She was the prime minister family’s third daughter, but never got the love of her parents because she was born in February (predestined to bring bad luck) and born by a concubine. After suffering patiently, but firmly resolved on revenge for eight years, she managed to become the empress. But life is unpredictable. The person you love the most is the one who hurts you the most. After giving out so much, she ended up being given poisoned wine.
Fortunately, God gave her the opportunity to start over again. So how can she waste this great opportunity? Who said being given birth by a concubine deserve to be bullied? She controlled her own life, not God. This time she will definitely not repeat the same mistakes!
She took on a new lease of life. She was no longer the kindhearted lady who was bullied and humiliated in the prime minister’s residence. Those people who had framed her, she will repay them double.
Punishing her father’s first wife, her stepmother. Suppressing her hypocrite step-sister. This was followed by the prince’s love. After working so hard, she only wanted a low-key life. But these people cannot wait to drag her to accept the people’s worship. This was not regarded as good news to her because she had to stay away from these luminous body.
Unfortunately, a man’s heart is like a needle at the bottom of the ocean. Cannot fish up and unable to guess or make out.
The man she vowed to stay completely away from embroiled in matter of life or death for her. Her former arch-enemy expressed that he has been secretly in love with her for many years. In addition, she has the misfortune of being involved with the world’s most attractive and intelligent rogue.
Acting coquettishly, acting cute and acting affectionate. Why she did not notice her nominal younger brother was actually a secretly sly (black belly) male covered with beautiful skin?
Oh no! The enemy has not been wiped away completely but she has fallen into the trap of love again. Hence what should she do?
[Ebook] [Eng Translation (Chapters 1- 29: Vietnamese source) (Chapters 30-on)][Thứ Nữ Hữu Độc][Manhua][Manhua in English]
[Audiobook][Alternate Single Voice Completed Audiobook][Drama with Eng Subs]
No no, I am not reading or listening to this novel bcos it is way too long. I am posting this for those who are interested in this kind of palace scheme romance as well as Tiffany’s fans. Thus, don’t ask me any question.
The drama will start filming soon and I think it’ll be very different from the novel, judging from the synopsis. The 1st audio book is pretty good with multi voices but I think it is incomplete. Hence you’ve to endure the alternate audio book in order to finish listening to the novel.
Ooh O: I actually really like this novel and coincidentally I am actually re-listening to the audiobook for the second time right now. The female lead is very intelligent and very calculating. Her enemies constantly try to plot her death, but she always manages to thwart their plans and instead come out on top. Maybe because I am female myself, but I do love a good novel with a strong heroine. If you manage to stick the entire audiobook through I think you might come to like it.
i wish some actor like liu shi shi will play for this role.. i just like her acting as ma ertai ruoxi calculating and smart girl.. i hope Tang Yan will not dissapointed me.. no offence i like tang yang but i just dont think her acting is really good..
How many chapters are there? Seriously, I rather read the book. I like Tang Yan but I hope her acting doesn’t destroy the story.
The audiobook of this story at Kting is great but incomplete.
Not sure if it is complete yet or not.
I plowed through 60+ chapters in a day and am amazed at how I never came across this when it first came out. I wouldn’t say the author’s writing is brilliant, but it’s simple and straightforward. Weiyang is such a smart girl and she doesn’t play nice so it’s entertaining to see how her enemies try to come up with evil schemes but end up walking right into her traps. I have like 500 pages left to read (I’m reading this off a different site) to finish so I hope there will be more than just reading about those idiotic enemies plotting against her. Some romance would be nice. 🙂
Is this a happy ending? Otherwise, not going to plough through all those chapters 😛
Hope someone gets interested in this and decides to translate it ^^ It sounds similar to Mei Gongqing, which I’m liking so far. I hope she has a happy ending in her 2nd chance at life.
