Raimie Barcega’s Reviews > The Lotus Shoes > Status Update

LF and LJ preparing LJ for her wedding soon, sewing and embroidering 8 pairs of lotus shoes for the family they will go to as gifts. themes of power are talked about more, but nothing too exciting happens ! LF understands why LJ sacrificed LF's freedom, to help herself through this marriage she's about to enter, and with LJ about to become a bride, she will become more equal to LF which will be interesting !!

19: apparently LJ and LF are friends now in LJ's mind, but LF will always be able to recognize that they are slave and mistress with power imbalances. LF belongs to LJ still, with no plans to escape. LJ is about to be married and is just being ignorant and selfish in how she sees LF, nothing new. LJ was being especially rotten this chapter but i'm excited to keep reading

18: LF got her hand mangled by a mallet as punishment, but SR remains her companion and helps her heal physically and emotionally. SR inspires the will to live back in LF and LF decides she cannot live in her slavery the way she's been living, and that things must change for her. this poor girl's freedom has been ripped away from her more times than she's even gotten to live as a kid :(( i love little flowerrr

17: this book is breaking me, putting me back together with shitty glue, and then ripping me apart all over again. LF escaped through this christian family housing her for two weeks, and then she goes on this carriage ride to what we think is her final escape, but she is back at the house she was sold to. we still don't know if she was found out or if the family betrayed her, but the scene is equally devastating.

15: one of LJ's fathers wives has had a son finally and the family is so happy, even though there is a bit of tension between the other wives, LF has gotten 3 marriage offers via her matchmaker because of her incredible embroidery, but LJ knows this will take LF away from her, and she wants to keep LF forever because she can help LJ once she gets married. LF is so close to freedom but LJ will do anything to keep her

14: i took a break from this book to go back and annotate it from the start again, but i think the break might have been subconsciously because reading this book is devastating. SR was found after escaping and was brought back and punished horribly. her right eye was taken, and so far she is not the same after. LF is still hoping for a marriage to free her even though she is trying to help SR get better too :(

13: LJ is making an effort to become closer with LF, giving her a gift that ends up making LF feel suffocated and like she doesn’t deserve it, LJ makes promises that if she stays her maid, she will be kind to her and promote her when she can, but LF stays strong wanting to marry, to one day be free, they both can’t seem to understand why the other wants what they do, and LF is focused on helping SR escape

12: LJ has decided she wants to be friends with LF and make up for her past, the women in the family go to pray to a goddess for a son to be born, the gma makes the women strip down to prove their devotion and pray for hours, the women are cold and suffering, LJ’s mother getting the worst. LJ and LF beg gma and persuade her that this could make the wife who is pregnant get sick and the baby could be in danger :(

the family has gone to a matchmaker to find LF a marriage, at first it looks hopeless because she has no golden lilies, but she impresses the matchmaker with an embroidery technique she created, because of this, the matchmaker agrees to try and find her a match but since her feet are gnarled from being bound and then unbound again, she says that even a deformed poor family’s son might reject LF :((

not a chapter update, just regular update but ohhh wow oh wow this book is affecting me in ways i really didn't think it would. i already want to reread this book and i feel like i've barely started it 😭😭 to be a woman is to suffer at the hands of men oh my god, also this book is shaping up to be a five star read and i don't give those out lightly