Water Moon book review

Water Moon by Samantha Sotto Yambao
on January 14, 2025
Pages: 384
Goodreads

A woman inherits a pawnshop where you can sell your regrets, and then embarks on a magical journey when a charming young physicist wanders into the shop, in this dreamlike and enchanting fantasy novel.
On a backstreet in Tokyo lies a pawnshop, but not everyone can find it. Most will see a cozy ramen restaurant. And only the chosen ones—those who are lost—will find a place to pawn their life choices and deepest regrets.
Hana Ishikawa wakes on her first morning as the pawnshop’s new owner to find it ransacked, the shop’s most precious acquisition stolen, and her father missing. And then into the shop stumbles a charming stranger, quite unlike its other customers, for he offers help instead of seeking it.
Together, they must journey through a mystical world to find Hana’s father and the stolen choice—by way of rain puddles, rides on paper cranes, the bridge between midnight and morning, and a night market in the clouds.
But as they get closer to the truth, Hana must reveal a secret of her own—and risk making a choice that she will never be able to take back.

Water Moon was one of my Illumicrate books and I am trying to make a better effort to read them. I went into this one not really knowing what to expect or where it was going to go. This was such a whimsical story with some fantastic places described and you never quite catch your breath as you make your way from place to place. There were some brilliantly imagined backgrounds and some wonderful worlds that create a breathtaking journey through a whole variety of places that you cannot even begin to work out.

We follow Hana and Kei as they try and work out where Hana’s father has disappeared to, following various clues and pursued by the monsters of the Other World. The different landscapes is really what makes this book, there is something beautiful about each of the worlds and how illogical they all are. I really loved seeing the different travel methods and how they all made their own sense in different ways. I loved the village where the night sky is created and the way that hopes and dreams are entwined all the way through the mythology. The use of origami and paper cranes was such a beautiful addition to this story as a whole and the way it was used all the way through made me so joyful.

I think the friendships and the people throughout this book is what makes it so special, I love how separated they are within the different worlds. Also seeing where they all fit in within Hana’s timeline and the store. Especially, Haruto and his beautiful hands, this is a character that deserved the world and more. I adored his outlook on life and how he thinks things will work out for him. It was utterly heartbreaking.

One thing that I wasn’t a huge fan of was the romantic elements, they felt very rushed and without the depth needed for the ending to have the impact it needed. I would have loved for it to have been more hinted at and for it to have actually been a friendship rather than anything more. Especially with the amount they had to learn from each other. There was such great scope for something more than what we got unfortunately, and I believe there could have been a lot more growth for the characters.

The climax and mystery was very well thought through and I loved seeing the cycle of the way things worked and how the entire world was created. The idea of the Pawnshop and the things they deal in and how that affects everything around them was beautifully explained and well integrated into the story. The idea of tattoos and fates was fantastic, especially the impact they ended up having on the various characters. I do think there needed to be a little more direction when it came down to the direction they were headed in, at some points it felt a little jumpy and with no real cohesiveness.

I will definitely be picking up her other work, I really enjoyed how beautiful the writing was and the vibes it was giving off.