love to my homies who adore this, but damn...it was just fine? 🤷
some parts rocked but other parts lulled. a lot of over-explanation in some sections but not nearly enough in others. also i am not huge on heavy hand-to-hand combat description so some specific parts bored me additionally so, it is what it is.
A lot of interesting ideas and snippets of world-building were set up here that I'm sure will add a lot of enrichment to the enjoyment of the further installments  (and this one as well of course, i definitely appreciated the aesthetics and mood created throughout the book) but the crux (HAHA!) of this first book standalone is...a pretty standard murder-mystery in one incredibly under-utilised setting. 
Kept waiting for something else to come that never did. Just a lot of key/door/swordfight/vaguely queer scene/repeat
but i am still interested to see where the story goes from here.
will definitely be reading on. i hope it gets queer-er, dark-er, and funky-er
catch you on the flip side, sugarlips