Kingmaker's Revenge

kingmaker? nope this is story of emotionally scared villain girl going back in time she is supposed to be good schemer, but she is almost losing to teenage girl, even when she knows future she is ruthless when she doesnt need to and when she should remove somebody, she fks big time-> plot reasons probably, but it just makes her even more incompetent knowing future is like winning lotery for scheming person and this isnt it Imagine RI Fang Yuan in this world and then compare it to her

Last chapter I read: 87. It was rather a meh read, the grammer and writing style much left to be desired, in all honesty. It feels odd to read, as some words do come off as rather ill-chosen; such as the paragraph that Asterias wanted Lumielle to 'emote' more. Bad word, emote is a modern word, had not even existed in the medieval times, especially in the POV of Asterias had. Would Asterias truly use the word 'emote'? A modern term? Another thing was the 'ocular' thing and all that. Just say hair. Just say eye, pupils, or a more close word to eye. With all due to respect, I understand; the want to stand out and be unique from all other novels. But the novel itself has the potential to stand out, there was no need to use unconventional words, especially 'female' or 'male' sometimes, too. I can't immerse myself because these words were just too alienating. It could be something only to Lumielle’s POV strictly, but it doesn't feel like she would use those words. It was just weird and uncomfortable that humans got addressed in such a way. 'Showing versus Telling' is quite a thing that all beginner who try to write always fall back into. Just like fan fictions on WattP*d that were written by teenagers or those who don't really try to improve their writing all have this common problem. Showing versus telling is not as easy and only when you are extremely good at writing can you excel at that, thus I don't mind that this novel rarely shows anything, and simply tells the reader everything, presented on a silver platter. It is quite common, therefore it's not a heavy issue. Punctuation is lacking and every chapter has at least a few errors. The one time the em-dash was used, it was used awkwardly and on the wrong point, in the wrong sentence. (Ch39) Ch 87: Okay, with time, the authors punctuation actually got better and the em-dash was used correctly, if I remembered right. A lot of beginners who start out writing also go quite into detail when it comes to describing appearances. We don’t care. Or at least, I don’t****—****because we forget them. Keep it at a minimum, only describing the little details that adds to the character. It is hard to imagine the appearances, nothing is quite vivid or memorable. I just know the hair colors and eye colors. That’s it. The pace is super rushed and feels inconstant, it keeps being super fast that in less than 40 chapters, 2 years had passed without realizing, somehow it felt like no real time had flowed. Then after that, it started to drag a little on with things that didn’t feel important to the plot, because I didn’t care enough for the relationship between the Main Leads. There were only a handful of moments where Lumielle was evil. And it was cringe. She is not an 'evil' woman. Well, maybe she is. But that persona is forced upon her by the author, and it wasn't well-made, thus making it feel as though you read two different characters with only the name in common. She took the whips of her 'teacher' to use it as blackmailing, but Asterias had made it all but useless. As far as I am aware, the secret of that 'teacher' was never revealed, thus why was she anxious in the first place? There was no evidence she did it and we, the reader, don't understand why the teacher would be so terrified. It made it seem exaggerated. And more-so, it left the reader unsatisfied. I know people are upset that Lumielle hoped for her fathers' affection, even though he...did what he did and neglected her. But actually, that was quite decent. Children do long for their parents for quite a long time before they come to terms on their own, that their parent might not love them. You wouldn't believe how many siblings were estranged in the real life, due to them competing for their parents attention. There are studies about specifically that. In my opinion, it was realistic. She was well-aware that she may be a bit foolish for hoping for his love and affection, yet her heart still wanted it. We can't control feelings. Well, other than that, Lumielle, and every other character is quite boring and all follow a certain archetype and follow that that archetype does, not a lot of uniqueness. Lumielle: When she killed that family, I didn’t care. It only irked me, because although it would be under the category of ‘evil’, it didn’t fit her. I thought she was supposed to be full of revenge, smart, calculating, cruel? When she randomly killed that family, Lumielle just felt like a bored person looking to shed blood, on a whim. Not smart. Not cunning, nothing like that. She also realizes that her fathers treatment is different and suddenly gave her attention, but didn’t realize what the other boys, especially Ruenti and Asterias may feel for her. Just like all other main characters, Lumielle doesn’t realize that they love her. Nothing unique, just a recycled character. We already have multiple heroines that have a sharp tongue. I actually don’t mind that Lumielle is good at that, no****—****what I mean is that she has nothing else. I also don’t hate dense characters. It’s just that in this particular archetype, it is quite a common trait most protagonists share that made her even more boring. - It was specifically stated that she didn’t like repeating herself when she faced off her ex-teacher that abused her and Aris in the past life...but, there are instances where she does repeat herself Chapter ..: “It’s between us women,” and then again, “It is an issue between us women.” Then again in the same chapter: “Eva, Silvia, there’s a rat in the castle.” she said, and then later on again “Find who the rat is.” I get that sometimes, in real life, we have to repeat ourselves. But it still kinda bothers me how some of her characteristics seemingly get introduced and then get forgetten. Her maids worked for some time for Lumielle, who they know is quite cruel, right? They would especially pay attention to her words, wouldn’t that be the most logical thing? Not that deep, but it irks me. However, when she explained in detail how much resentment she felt for her father, that was sooo good, like how she was like “Why?” “Why have you forsaken us?” sorta type of deal, that was really compelling and was fun to read, because it genuinely came off as if Lumielle truly felt resentful, it weren’t just mere words by then, but feelings. Aris: Not much to say. That he was co-dependent on Lumielle seems to be logical, after all the torment they received from their elders. It makes sense. He is possessive of his sister, like all other archetypes just like him. I don’t dislike his character as much as I dislike Lumielle’s character. He is just the flat side-character meant for validation, to make the reader feel as if they’re treasured by a sibling, nothing more, nothing less. Although, I do think it is nice that they have a good relationship and that nobody has fought over the throne. Aristerias: Meh. I don’t quite understand how he is so smitten with Lumielle. The way he described Lumielle, it was as if she was mysterious and fascinating. The author just told us. But the author should have shown it, by making Lumielle and Aristerias have a conversation where she seemed that way. They bantered quite a lot, yet anybody can do that. It doesn’t have to do with a sharp tongue or whatever, anybody could have spoken to Aristerias the way Lumielle did. He is the flirty type, but only committed to the FL. He is smug, and quite arrogant, acting like he knows everything. Well, I don’t dislike his character/archetype. I hate none of the characters to be precise. They just bore me. Though, Aristerias gave me, as the only character in this novel, a feeling. It was negative, but it was a feeling. He wanted to go under FL’s skin which he succeeded in and I don’t really enjoy his character as a ‘person’ that much, but that is subjective. From an objective point of view, I do enjoy him from the perspective as a ‘character’, he is the perfect ML fit for the FL. Although I usually skip the scenes they are in, since they don’t drive the plot and barely have any interesting chemistry going on. ...Is what I thought, had I not read until ch87. When Lumielle got all mysterious about how she knew Lyanna, that was good. I am glad that the author got a bit better after some time. Improving in writing is difficult, after all. And the father? Well, it was good that he didn’t suddenly praise her or spoiled her rotten. I don’t care how the relationship with her father turns out, he just doesn’t have any presence in the novel, nor in the mind of Lumielle, no character has enough impact or adds anything interesting to the narrative to make me attached to them, or remember them. However, I slightly changed my mind when Lumielle got more depth and talked about her resentment with her father. That got me interested to see how she is going to kill him, or if she doesn’t, how she deals with it. Depth is more important than I initially thought. Overall, it left a bitter-sweet taste in my mouth reading this novel. I don’t hate this novel. It just didn’t evoke enough feelings in me as novels should actually do****—****I simply don’t care. If you want to pass time, this is the perfect novel for you to turn to. This is by no means a hate review. If I had made it seem like that, I am sorry. Honestly, this could’ve turned out at least interesting, had it not played in the rules of the genre and tropes the author have been writing; it could’ve been amazing. (There is nothing wrong with tropes or clichés, but they do get boring used the same way. They are more fun when given a unique twist.) Can you still enjoy reading this? Of course, it is just my point of view. There is nothing wrong with enjoying something others dislike. The scenes I loved the most was the Past Arc that the author wrote. That was good - only plot, no filler episodes that got in the way of the plot. Perfect. I genuinely enjoyed reading it. I can see that the author got greatly inspired by the manhwa/manhua/etc. to create this. This has so much potential. Or had. It’s not a bad novel, albeit a bit average.

