finished the first volume of rosmei's translation of zwdec! my (spoiler-laden) thoughts below the cut
i haven't read a lot of ny novels (this and fq are the only two i've read any of), but i've noticed that her prose tends to be the weakest point for me. it's always serviceable, don't get me wrong, but it's just not a style that i personally favour.
but that said, the plot and character writing is excellent—i was on the edge of my seat the entire time reading it, and finished it in three days total (probably about five or six hours of reading time for a ~300 page volume). i think ny is really good at writing character dynamics as well, and the shifts that occur in them—the swing from cy between "suspicious and furious at rj and trying to destroy her" and "reorientating and open to rj being innocent" could have been very poorly executed, but in my opinion, the author pulled it off perfectly. there's still an air of simmering disquiet under everything, because cy still doesn't fully trust rj, but it's very believable and holds up well.
in terms of plot threads, i really enjoyed the way ny slowly weaves hints of the past and what (might have?) actually happened throughout. the dual pov is weighted more towards cy, but what we do get from rj is incredibly revealing—and damning for cl, if i've been reading the hints sprinkled in throughout correctly. overall i'm very interested in what happened, both in rj's past with cl and with cl's murder, and i'm really compelled by all the various character dynamics, but especially rj and cy! i've decided i'll probably buy the raws and read the rest that way rather than waiting for v2 to come out, but i'll likely order v2 (and beyond?) as well, because i think the translation is very well done and would like to see more baihe from rosmei.
