Dropped at ch 233, because her relationship with her man in the first life interfered too much with her love life in this reincarnation, because 1) this husband looks exactly like the first one who sent her to su*cide and eliminated her entire family and all relatives 2) because this one was not nice to the previous soul in this body at all. When I read the spoilers that Mu Gu, the best friend, such a sunny boy Mu Gu, will go crazy and die, that killed any remaining desire to continue reading.... more>>

 This was reinforced by the fact that the original soul from the modern body is still here, in this world, occupying some other body, and still loves and wants her husband and nope, won't get him. He loved her and now he loves another soul in the same body, the super elegant ancient woman,herbeing a brave general slash empress slash business magnate soul and artsy to boot. Just loving him no matter what doesn't cut it anymore. That was his reason to divorce her in the very beginning of the novel. They are simply not a good match on so many levels. 

First, he appreciates that he had to suffer to conquer this one. Second she is super educated, gifted and developed, a true match to him on every level.  But until ch 233 it was good, interesting and well translated. Kept me entertained until I suddenly lost interest in all of them and in the author herself. <<less

Very well written and translated. A modern police woman in drug trafficking force transmigrates into the body of an ancient Chinese rejected bride who killed herself out of desperation, because the emperor's brother refused to marry her due to her weak character mismatching his own and his needs for a wife with a stronger personality. ... more>>

He broke the engagement and she run into a column to hit her head and this is how our FL awakens, with her forehead covered in blood and back in her father's home where no one wants her since she was orfaned at the ripe age of one month old.

Stopped reading this one very soon. Too heavy on concubines and their daughters and other people I felt not interested in. Most importantly, I felt no interest in FL or her future husband, the prime minister. There is zero joy in this novel. <<less

Writers of Korean dramas love to use sudden onset of mental ilnesses in their plot. Anything goes, from amnesia, social anxiety and depression with psychotic... more>> features, to split personalities. This author decided to do the same in the second half of the novel. She decided to give the FL severe and acute mental illness. If I wanted a Korean drama, I would just go and watch some. I dislike authors who use mental illness as a plot device in the novels to make them interesting.  <<less

Stopped at ch 133. Both FL an ML, especially the latter, failed to catch and hold my interest in them. It's as if this novel is about nothing, and I am not really that interested in bickering between an old lady and her neurotic duchebag of a daughter in law, or in s*x life of a fourteen year old who is willing to do it with an old lecher but not with a young stud. And her father agrees! ... more>>

The novel started as very, I must say VERY interesting, and then the author ventured into an area of dealing with an emperor sociopath, wait, two of them, and lt us not forget that ML is a firure emperor as well and is explicitly described as an epitome of sociopathy, and I dropped it a couple of times, tried to give it another chance, and then said good bye for good. 

It became politics for the sake of politics and zero real life and real human emotions. It is chapter 133 and still no one loves no one at all, the only good person and good relationship a distant past, that between a kind woman and a newborn she picked up next to a little creek. <<less

So cute! Heartbreaking... Maybe it's because I mtled the second half, or maybe because of the novel itself, the impression that I got changed dramatically from it being a story of a young woman dutifully working on changing her luck and luck of others around her, to a heavy and very smart family tragedy.... more>>

 Since I learned about nanny being the kidnapper and the mother of the adopted daughter, I got so disgusted by the horror of it, how the parasite infiltrated a family along with her child, I could no longer enjoy anything in this novel. To me it became a giant panorama of modern Chinese family dynamics, and Chinese society overall, not a story about life of its central character, Mingxi.

 The story lost its drive, stopped being a story about characters that you love and care about and I no longer cared about the plot or justice and could not believe in love in any family depicted in this novel. It became a descriptive analytical essay of sorts, a sociological paper. Too bad. <<less

Asinine. Absolutely idiotic. Stopped at ch. 396. I endured long enough.

