This is one of those books that I was just confused by.  I don't mind a genre-mash up- it can keep things fresh but this one just felt a bit disjointed.  If it had been a straight forward crime noir or fantasy it may have just worked better for me.

The author certainly conjured up 1920's Shanghai for me, the descriptions were so in-depth and sensory laden.  However I struggled with Jingwen.  She went from flapper girl to gangsters moll to demi-goddess. I'm all for a girl seizing her destiny but I felt that she got over every new reveal so quickly.  Magic, gods, body part farmers - she seems to get over all these things so fast! I did sometimes wonder if some scenes were just the drugs/alcohol fuelled dreams of the MC's.  Sometimes one sort of drifted into another and I was a bit lost.

Jingwen comes over as naïve and a "good girl" dancer and wants nothing to do with her grandmothers trade but by the end of the book she's like a Dancers Triad King Pin!  The romance element of the storyline could have been removed completely and the storyline still would have worked - for a gangster he took up little room!

I was definitely left dazed and confused.  I may have to give this another read in a few months and see if it sits better with me then - I may not just be in the right mindset for this but it was a solid 3.5 stars - I just wished I could have felt more invested in our MC!