Empress of All Seasons - Emiko Jean

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Each generation, a competition is held to find the next empress of Honoku. The rules are simple. Survive the palace’s enchanted seasonal rooms. Conquer Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall. Marry the prince. All are eligible to compete—all except yōkai, supernatural monsters and spirits whom the human emperor is determined to enslave and destroy. 

Mari has spent a lifetime training to become empress. Winning should be easy. And it would be, if she weren't hiding a dangerous secret. Mari is a yōkai with the ability to transform into a terrifying monster. If discovered, her life will be forfeit. As she struggles to keep her true identity hidden, Mari’s fate collides with that of Taro, the prince who has no desire to inherit the imperial throne, and Akira, a half-human, half-yōkai outcast."

Mari is an animal wife, a yōkai who has been sent to the palace to compete for the chance to marry the prince. 

Akira is a half-human, half yōkai who calls himself the Son of Nightmares. Akira and Mari have been friends for years, and while she may not love him, he is in love with her. Terrified at the thought of her risking her life at the palace, Akira tries to convince her to run away with him--when she turns him down, he decides instead to follow her, learn what he can about fighting, and try to win her heart.

Taro, the cold prince, lives a secluded, lonely life. His father, the emperor, is heartless and unfeeling, and Taro finds peace only in his workshop, where he creates mechanical creatures to keep him company. He keeps himself closed off, close with no one, until he unexpectedly runs into Mari and finally finds someone he might be able to open up to.

The lives of these three characters will intertwine in unexpected ways as Mari battles her way through the seasonal rooms, falling in love with Taro along the way, as Taro falls in love in return and struggles to decide who he can trust, and as Akira makes connections with the yōkai resistance and learns how to be a warrior. Snippets of tales about the Gods who created the yōkai and the humans are interwoven with the story, and these stories enrich the narrative by offering insight into what the Gods have in store.

Overall, while I found the story intriguing and enjoyable, there was a lot going on, and the pacing and transitions were clunky at times. Also, I didn't love the ending--lots of hasty wrapping up, when I would have loved to see more detail. Complaints aside, this is a solid read, and I especially think that anyone interested in Japanese folklore will enjoy it.

Alex and Eliza - Melissa de la Cruz

My rating: ⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Their romance shaped a nation. The rest was history.

1777. Albany, New York. 

As battle cries of the American Revolution echo in the distance, servants flutter about preparing for one of New York society’s biggest events: the Schuylers’ grand ball. Descended from two of the oldest and most distinguished bloodlines in New York, the Schuylers are proud to be one of their fledgling country’s founding families, and even prouder still of their three daughters—Angelica, with her razor-sharp wit; Peggy, with her dazzling looks; and Eliza, whose beauty and charm rival that of both her sisters, though she’d rather be aiding the colonists’ cause than dressing up for some silly ball. 

Still, she can barely contain her excitement when she hears of the arrival of one Alexander Hamilton, a mysterious, rakish young colonel and General George Washington’s right-hand man. Though Alex has arrived as the bearer of bad news for the Schuylers, he can’t believe his luck—as an orphan, and a bastard one at that—to be in such esteemed company. And when Alex and Eliza meet that fateful night, so begins an epic love story that would forever change the course of American history."

Could have been worse, but could have been waaaaaaaaaay better. The development of the story was crazy choppy, and the progression of Alex and Eliza's relationship was super weird. It almost seemed like what used to happen to me when I would start working on something. I'd have all these great ideas for key scenes, so I'd skip around and write those scenes, and then....bleh, I don't want to have to do the hard part of coming up with the in-between stuff! This book? Key scenes with no in-between. Its one big redeeming quality is that it's a relatively quick read. If a book has to be choppy and weird, at least it only took me a few hours to read.