Boring AF. The change of translators did it great damage. The first translator was great, the second bad and the third one insufferable. Stopped at... more>> ch 17. <<less

Dropped on ch 122. Poor Chinese town and poor Chinese military in the 1990s, equipped with Soviet munitions, full of hatred and lacking normal human... more>> emotions and relationships. Zero interest in ML and eventually lost interest in FL as well, because she is unattached to the point that she feels autistic. It's like they are not human, their qualities are too artificial. Poor writing and change of translators to one nicknamed Death something finally did it. Not reading that no more. <<less

Dropped at ch 57. It was an interesting adventure until they both got their freedom and everyone and their brother started messing with their desire... more>> to be together, to marry, etc. I don't care about mother in law, imperial cousins and half baked martial masters from a province. Let alone dainty pastries for prices no one could afford. Not interesting no more. Crude story with crude translation. And an extremely distasteful finale. Fooo, yucky... <<less

Similar to I Just want to freeload on Your Luck, a swap of two daughters and the fam is unable to love or even recognize their birth daughter as their own pampering the intruder instead for business marriage reasons with a more powerful fam of her fiance. And she does not care about her blood relatives. Of course, there is a kind grandma that brought her up as well.... more>>

 Except that the freeloader in this one is the ML, he and FL had been swapping bodies up to two times per day, willingly or unwillingly, for unknown reasons, since the age of seven. And she did excel in a lot of things for which he had been recognized. 

I still haven't figured out what this novel is about, but I am beginning to lose interest around ch 22. The text and translation are not remarkable in any way.

Initially, her I Don't Care rxn was fresh and happened in surprising places in the novel, but eventually I got fed up with it, because it feels like she does not care about anything at all, nothing drives her behavior, except two things mentioned so far, her love and need to care for her grandma and her love for country for which she sends the ML to participate in an international piano competition of prodigies. She pays, of course, when its his turn, they swap.

So it feels like nothing happened in twenty two chapters and nothing will, there is no drama, no humor, no intrigue, nothing picks our interest and makes us anticipate further events.  <<less

Tried to read it twice. The first time I lasted for two chapters, the second time - for eight. It is awkwardly translated and empty... more>> of meaning, really. A uni graduate in MBA and an experienced executive secretary at the age of 29 transmigrated into the body of a 13 years old s*ave girl, at 14 starts working for the second master and at 16 to sleep with him until now that she is 18 and he is 22 and has to marry and cannot marry a s*ave. Her future MIL attempts to mu*der her, etc. There is smut every other chapter and the Chinese style webnovel s*x, unbearable for the receiving woman and lasting all night for the stud who leaves her covered in bruises with torn muscles and what not. Weird stuff. <<less

Just as it got exciting around ch 29, it quickly went downhill. The first thirty chapters were hideous because of the ML and the way the FL was with him. Next, the focus shifted to the FL and she disgusts me to no end. I simply don't see her as adorable or the goddess of cooking as the title says. There is nothing to adore in that person and there is no love of cooking or loving people through cooking for them. Only money and prestige through opening restaurants and pastry shops and having a name. She is disgusting, her foul mouth stinks to heavens. Each time someone was threatening to kill her, I honestly... more>> wanted them to succeed.

 Now I understand the ML in the first twenty chapters. She is obnoxious and truly has no manners. Who cares about her cooking is she lies her way though the day and fights like a true Chinese villain with all 32 stratagems in use. She is terribly rude and low, coarse and suffocating. Next to her I begin to miss the bandits and soldiers and the fresh air of the mountains, really.

Dropped around ch 72. City life of nobility is so not interesting. And the FL s*x life is so not interesting. The ML is a Chinese stud of sorts, from a culture where a man would r*pe someone else's bride and then treat her terribly and after a month of cohabitation just discard as a nobody. Even worse was his treatment of his maid and bed warmer of several years, not just discard and leave without employment, but tell her that she is no longer young.