Spoilers alert (below): *I don’t know how to set the spoiler settings 🙁
Yes, it is a happy ending. For those of you who have read far enough, I personally really like when she gets a new identity as the missing daughter of Gougong Fu. The warm atmosphere of the family and the interactions between the brothers was touching and funny, especially when they tried to stop the male lead from trying to see her. Her “younger brother” mentioned above is actually the male lead. Before you think of the i word, he is not blood related to her at all. The importance of his identity plays out in the second half of the novel.
Is the 7th prince not the male leas but her stepbrother?
Im currently lsitening to the audiobook. There isnt much about the males yet. But from what i heard her stepbrother is only 10 now.
Loved this novel, read it about three times.
I agree with Lolli, it sounds similar to Mei GongQing. How many chapters is it? I hope someone pick it up for translations, I will willingly help to proofread. Heehee~
Is there a hint of comedy in this novel? I like Tifanny Tang (Tang Yan) however she seems more suited to comedy.
Personally I don’t think it resembles Mei Gong qing. In that book, the lead simply wants to live a peaceful life with a husband that would only marry her. In this novel, the mc wants revenge. She wants her family (especially her sister) and husband to pay dearly for what they did to her. It’s understandable, considering what they did to her. So in the beginning of the book, she is a cold-hearted bitch who cares for no one….or at least that is what she thinks. Yes, she’s quite cold, and the way she deals with her enemies are shockingly terrifying, but she eventually warms up to people, even though she claims she doesn’t care for them. So her character development is her learning to love and trust people again.
……..which seems to be very different from where the drama is heading……..THEY ARE GOING TO MAKE HER INTO ANOTHER SWEET LEAD WHO RELIES ON MEN!!!!! Not only that, it’s possible they’re even changing the male lead ugghhhhhh. It feels like they are only keeping 20% of the novel, and then changing EVERYTHING ELSE. This is one of my favorite novels, and to see it being changed like this is so frustrating! Why can’t these adaptations be like Bu Bu jing Xin?? Where they pretty much kept everything the same???? Is it because her character is too cold???? THAT’S OKAY!! She slowly warms up to people again. I mean, yeah, she still uses extremely cruel tactics to get rid/punish her enemies, but that makes sense considering what she’s been through (and what some of her enemies did too).
okay, sorry about that rant, I didn’t intend to blab about all that, it just came out while I was commenting about the book.
Who’s second male lead?How many chapter r there? Similar to Mei Gong qing or Chu wang fei?
I’m not really sure if there is a second lead, as in the guys who are romantically interested in her besides the male lead don’t hold much importance to her or the entire story (maybe half but not all)
If I must point one out then:
Another thing, I wouldn’t say it’s similar to either Mei Gong Qing or Chu Wang Fei.
One, Chu Wang Fei isn’t a rebirth, but a modern soul traveling to an ancient setting, and even that element wasn’t that important (she adapts a bit too well). The things the mc did in the book was retaliation towards those that wanted to kill her and wanting to live well. Two, in Mei Gong Qing, the mc simply wanted to avoid her previous husband, marry a guy who would only marry her, and live peacefully (and maybe revenge against some of her old foes if they still try to bother her).
In 庶女有毒 (I prefer this title more, since it describe the novels better) it is about revenge, not just any revenge, but crushing the antagonist in the most bitter way possible. It’s not just the mc that does this, but the antagonists too. If we were to just talk about the mc, when she gets reborn, one of the first things she does is get revenge on her terrible caretaker. All she wants is to make all those that hurt her repay dearly for stepping on her in her previous life.
So, this novel really isn’t like Mei Gong Qing or Chu Wang Fei.
Both Chu Wang Fei and 庶女有毒 are long novels, but that’s about it. Chu Wang Fei was smart about defending herself, which sets of a chain of events that led to her enemies’ demise. She mainly exacted revenge on her step mother. Wei Yang however, sets out to deliberately plan the most devastating ends for ALL her enemies. TBH, I couldn’t finish Chu Wang Fei. I got weary of the overly detailed descriptions after a while, which I felt dragged out the pace of the story unnecessarily. However, the plot twists in 庶女有毒 are keeping me hooked in.
