Aru Shah and the City of Gold by Roshani Chokshi

e-ARC, 400 pages
Release Date: April 6, 2021
Published by: Rick Riordan Presents
Read from: April 4-28, 2021
Pandava, #4
Source: Netgalley (I received a copy of this book from Netgalley and the Publisher in exchange for a just and honest review. This did nothing to influence my review.)
TW: 
For fans of: Folklore, Own Voices, LOL, Romance, MG/YA Crossover, Series

     Aru Shah and her sisters–including one who also claims to be the Sleeper’s daughter–must find their mentors Hanuman and Urvashi in Lanka, the city of gold, before war breaks out between the devas and asuras.
     Aru has just made a wish on the tree of wishes, but she can’t remember what it was. She’s pretty sure she didn’t wish for a new sister, one who looks strangely familiar and claims to be the Sleeper’s daughter, like her.
     Aru also isn’t sure she still wants to fight on behalf of the devas in the war against the Sleeper and his demon army. The gods have been too devious up to now. Case in point: Kubera, ruler of the city of gold, promises to give the Pandavas two powerful weapons, but only if they win his trials. If they lose, they won’t stand a chance against the Sleeper’s troops, which will soon march on Lanka to take over the Otherworld.
     Aru’s biggest question, though, is why every adult she has loved and trusted so far has failed her. Will she come to peace with what they’ve done before she has to wage the battle of her life?

*MY THOUGHTS*

This series is one of my favorites from the Rick Riordan Presents line, and every time the next one comes out, I get excited. And this one was no different. And although this wasn’t my favorite, I still enjoyed reading it and seeing what kind of trouble the Pandavas got up to!

“The moment someone knows what you want, it becomes a weapon in their hands,” Hanuman had taught them.”“

4%

Aru and her Pandava sisters have found another sister. Well not a Pandava sister, but another daughter of the Sleeper. She joins them to fight the gods and those trying to stop them from getting rid of the Sleeper’s army. To help fight him, they are promised two very powerful weapons if they can win the trials he places in front of them. But how can any teen concentrate on that when all the adults or those in charge are turning out to be missing or just plain not who she thought they were?

“The only people who can truly speak of history are ghosts.”“

18%

The best thing about this was the characters. I always love meeting new characters in these types of stories. It makes me go looking into who they are and if they mean anything to the story they’re in. And these characters that we got to meet were kinda awesome. I especially loved the mongoose with the jewels lol (Read it and you’ll see lol)

“Happiness destroyed only begets more destruction,” said Tara.”“

29%

There’s also the fact that Chokshi is still a master story teller. This story would be NOTHING without all the humor. The Pandavas all have very different but hilarious personalities and it was wonderful being back with them. There’s also the new characters. I enjoyed learning more about them as we met them. And let’s not talk about that ending scene…….

“The good guys weren’t so good. The bad guys weren’t so bad. So where did that leave her?”“

56%

Now there were some times where I thought she could go a little more indepth with with her writing tho. Idk if that makes sense, so basically what I mean is I wanted more. For example, if the scene is on the cover, I want more of a fight. Maybe it was just me because I kept starting and stopping reading because of my baby, but I did feel that it was a bit light on the fight scene compared to what she usually does.

“As I have learned over my many lives, sometimes the best way to win is to walk away.”“

62%

And I mentioned the ending scene, but what about all of it? Is Chokshi TRYING to kill us with these cliff hangers? She’s given us one in every book! And this one in my opinion was the worst! How can you end a book when about 98% of things have changed?! Like I have so many questions and there’s so many that have not been answered ugh lol I can’t wait to get the next one!

“Ugly words have a tendency to burn the mouth and as Aru spoke, she felt scalded.”“

78%

This series is one of my favorites from the RR Presents line. When I heard it was coming out, I knew it was a no brainer to go ahead and read this one. Although it wasn’t my favorite, I still enjoyed it and I can’t wait to see what goes down in the last book. With the ending of this book, I can’t imagine how its all going to end. I guess we’ll see!

Overall, I give this