Lady Jing is a Celestial in the making (so to speak) und gets paired up (not entirely by accident 🤫) with a human who is the cinnamonest roll you can ever imagine. And their interactions do not annoy me at all (contrary to Lady Jing). This year, I read incredible ARCs having female protagonists who embark on an adventurous journey. Shanghai Immortals is one of those ARCs. This novel has several interesting aspects. council role that supports her guardian. Lady Jing is a warrior at heart, and fights her way through self discovery while encumbered with a mortal man she finds both infuriating and fascinating. This book has the perfect balance of romance and plot, of quiet fun and action and of irreverence and seriousness. I read an eARC of this book so thank you to Net Galley, the author and the publisher for allowing this.

I had a lot of fun in reading this book; it's fast paced, well plotted and there a lot of humour. The world building is fascinating and Lady Jing is a character you cannot help loving. The way Chao describes these mythological characters is really amazing. I absolutely loved the concept behind the story. So we have Lady Jing, an immortal of soon to be hundred years and considered as a child not so long ago (the aging and adulting of immortals are different I guess).

When tasked with bringing a mortal, Mr Lee, into Hell, Jing spies on the courtiers' plotting. She overhears their plans to steal a dragon pearl from the King. Suddenly, Jing sees her opportunity to expose them as the liars they are.

The title ‘Shanghai Immortal‘ still fits, but it’s the hell version of Shanghai we’re first introduced to. Chao takes us on a little trip to ‘mortal Shanghai’ as well, which is basically 1930s Shanghai as it would have known historically. This worked really well in terms of helping to get engrossed in the story, as it was Jing’s first trip too, and Chao did a great job at describing the world; it’s clear a lot of research went into the story.At first, I thought I would be annoyed by her behavior but Lady Jing grew on me. Since her vampiric father is absent and her hulijing mother was killed, Lady Jing was sent to Yan Luo Wang for protection. However, Lady Jing assumed that she was pawned by her mother to the King of Hell to repay shopping debts. With resentment and hidden disappointment growing, Lady Jing hides her true feelings behind her rebellious actions and impatient personality. In actual fact, she just wants to be friends with others and live a normal life without people looking at her for being different. In terms of the characters, I love sassy characters. I love them because normally it’s an absolute front and there’s so much more to them, and Lady Jing was no exception to that! She spends her days as, what she thinks, is kind of more of a slave to Big Wang (he says differently to her, time and time again, but hey everyone has at least a little bit of self-doubt). He wants her to live up to her title, to wear nice dresses and excel in her lessons so she can take her place in court. Lady Jing has other plans though, she wants to wear trousers and be comfortable whilst avoiding the court for as long as possible! The MC Lady Jing is young, and inexperienced with the normal world and relationships, she is still finding herself. She uses sarcasm as her shield and doesn't trust anyone but in her heart, she is brave and strong. I love scenes when she gets tipsy and become walking sunshine. Her dialogues with Mr. Lee are interesting because we can see how she grows thanks to him. The first half of the book is pure fun: I was enjoying myself so much, I loved every crazy line and stunt by Lady Jing. And then I started falling in love with all the secondary characters. I was so distracted by the sassiness that I didn't take them seriously until they said hey hi, this story is also about us. The found family trope is my weakness and Shanghai Immortal hit me hard. There's even a bit of romance and it's so well done. u>My least favourite part was the mystery that moves the plot forward. I forgot about it often as I was more invested in Lady Jing’s journey. I think the mystery works well within the book and makes sense at the end, but sadly I was expecting a bigger plot twist at the end of the book.

Big Wang, Lord Ma, Lord Nioh, and Old Zao are all fabulous side-characters, with their own personality and quirks. They made me love them more and more as the story progressed. The ancient Chinese myths and legends are integrated beautifully into the story and the little drops of historical and social history, made this book that much better and immersive. One of the things I really enjoyed about this book were the action scenes with demon swords (I don’t want one, I need one NOW), because they were really entertaining and well explained stars! This book is hilarious, dark, witty, and extravagant all at once. Lady Jing was such a stunning character and I couldn't get enough of her. She truly is a 'sasshole.' This story weaves mythology, fantasy, and satire together into a story as gorgeous as its cover. I will be impatiently waiting for the next book by this author. Set in 1930s China, Lady Jing is half-fox spirit half vampire and all sasshole. When she overhears her fox spirit elders planning to steal a priceless dragon pearl from the King of Hell, she’s all in to expose the two-faced vixens for the bitches they are. But when the King tasks her with babysitting a visiting mortal, the mortal’s unexpected friendship puts her at a crossroads and she must decide what matters more: honour and vengeance or friendship and joy?The romance: I have to preface this by saying that I'm generally not a romance person, but the biggest issue I had with it was mostly that it felt like a third of the book was mostly only romance, and the rest was the actual plot. It felt oddly separate to the plot to me, almost as though it put a kind of halt to it. This might just be me personally, but it didn't feel as connected as it could have been. I absolutely loved Lady Jing as a protagonist. She has absolutely no filter, saying and insulting without discrimination, and speaking her mind no matter who is in front of her. Her snarky, sarcastic comments and insults made me laugh multiple times. But beneath the string front she puts on, it's a young woman unable to let go of her pain and of everyone's opinion of her. I also enjoyed her most vulnerable moments, her growth, and the growth of the relationships with those around her close circle. The secondary characters are so complex and well-explored that I know the story wouldn't have been the same without them, their strengths and their unwavering love for Jing. Gigi is a particular favourite of mine.

Lady Jing is half fox spirit and half vampire, and she was apparently sold by her mother to the king of hell to buy diamonds. As I mentioned, the worldbuilding is complex, full of Chinese folklore and magical creatures, which was definitely my favourite part! I want my own Pixiu so I can call them cutie. The gods, demons, swords, and creatures are amazing. The fact that Lady Jing, the main character, is half-vampire and half-deity adds insight to the story. She feels misunderstood and that she doesn’t belong in her own world which makes her relatable. Shanghai Immortal is the must-read debut of 2023, both intensely fun and heart wrenching. A wild ride through a Shanghai you've never seen before." - Tasha Suri Source: eARC provided by the publisher (this in no way affects my review which is honest and unbiased) Lady Jing is nearly 100 years old, and, typical for Xianxia, that means she's a young thing teetering on the verge of adulthood. In Xianxia, a cosmos full of gods and demons and weird spirits, time measure is in centuries and millennia. She's a "mongrel," or so her horrible relations insist, which is why she's the ward of the King of Hell. She's half huli, or nine-tailed-fox, and half vampire. She's been raised by a couple of venerable mythic figures in Big Wang's Court. ("Wang" by the way, means "king") She's feisty and mischievous and burgeoning with nascent power, but like many adolescents on the verge of adulthood, she's too impatient to sit for lessons. Especially as it seems everyone in Hell's court hates her guts, and there are powerful figures related to her who go out of their way to be cruel. With the emotional fallout you'd expect.This book was so much fun! It’s fast, it doesn’t take itself too serious, it’s amusing. I had such a great time reading this book. b>Her relationship with Mr. Lee is cute, sweet, and real. They like each other but must learn to understand each other too. I’m not a big fan of romance in fantasy books but this one was well-written, and it fits perfectly in the story.