Court Of Wanderers by Rin Chupeco
Publication Date: April 2, 2024
Summary from NetGalley:
Remy Pendergast, vampire hunter, and his unexpected companions, royal vampires Lord Zidan Malekh and Lady Xiaodan Song, are on the road through the kingdom of Aluria again after a hard-won first battle against the formidable Night Empress, who threatens to undo a fragile peace between humans and vampires. Xiaodan, severely injured, has lost her powers to vanquish the enemy’s new super breed of vampire, but if the trio can make it to Fata Morgana, the seat of Malehk’s court—dubbed “the Court of Wanderers”—there is hope of nursing her and bringing them back.
En-route to the Third Court, Remy crosses paths with his father, the arrogant, oftentimes cruel Lord of Valenbonne. He also begins to suffer strange dreams of the Night Empress, whom he has long suspected to be Ligaya Pendergast, his own mother. As his family history unfolds during these episodes, which are too realistic to be coincidence, he realizes that she is no ordinary vampire—and that he may end up having to choose between the respective legacies of his parents.
Posing as Malek and Xiaodan’s human familiar, Remy contends with Aluria’s intimidating vampire courts and a series of gruesome murders with their help—and more, as the three navigate their relationship. But those feelings and even their extraordinary collective strength will be put to the test as each of them unleashes new powers in combat at what may be prove to be the ultimate cost.
ARC provided by Saga Press via Netgalley for an honest review.
Confession:
I have very confused and mixed feelings about this second book in this series. I still liked the characters, especially Remy, and the storylines that continued from the first book were nicely tied up by the end, but for most of the story I just felt confused as to what was going on, especially with the vampire politics and some of the battle scenes.
I still really liked Remy, he is still the sweet and kind young man that I remember from the first book, and he seems to be finding himself and his place in the world in this story. I loved his relationship with Xiaodan and Malek. They are all very kind and caring people who love each other. Remy becomes more and more sure of that as the book goes on, even when things are a bit dark for all of them. His relationship with his father, also has some resolution which was nice to see.
My main issue with the book was all of the political intrigue with the vampires. I often felt confused and lost during those chapters. I also had a really hard time keeping track of who was who among the vampires. I think part of this was just that I had forgotten so much from the first book that I just felt it a struggle to keep up. There was one critical point in the story when Remy says something to the effect of, wait what just happened? What is going on? and I was saying to myself, yes, I feel the same way. It did eventually become clearer in that scene but I still felt lost the rest of the time.
The pacing and the writing were also a bit of an issue. The pacing was very slow in bits and there were a lot of chapters where it felt like nothing happened at all. I usually love Ms. Chupeco’s writing, but this book often felt muddled and not well edited. The action sequences and fight scenes were especially hard to follow. But there were also some sections and interactions between characters that were wonderfully written and beautiful and made my heart ache. I don’t like being overly critical of an ARC, as I always hope that some of these issues are fixed before the final publication, but this was a bit underwhelming on the whole.
If you liked the first book then you should give this one a chance. The story is wrapped up nicely even with all of the confusion. I really wished I had reread the first book before tackling this one, I think it might have helped with some of the issues I had. Either that, or perhaps a guide to the characters and the courts they belonged to would be helpful. But, in the end, I am glad that I read this and I did like it, even though it left me feeling a bit muddled.
Confessions of a Serial Reader 
Fab review. I’ve been debating whether to get book 1 as heard great things!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I liked book one a bit better than this one. But still a very interesting take on vampires.
LikeLiked by 1 person