While Roma thinks he’s determined to kill Juliette, he still struggles when he actually gets an opportunity. The habits of loving her turn out to be hard to break, even as he hates himself for it. The love story remains central, of course Families can talk about the violence in Our Violent Ends. How much is too much? Is reading about it different from seeing it in movies, videos, or games?

This city holds itself upright by the power of information, and its messengers work frantically, whisper passing whisper until it reaches the ears of its rival darlings.” This quote acts as foreshadowing. What examples from the text describe instances of miscommunication? Imagine the internet and electronic devices did not exist. What scenarios would be disastrous if you could not communicate instantly? Share a time a text message was misunderstood or not delivered. What problem(s) arose from the situation? A nightclub setting with mention that excessive drinking is a pastime. Alcohol flows at a dinner meeting. Customers drink at a dance hall. Mention that a gang trades in opium. Cigar and cigarette smoke mentioned. Personally, I’d have liked to see more emphasis on the traitor storyline and less on the main characters’ relationship to the political side of things. I know not everyone will agree with me on this! But although I thought the citywide tensions helped to add texture to the plot and were interesting in abstract, I thought they overcomplicated the central story. Bringing the hunt for the spy forward in place of the more large-scale political side of things would, I think, have helped to keep the stakes more personal. I enjoyed Our Violent Ends, possibly even more than These Violent Delights She didn’t mean it. She knew Roma Montagov. He thought he wanted her dead, but the fact of the matter was that he never missed, and yet he had—all those bullets, embedded into the walls instead of Juliette’s head. The fact of the matter was that he had his hands around her throat and yet she could still breathe, could still inhale past the rot and the hate that his fingers tried to press into her skin. Do you hear yourself?” Roma interrupted. In three strides, he was close enough to point his gun right in Juliette’s face. She could feel the heat of the barrel, hot steel an inch away from her skin. “You killed Marshall. You killed him, and it’s been months, and I haven’t heard a word of explanation from you—”The picture started. Screen One was the largest viewing room in the whole Grand Theatre, its orchestral sound booming from all sides. Each seat was equipped with its own translation system, reading out the text that appeared alongside the silent film. The couple to Juliette’s left were wearing their earpieces, murmuring excitedly to each other as the lines filtered through in Chinese. Juliette didn’t need her earpiece, not just because she could read English, but because she wasn’t really watching the film. Her eyes, no matter how much she tried, kept wandering down. This balancing act between plot and character development was excellently carried out. It really speaks to Chloe Gong’s talent as a writer! Romance and angst worthy of the Bard

For those who have read or seen Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, characters and specific scenes from Gong’s adaptation will seem familiar. Choose a character, whether they exist in the original play or not, and create a character map that shows their character development and personality. If they’re a character that appears in the play, consider the differences and similarities. What catalysts propel their story across both books? What are the points of no return? You can create your map as a time line, an aesthetic board or video, a series of tweets, diary entries, or something else. Be prepared to present your map to the class, including a rationale on why you chose to represent it the way you did. The screen dropped into shadows, but Juliette took aim anyway. In the second before the man could act, she pulled the trigger first with a loud bang. You destroy me and then you kiss me. You give me a reason to hate you and then you give me a reason to love you. Is this a lie or the truth? Is the a ploy or your heart reaching for me?” You were three paces away from the merchant,” she said. She was surprised her voice remained level. Ta ma de. There was one knife strapped to her leg, but in the time it would take to reach for it, she would be giving Roma plenty of time to shoot. “You left him just to find me? I’m flattered—” They had always been two mirrored souls, the only ones who understood the other in a city that wanted to consume them whole, and now they were joined, mightier when together.”

Table of Contents

Fantasy violence from a pandemic illness, spread by large insects, that makes people tear their own throats out. Gory descriptions of victims mention gouging arteries, tendons, and muscle as well as blood spurting, seeping, pooling, etc. Real-world violence includes past and present murders by slitting throats and gunshots. Lots of gunfights with rifles, pistols, and machine guns. A massacre is described. Pain from injuries is briefly described. A whipping with screams of pain. A house fire seen from outside describes children and elders trapped inside screaming. Some eerie atmospheres and descriptions of scary, indestructible monsters.

She’s also much clearer on her feelings about Roma, which made for one of the crucial changes to the romance dynamic.Our Violent Ends, by Chloe Gong, is the sequel to These Violent Delights. As such, spoilers for These Violent Delights are pretty much unavoidable! But, as usual, this review will be spoiler-free for Our Violent Ends. At first I thought Our Violent Ends was going to reset us to square one Juliette considers the racism she experienced in America and Shanghai due to colonizers. “They believed themselves the rulers of the world—on stolen land in America, on stolen land in Shanghai. Everywhere they went— entitlement. And Juliette was so tired.” Do you think entitlement fuels racism, imperialism, and colonization? Explain your answer. Give examples of how these systems of oppression exist today. I made a vow to you, Roma.’ She took a step forward. No one stopped her. ‘Where you go, I go. I will not bear a day parted. I will take a dagger to my own heart if I must.” But despite the heaviness of the plot, the characters still manage to shine through. Juliette and Roma’s star-crossed romance gets thrust even more into the spotlight in this one. Yes, even more so than in These Violent Delights! But we get to see them as more than lovers. Each of their individual chapters has a very strong voice, such that you can immediately tell who is narrating which chapter. We also get to know more about side characters: Marshall, Ben, Alisa, and of course Juliette’s formidable cousins Kathleen and Rosalind. Everything that makes a character good and relatable is so palpably present in this book.