I loved how the different myths were blended! The worldbuilding was lush and I liked how there's still room for growth.

Princess Shiori has magic. Unfortunately she unleashes it at the wrong time and is banished by her stepmother. No one can recognize her and she also cannot speak. Worst of all, her six brothers are turned into cranes. Shiori must work to restore everything to rights.
Opinion
This was a fabulous book! I love the twist at the end that shows that not everyone who I thought was bad was not actually bad. (There was more than one character.) I immediately went to get the second book. Probably what was most interesting to me was the fact that she could not speak. I would 100% find that a challenge. Shiori was able to get her thoughts across well.
Many thanks to Net Galley and to Knopf Books for Young Readers for providing me with an ARC of this book. Many more apologies for taking so long to read and review it.

let's ignore the fact that it took me an embarrassingly long time to read this ARC...

i was super excited for this one because it sounded so cool and maybe my expectations were a tad high because ultimately it fell flat for me. the book ended in a cliffhanger obviously setting up for book #2, and i don't feel compelled to read it at all (plus knowing that a lot of people were disappointed by the sequel... i probably won't pick it up)

there's a lot of aspects about this that i loved: the East Asian inspired folklore and culture, fairy tale vibes, descriptive writing - i feel like this had so much potential but it didn't wow me. i was so close to DNFing this many times but i pushed through because i wanted to see where this book would end up.

there was good action in the beginning that piqued my interest but then the next 300 pages were full of very little plot to move the story forward and it became very repetitive. i wish we got to see more of the relationship between Shiori and her brothers in the beginning because her motive to finish the quest was primarily about her love for her brothers and it didn't feel strong enough to me. i guess it would be hard to develop that because she has 6 brothers but it felt more like "oh they're siblings so they have unconditional love for each other". the plot started to pick up some once Shiori made it to Castle Bushian but i found that it was still just repetitive with occasional action sprinkled in there.

the characters were pretty basic and didn't have a ton of depth to them. Shiori was the classic princess who gets cursed and is banished and forced to work as a servant because no one can tell her true identity. and Takkan was sweet but he was a cliché perfect prince. the romance wasn't horrible but it wasn't very believable and just made me roll my eyes a ton. like of course Takkan falls for the weird servant girl who can't speak and has a bowl stuck on her head because she makes good soup and oh "i knew it was you all along Shiori" BORING

Shiori supposedly has "forbidden magic" and it's made out to be such a big deal but then it's literally not?? and the plot twists were so predictable that honestly nothing surprised me

so many people have given this 5 stars and i just don't see how... maybe YA fantasy is not for me anymore lmao

Six Crimson Cranes is a wonderful fantasy book and it's book one in the series. The Dragon's Promise is book two. This is a fantastic story about a curse, a dragon, and everything you want in a fairytale story. If you like to read fantasy books, please read Six Crimson Cranes.

A Great Ya novel. The world building and cultural history was really interesting to read.the writing style is beautiful, and the magic was cool.

This was my first exposure to Elizabeth Lim. A friend told me I’d love her, and I did. This book is a combo of amazing world-building, magic, fantasy, and a little bit of romance thrown in for fun. It’s full of dragons, demons, curses, deception, shifting loyalties, and so much more that’ll have you absolutely guessing at what’s going to come next. I haven’t read a YA this surprising and exciting in a while. It’s the first book in the duopoly, and I’m so excited to see where it goes from here. Where Shiori’s story leaves off hints at an epic adventure to come, as if this first book wasn’t adventure enough!

Shiori is a princess that I can get on board with. The youngest of 7 siblings, and the only daughter to boot, she has spent her life growing up with her brothers. It’s left her a strong, independent-minded, and adventure-oriented young woman, ready to tackle any challenge that comes her way, even when those challenges put the lives of those she loves in impending peril. There’s no one more suited to the task of saving the empire. With her magic just budding, she feels ill-equipped to face the darkness that threatens her world, but through her journey she discovers the vast depths of her own mental and physical strength. She has many traits that will certainly endear you to her.

I couldn’t help but love this book. It pulls on Asian mythology and is a strong opener to this duopoly. The romance is subtle and slow-burning, which has the reader questioning if it’s really going to happen, which is a nice change of pace for YA fiction. The main relationships are familial and we see a ton of Shiori’s interactions with her brothers. There is so much yet to be uncovered in this world and I’m excited to now wait for book number two.

Gauzy, Ethereal, Fairytale. Lim does it again and I can't stress enough how gorgeous this prose is. She writes like an absolute dream, so filled with emotion and empathy it's hard not to get swept away with the characters and their troubles. Absolutely recommend to any reader who enjoys fantasy, fairy tale, and romance.

This book has been on my backlist for so long, and for whatever reason I kept putting it off. With the urging of many of my bookish friends telling me it was a must-read, and being invited to be a part of the book tour for the prequel, Her Radiant Curse, I knocked this one off #backlistbooks23 list and couldn’t be happier about it!

Lim certainly knows how to combine mythology with interesting characters and wonderful world-building, I was blown away by how constantly surprised I was by the twists in plot and how much I came to care for them, especially Shiori! That cover is stunning and I cannot wait to read more from this author now.

