the fourth quarter of this year.
So what's happening is everyone who's on Patreon can submit
a suggestion, a recommendation you have, don't have to have
read it, something you want to read, and then the
whole book club at large will vote. So oh exciting. Yeah,

(45:06):
you have a really good chance of your book being
picked because we're you know, we're exclusive on shelf Addiction Patreon.
Right now, we still have a tight group, so you
have a really good shot of getting your book picked. Yeah.
So maybe we'll do something like that for Fantasy next year. Yeah, definitely, Yeah,
as long as it's not too long.

Speaker 2 (45:27):
Duologies and trilogies only.

Speaker 1 (45:29):
Yeah, because you know, we can't commit to the crazy
because I'll be crying right now. If this was like
four books, I would be I'd be like, can we
switch it? I'll be crying. I would too.

Speaker 2 (45:41):
I don't think I can handle book too, because I'm
excited for Dragons, but I don't think I can handle more.

Speaker 1 (45:46):
Yeah, like dude, And that's part of the bonus of
reading duologies and trilogies, you know, even with the duology
more than the trilogy. You know, come on, it's a
really short commitment. We can push through two books absolutely. Yeah. Yeah,
So I think that was great that we decided to
do that, although it limits what we're able to do,

(46:07):
you know, but we can't have all the things. No,
apparently not. Okay, I think I'm done. What do you
think I think I'm done to? Okay, So this was
a good conversation. You guys. Let us know. Did you
enjoy six Crimson Cranes? Did you love it? Don't didn't
love it? Will you read it? Let us know all

(46:28):
the things? You can find us all over again. Our
links are in the show notes, and hopefully y'all see
you in book clubs or maybe over on Patreon. Anyway.
All right, that's it. We're gonna call it. Have a
great one, take care of yourselves until next time. Bye guys.
Hi everybody, did you enjoy today's episode? If so, please

(46:54):
head over to Apple podcast or Spotify and leave a positive,
five star review. It's a simple action that makes a
big difference. You can also like this episode on your
favorite podcast player or share it with your fellow bookworm
friends on social media. Joining the shelf Adiction Patreon family
is another way to support us, where as little as

(47:14):
two dollars a month you can help our team create
even more amazing bookish content. If Patreon isn't your thing,
consider becoming a supporter on the Breaker app for just
five dollars a month and gain access to exclusive audio
only content. You can find me everywhere, including Instagram, x
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(47:35):
club of the same name on the book club's website
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