[Contemplation] House of Cards by sugamins
A NOTE OF HISTORY HERE:
WARNING TAGS: Alternate Universe - Gangsters, Gang Violence, Violence, Drugs, Drug Use, Explicit Sexual Content, Explicit Language, Blood and Gore, Blood and Torture, Gambling, Gunplay, Undercover, Disturbing Themes, Homophobic Language, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Xenophobia, Dom/sub, Threesome - M/M/M, Drug Addiction, Dubious Consent
Here is the synopsis of the story:
Jungkook is the heir to a mob empire, the most notorious in the whole of Seoul. Taehyung is a rookie sent in to infiltrate by his select team and bring the empire crumbling down.
"You knew the game and played it, it kills to know that you have been defeated."
I started off the review with this story because this is the first story that got me into ao3. AO3 was not then accepting new members and I had to read the story from a reposted topic from wattpad. Thankfully the story was properly credited.
PLOT: The fiction contains 25 Chapters of 400k word count so yeah, it's pretty long. The story starts when Kim Taehyung, a rookie Police Officer was sent to infiltrate a big Korean Mob led by the Mob Founder's son Jeon Jungkook. As he successfully infiltrates the mob and gets close to Jungkook, all sorts of crazy shts happened for Taehyung in order to survive and from there you just can't stop reading. This story is, for one thing, very original. I love reading both fanfiction and non fanfiction and this truly is one of the most memorable pieces of literature I have ever come across. I don’t mind reading violence and gore, but even I was really surprised at the details this story involved. I mark this as a masterpiece in psychological thriller.
CHARACTERS: The characters are all BTS members who functions in different parts of the story. The Main Characters Kim Taehyung, Jeon Jungkook and Park Jimin were complex in more ways than one. There are very few authors who can write such complex characters. Who can make you sympathize with monsters. Who can make you hate a character one minute, then love him the next. This fanfic showed that we're not only good people or bad people. People are grey. And even monsters are capable of love. It played with my head so bad that I can't even explain it.
REALISM: House of Cards is so well-written that it's a shame it isn't an actual published book. The amount of research and thought that went into this book, this author has amazing talent! Even without a whole team behind her (him?) they were able to include details of cars, guns, drugs, businesses, police work, the underground world and I was constantly blown away by how much research went into writing this. Some aspects somewhat makes you dumbfounded that they actually happen in real life and people do these things in order to survive.
HIGHLIGHTS: Everything. Hahaha You have to appreciate every part of this because it's just that awesome hahahah! Okay kidding aside, I love Yoongi and Jimin interactions. They're sincere to each other and they don't need intimacy to prove that :)
BEST QUOTES: "Out there things are going to get terrifying for you. You will see things and hear things that will fuck you up. You will do bad things. Because that's how you survive. But you're one of the good guys. No matter what happens, I know you won't let that shit destroy you." -Kim Namjoon
MEMORABLE AS: Psychologically driven, Thriller, Explicit Sexual and Language Content. Yoonmin moments, Memorable dialogues!
House of Cards is one heck-of-a-ride so it's a shame it's not a book (yet). I mean if fanfics like Fifty Shades of Grey can be a best-seller then House of Cards deserves way more recognition because it's actually good fiction.
For warnings, this fic has a lot of sensitive content. Do read the warning tags before you proceed. But if you're okay with that and just want to see a nice gem, then please read it because you'll be missing a great story here if you don't!!
My Rating:
Plot: 10/10
Characters & Dialogue : 10/10
Structure & Pacing: 10/10
Theme: 9.8/10
Style & Tone: 9.7/10
OVERALL RATING: 9.9