With the prequel's release only a few weeks away, I finally sat myself down and finish Six Crimson Cranes and once again bow down to Elizabeth Lim for delivering an incredibly magical tale. Shiori is somewhat of an entitled princess at the start, loved by her father and brothers, and very unhappy about being betrothed. When she discovers her innate magical abilities, she hides them from her family until an incident reveals them to her stepmother, who is also hiding some magical secrets of her own. The Nameless Queen turns Shiori's brothers into cranes and curses the princess - for every word she speaks, one of her brothers will die.

The inspirational fairytale is one that I've grown up with and always had a fondness for so it's no surprise that I loved how it was spun something familiar into a brand new story. Shiori is incredibly headstrong and her character growth throughout all the trials of reuniting with her brothers and figuring how to break the curse hones her determined and stubborn personality. We're transported into the kingdom of Kiata as the disappearance of the royal heirs breeds unrest and Shiori finds herself in the middle of the chaos, with her magic tested and hunted. I would be lying if I didn't also acknowledge Takkan, Shiori's betrothed, who once again reminded me that Elizabeth Lim just writes male characters that raise the bar each time (I'm still not over Edan and now we have Takkan). Needless to say, the characters are easily lovable and with each revealed secret, I was cheering for Shiori to win.

Six Crimson Cranes weaves together familiarity with an Asian-inspired twist and creates a world full of characters that I've grown incredibly attached to and will be jumping into its sequel immediately because I cannot wait to see how their journey continues.

Six Crimson Cranes (Six Crimson Cranes #1) by Elizabeth Lim, 464 pages. Knopf Books (Random House), 2021. $20.
Language: G (0 swears, 0 “f”); Mature Content: PG13; Violence: PG13
BUYING ADVISORY: HS - ADVISALBE
AUDIENCE APPEAL: AVERAGE
While Shiori (16yo) is not happy about her arranged marriage, she didn’t mean to ruin the betrothal ceremony by running into the lake and nearly drowning. Her father, the emperor, is still not pleased by the offense caused—especially when she claims to have seen a dragon. Now Shiori has to spend every day embroidering an apology tapestry, forcing her to spend time with the stepmother who hates Shiori for no reason and might actually be a demon.
This is the most beautiful retelling of The Wild Swans that I have ever read. I loved learning about Shiori’s kingdom and culture, about the dragons and magic, about the strength of familial love and loyalty to their people. The stakes are high as Shiori gives everything to break the curse placed upon her and her brothers, and I felt the pressure with her through the last battle. The end of this book tied up all the ends of the original fairy tale, making me wonder what the sequel will be able to add.
Shiori is depicted as Asian on the cover, and all the characters are implied to be similar. The mature content rating is for alcohol use, innuendo, and sexual harassment. The violence rating is for assault, blood and gore, and murder.
Reviewer: Carolina Herdegen

I really enjoyed how this story brought together old tales with fantasy elements and a unique storyline. The characters were well developed and the adventure captivating. I want to go and read the sequel!

I LOVED everything about this book. The use of folklore, the dragons, the magic, literally everything. The characters were well thought out and had significant growth by the end of the story. I could not put this book down.


I just reviewed Six Crimson Cranes by Elizabeth Lim. #SixCrimsonCranes #NetGalley

Six Crimson Cranes takes a well-known fairy tale and expands it, imbuing it with magic, romance, and an East Asian-inspired setting. Unfortunately, despite all the promise and potential of that beginning, the story itself was a let-down for me. The writing felt stilted and flat, I didn't feel invested in the characters as people, and every twist or turn of the plot felt obvious and uninteresting. I wanted to love this book, but ultimately I just didn't really care about any of it.

Thank you to the publisher for the review copy.

I loved this novel with its stories of of mythology interwoven within the read. It contains a heroine who is a strong female character and who is, herself, living a myth. A beautiful story that I could not stop reading - and in which the evil stepmother turns out to be not so evil after all!

Lovely retelling of the The Wild Swans fairytale by H.C. Andersen, mixed with East Asian folklore. And the cover for this book is so gorgeous! I'm definitely reading book two.

(i received this e-arc from netgalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.)

i held high expectations for Six Crimson Cranes (considering how much of a high i got while reading Lim's previous Spin The Dawn duology), but i felt let down this time around.

LOVED this. I was so drawn into the world. I loved the East Asian take on a western fairy tale. (Another of my favorite fantasy novels is based on this fairy tale as well.) I loved the way the relationship between Shiori and Takkan developed. Made me want to read more of her books.

Elizabeth Lim has been quite a popular author in the YA genre the past few years. Six Crimson Cranes is another strong work. Lim seamlessly weaves together elements from various fairytales and folklore stories to craft a compelling novel, with a very interesting main character. Great to also see elements of other cultures, diversity, and an #OwnVoices author here.

I certainly thoroughly enjoyed SIX CRIMSON CRANES. I’d already been eager to get to it solely based on the premise and after enjoying Lim’s previous duology, but I definitely didn’t expect to really love it as much as I did. This novel has a very strong anime feel to it, combined with a whimsical fairytale vibe, and I totally enjoyed getting to know Shiori and coming along for the ride that is her story.

A strong contender for my favorite book of 2022! (At the very least, my favorite fantasy!)

Six Crimson Cranes is definitely a masterpiece from author, Elizabeth Lim. I can't wait to see what else she will offer in this universe.