I would say that reading this book twice does it justice. The author does state it is her first novel, (apologizes if you don’t use she/her pronouns) and you can tell at the start. It feels directionless and a little like “why is Lumielle acting this way” but, after reading up to the explanation chapter where the author explains her reasoning as to why she made the plot the way it is and owning up to her mistakes, I honestly became a bigger fan. I can see a lot of thought goes into the characters and despite the somewhat sloppy start, it’s really good. The writing makes it worthwhile. So let me start diseccting: 1. Lumielle. I agree at first I didn’t understand why she acted the way she did. Why did she put herself through needles pain because of Countess Fleur? But, honestly, seeing her characterization it makes sense to some extent. Like, she’s always been someone who lets people use her and she feels horribly guilty. It being part of her guilt and her inability to view herself as anything but a Kingmaker makes sense. Also, I currently do love the growth she is going for. I like that she has accepted that she doesn’t need to play the white lotus role. Its satisfying to see her be a villain but also understand that Aristele and people around her are important. 2. Aristele. Idk why everyone dislikes him. He’s probably one of my favorites. He’s loyal and a good character, seeing him from the past perspective and seeing what he is right now, it’s a good juxtaposition. I also would be honest if Lumielle kept me in the dark so I’m on his side. There are a lot of loose ends and some characters that vanish but I mean that is to be expected like the whole magic plotline sorta left as did Sebastian. I don’t know if I like Asterias since he also left, but I am excited to see him come back sometime in the future. I do reccomend the book and to continue reading it despite the first couple of chapters. It develops well.