 The FL has such a foul mouth that everything else pales in comparison, all her modern uni education, years of worldwide travels, good deeds and whatnot lose value after you read over and over how terribly how brutally and distespectfully she treats people when she speaks and then assumes that it was nothing, people should not take it seriously.  <<less

Dropped around ch 56, at the family dinner which is not a family dinner. Gosh, this is such a weird novel!... more>>

I don't even know why the tag of romance. This is the least romantic novel I have ever read. It is more about two extremely lonely business tycoons with very abrasive personalities in their private lives because they are forced to live together for a while, five years or less in contract marriage.

 The disgust they feel for each other is horrendous. It's on the level of physical aversion. Who cares after that that they will fall in love and be together. This is the central trope of Chinese life where the most important value is having a good life, meaning financially smooth and enjoying food, good job, lots of overtime, etc. Things like friends, family or love, charity and spiritual fulfilment are not even an afterthought. Reading about their thoughts about breeding qualities of a wife to produce an offspring is simply so off-putting, that it kills all desire to continue reading. 

It is written passably well though. It is just not my cup of tea.  <<less

Ch.753 imperial harem sh*t with the dowager and the empress, etc. Bueeeeh... yuck. ... more>>

Around ch 400 it begins to tell the boring part of this saga: the Mengs and other powerful aristocratic families from the capital and politics, the crown prince wannabe, arranged marriages and factions. People we do not care about at all and the author is not a master writer to make that topic interesting. Both her linear writing and extremely rough level of translation are very primitive and not suitable for such themes. 

The FL is 13 years old by now, the ML left to army, her next business plan is to develop medicnal plants farming and medicinal diet recipes for the restaurant network. At home, to move to the new house, to marry her mom to Hu Bo, to move the bodyguard family to live with them in her two stories house. And on a personal level, to continue to explore the 15th of each month nightly phenomenon of her soul travels between two of her bodies.

The Bai family villains are regularly bothering her using the same old tricks to try to make her shell out some money to them. The two Bai brothers have split by now and the elder bro again broke both arms. So one brother's family is totally useless by now and penniless with the old Lady losing money, the entire wheat harvest to rain, and power status, and another brother's family begins to at least rely on some fishing but still borrows rice from wife's brother in exchange for the fish. <<less

Stopped at ch 73 of mtl. Bored to read ugly text, especially once the emperor appeared and the capital families, of which I have zero... more>> interest, that's all. The novel as such is ok. <<less

Too many nasty characters, not enough goodness. By November 4th, 2021 it has been translated up to ch 357. The TCM competition with two cousins.... more>> The first wo rounds out of five. <<less

The same old. Barely passable translation, a story of a 50y.o woman who lived for 20 years in modern Chna and for 30 in some xianxia world as a cultivator slash pill maker reborn in a 16y.o. body of her younger self, intense troubles in the family with mother and grandmother, s*upid focus on grades and position in the top of the list of the best students, entertainment industry as means to make a quick buck, hateful envious co-eds, and older sister, etc. No focus on joy of learning, it is all about performance and status in ranks, overall smartness.... more>>

 There is quite a bit of goodness as well on the part of her sha ma te friends, all rich second gen and poor students, her uncles, and her boyfriend to be and his relatives. 

The most terrible punishment for her son-worshipping parents that the author came up with is the homosexuality of their only son and two granddaughters from their two daughters. In traditional Chinese worldview, which is opposite to Jewish and scientific, genetic reality, their branch of family ended, because their son did not have a son, no offspring from the son or any other achievements as an adult, only shame.

The ending shocked me, made me cry and feel heavy in my chest. She became an immortal, her precious boyfriend, husband, father of their only child died at 120 and a thousand years later was reborn, given the same name and given to her to rear and be hers.

