Daughter of the Burning City is about Gomorrah, a mysterious, magical festive with murder, illusions and "freaks". I enjoyed reading it but I wasn't really hooked by the plot or the characters. They sometimes felt kind of flat, especially in comparison to other books I have enjoyed more, and even at the end there were quite a few questions and plot holes still unanswered. The story has a litte bit of romance, political issues and of couse magic and illusions. It reminded me of Caraval and I heard it also has similiarities to The Night Circus, I haven't read this book though. So I'd say you can read this book and enjoy it but it is not a story I would say is necessary to NOT have read.

5+++++ Sterne. Ich bin einfach geschockt, was auf den letzten 100 Seiten alles passiert ist. Ich fand die Geschichte, die Charaktere, einfach alles, von Beginn an grandios. Ich hätte niemals gedacht, dass es noch besser werden und mich mehr mitreißen könnte. Aber... Das hat es getan. Es war so toll und gleichzeitig schockierend. Das wird nicht das letzte Mal gewesen sein, dass ich dieses Buch lese. Ich kann diese Geschichte jedem nur wärmstens empfehlen <3

I really loved the whole atmosphere with the setting of the Gomorrah Festival, which is a city but also kind of a circus and a carnival, described in a dark and gothic way. The whole idea of people living together, sleeping during day-time, being awake at night, of danger seemingly waiting everywhere, of grotesque attractions and magic and of being a family - I loved it. So much. I also liked the casual diversity - the protagonist Sorina is bi, falling in love with an asexual love interest. I am just unsure about the depiction of asexuality. While Sorinas bisexuality or other occurences of same-sex relations are never questioned and treated as normal (which I liked!), asexuality is regarded as freakish and abnormal and there are several acephobic comments. On the one hand, I would have wished for it to be treated as normal as the other orientations. On the other hand, this is a book on how Sorina and her family are treated as freaks in a city that is seen as freakish in the outside world, and having the parallels of asexuality being seen as invalide in parts the queer community (that is then again invalidated in some parts of the allocisheteronormative world) can be seen as an interesting take. Not sure whether it was intentional but that offeres an interesting perspective. I really loved the book at the beginning but became less intrigued until the end, not because I didn't like the story but rather because it became a bit predictable which is probably less the book's fault and more mine for reading to much books in this genre and becoming too accoustomed with typical plot lines. It was still a fun read with an unusual setting and I practically inhaled it so defintely worth it.