“In 庶女有毒 (I prefer this title more, since it describe the novels better) it is about revenge, not just any revenge, but crushing the antagonist in the most bitter way possible. It’s not just the mc that does this, but the antagonists too. If we were to just talk about the mc, when she gets reborn, one of the first things she does is get revenge on her terrible caretaker. All she wants is to make all those that hurt her repay dearly for stepping on her in her previous life.”
Totally agree Rinri!
I can’t agreed more with Rinri^^ To be honest I don’t find her cruel since what she did is what those enemies did to her in the past or might do to her this time around if she fell into their traps. She’s harsh but if given a chance those people would do even more harsher things to her.
I don’t know, a lot of her revenge plans were really quite cruel. Yes, if she didn’t do it her end might be even worse, but not cruel by comparison does not mean what she did was not harsh. She could have ended her enemies without torturing them to death. Her earlier revenges were as bad, but they gradually got worse and worse. I’m just glad for her that the man that loves her is just as black bellied. Also, admittedly, they were very satisfying for the readers.
I like this novel. I like her strong character.
Can I ask, what exactly did she do to her relatives? Cuz it seems like a lot of people are saying that she is more cruel than Yun Qian Meng, I find Chu Wang fei’s couple slightly ruthless in the way they handle things but it was still a very interesting read so I was wondering how cruel Wei Yang is cuz currently I’m at chap 20, wondering if I should continue to read.
@sparklingdawnlights
I find Yun Qian Meng and Chu Wang Fei more of the type to punish their criminals without hesitation. However, they don’t try to torture their victims in horrifying ways. It’s more like, they want to get rid of them, but couldn’t really care less about finding the worse way to do so.
Here, she really does try to, but at the same time, it is also satisfying (for the most part). You can try skipping the scenes.
I see, thank you! That mades thing much clearer. Just asking but when does the male lead appear? I thought it was 7 Prince lol
@sparklingdawnlights
I don’t remember when, but it should be fairly early in the book. The only problem was that he didn’t seem to be the male lead, so unless you know who he is, you might not even realize it’s him.
@sparklingdawnlights
the male lead is actually her younger adopted brother (he’s older than her though, keep reading and you’ll know what i mean and not blood related). though in the first book he didn’t do much since he didn’t have that much power. i actually like second book more since we see more of weiyang warmer side in this arc. though i do agree with 11thagent, her punishment and torture keep getting harsher and crueler. but that doesn’t meant she disregard people lives. she did try to compromise if she can. I remember in one of the chapter (before Jiang 4th son died), he told Weiyang, that the law of this world is the law of the jungle, only the powerful and strongest can win and stand above. you are not allowed to complain when you died injustice since you are the lower born. due to this Weiyang throw him in a cage of hungry beasts (she drug Jiang 4th son and the beasts with hunger drugs, so they’ll keep killing each other for hunger and die due to overeating). though cruel i do agree with Weiyang since he disregard other people lives due to his higher status (like others are oblige to obey him even if he want them to die) then she didn’t need to give him mercy.
p/s : i’m kinda biased since i really like this book (and i’m reading with google/bing/systranet translator since i didn’t know chinese but get the gist of the story)…hahaha…
Actually …
The [i]true[/i] birth secret of the male lead is revealed in an epilogue.
I really enjoyed Shu Nv You Du/Jin Xiu Wei Yang and would highly recommend it. It’s not a perfect novel (for example, I think the author got a few minor details mixed up – but they’re exceedingly minor, don’t impact the story, and you’d only notice if you were very carefully reading/following along), but I do think it’s a better story than Chu Wang Fei, which is the story that I find it most similar to.
There’s no doubt that the protagonist, LWY, is merciless and, yes, even cruel to her enemies. She has a rather creative mind for torture, though it’s implied that she got a lot of her inspiration from having spent something like 12 years in her previous life being tortured herself at the hands of eunuchs in the cold palace, which is where imperial consorts who have lost favor with the emperor are thrown. I would sum up her philosophy as “two eyes for an eye”.