It is attractive in some weird way, characters are well sculpted, but there is a lot of drivel that I don't care about, particularly chats in forums and entertainment industry bit or her exceptionally white skin, etc. <<less

Stopped at ch 199. Boring AF. Having read several novels of this sort, about striving for the first place in school or in math competitions on national level, and the weirdest relationships in families , between students and teachers and among co eds in Chinese schools, as depicted in C-novels, I begin to lose sense of how abnormal this all is.... more>>

 This novel stands alone though, it tries to describe something different. Not just rote learning and insane amounts of memorization and repetitions but FL's mentor, her boyfriend to be actually teaches her to think and analyze. 

I do not now how anyone can survive in such school and home environment as depicted in those "god of learning" novels. High school or even college and uni is not all that! And I speak from experience, having degrees from unis of the same world rank as Tsinghua or Peking universities: top 15-top 25 in the world. 

 There is something seriously wrong with the heads of those authors when they pile up such crap mountain high. <<less

This entire story is narrated by the FL and right off the bat she discloses that she hates Chinese language and literature and got the lowest marks in it in her college admission exams. I guess that sums it all. If you detest language and literature so much then why write a story and publish it and charge for reading it? WTF?... more>>

This text is full of such contradictions. For example, she cannot eat Western, only can eat Chinese food, whatever that means, and is starving for ten days in Maldives (how Maldives are being "Western" escapes me) eating only fruit and losing weight, her only joy being a bowl of instant noodles, made in China, aparently, for her birthday, yet when she is back home and eats Chinese food she has to vomit ot all or be hospitalized for indigestion!

 WTF!? There are tons of Chinese restaurants in Maldives and every resort offers Chinese foods for their guests.

It was moderately interesting and funny at first, but later on it felt like tragedy, like a diary of a profoundly depressed and abused person who is trying to make us laugh by not taking herself seriously and joking about herself all the time. 

Her husband starves her sexually, calls her s*upid, idiot, ugly, useless, cow dung etc., sexually assaults her and we are supposed to think that he is such a catch and fall on love with him along the way. It is also very Chinese in the sense that here we see a husband who is training and educating and modifying his wife as if she was a service dog, in a way that feels manipulative, not civil at all, let alone respectful or loving.

They both work full time, each has their own money and expenses, their marriage is not a marriage, all she needs from him is just a small corner in his giant bed, because she cannot sleep alone, she is tortured by night!ares otherwise, and he charges her for that: in exchange she is supposed to cook for him, clean, do his laundry, etc. while he is perfectly capable of doing all that FOR her or with her. There is no charity or sympathy or love. Only the economy of exchanges of some kind of favors or services, like a marketplace.

Mildly interesting, Not something that is pleasant to read although it is very well written and well translated. It only shows a  huge chasm, vast differences in mentalities of modern female Chinese authors and non-Chinese ones. Dropped. I stopped reading after he, a man she has nothing to do with, whom she considers being gay, restricted her and gave her a mouth to mouth kiss with saliva and all, ewwwww. EWWW... <<less

Lovely but poorly translated. But very, very lovely.

Wow! What a gem! Impeccable translation by mimi @jiyangtranslations and a beautiful, beautiful love story. Did I say beautiful? Sooooooo satisfying, especially in the beginning, mmmm...... more>>

....And then we learn that all this beauty is built on foundation of unimaginable cruelty and torture. I do not know why mimi stopped translating it midway, but reading it after that point in the story, when the ML finally "catches" the MC, proposes and places an engagement ring on his finger, became meaningless and very painful. I tried reading up to ch 81 and had to stop. 

Reading about horrors and brutality of s*x correction camps at the very end of the novel felt like overkill. It also felt like us readers were made to look into someone's private pain in the middle of happy and ridiculously exclusive wedding preparations, like this couple deserved privacy and the MC's mother and other parents of mutilated or dead gay teens - some degree of guilt and amends for what they did which never happens in this family. So I became dissatisfied with the author's lack of sensitivity and her sense of justice and stopped reading when she crossed more than one line. <<less

Tour de force. One of a kind, truly. ... more>>

Unfortunately, the author destroyed all that beauty with her own hands. The more she wrote, the less attractive all characters became, including the main couple. <<less