You also get the sense that if she were ever to fall into the hands of her enemies (though she never does, fortunately, because she’s too cunning for them), she would resolutely face whatever cruel tortures they meted out to her, all while scheming her revenge. As she says, “You must dare to face the consequences of your actions”, meaning if you do something nasty to your enemies, you can’t cry foul if they manage to get back at you (that’s IF they manage it – which in LWY’s case, they never do).
There are 2 audiobooks for this book on Ximalaya. One has multiple (male and female) voices, the other only has (I think) 1 female voice. The audiobook with multiple voices is incomplete (it stops a bit before the end of the first half of the novel), whereas the female-voice-only audiobook is complete. I know a lot of people prefer multiple-voice audiobooks, but I actually think the female-voice-only audiobook is very well done. It might even be a professional/official audiobook? The female speaker’s male voice imitation is well done/doesn’t grate on my nerves, and I actually prefer it to some audiobook male speaker voices that I’ve heard that, frankly, sounded really whiny to me.
Has anyone finished the epilogues? I didn’t quite get the switch part.
Wei Yang had so many suitors!
Ying Chu was one of my favourite villians. Sure he was evil. But he was unwavering in his unconditional love for Empress Pei. He made his sacrifices with his eyes wide open, and he never regretted them. I loved the exchange he had with the Crown Prince at the end. Both of them competed and schemed against each other, but both ultimately were just striving for a bit of genuine attention from Empress Pei.
Empress Pei outplayed and outsmarted everyone, except Wei Yang. And even so, she still achieved her ultimate goal. In a way, she still won, as she got what she really really wanted.
I have to say, out of all the villains I read about in the CNovel land, Empress Pei is definitely one of the best. Don’t get me wrong, I hate her, but also find her fascinating.
The author did indicate Empress Pei was her favourite supporting character in the novel 🙂
haha..that’s so true. remind me of Mishil in kdrama ‘Queen Seon Duk’.
@11thagent
Yes empress pei is awesome. She remind me of brigitte lin in her early forties.
She is one of those villians i hate but cant help but love/admire
Can someone tell me the ending of the story?
Can someone spoil how the 2-faced older sister ends for me? Seriously! Does she get publicly humiliated? How? How will the vicious younger sister end up? The mother? I need details.
@Ivy Uy
From what I could understand through google translate, Weiyang messes with her elder sister’s beauty products and destroys her looks, literally makes her hair fall off and her face gets covered with festers. The sister who was known for her grace and beauty, has to wear a veil and false hair, as she becomes an eyesore, and makes people shudder.
Younger sister ends up with a scar on her face and goes mad….her mother calls a truce with weiyang to bring down the elder sisters mother….as far as I can remember….might not be 100% correct. GoogleT is hardly accurate….but its better than nothing.
Hi,
Thank you so much for the details. I really want to read this novel, I have heard that there´s another novel by the author named 千山茶客 that has very similar plotline to The Princess Wei Yang. In my mother land 千山茶客’s novel was translated first hence came the suspicioun regarding the similarity of the story plotline between Wei yang and 千山茶客’s novel. I wonder if anyone of you have read or know about 千山茶客¨s novel before.? I would love to read about your comment .
Last I checked, I know that Wei Yang was published long before 千山茶客’s one. Also because of the storyline Chu Wang Fei was also marked as has similar plotwise.
Thank you very much in advance.
@Ivy and Dee
Elder sister tried to poison Wei Yang’ s younger brother with a venomous and painful toxin. After discovering the plot, Wei Yang doctored elder sis’ hair oil with the poison instead. The poison was so unbearable that elder sister pulled out her own hair and scratched out her own face, destroying her good looks with her own hands. She had to sport a wig and mask after that but hid it from everyone else and pretended she recovered. The wig and mask caused her condition to degrade further and turn septic as her flesh couldn’t ‘breathe’ properly. Wei yang engineered it so that elder sister unwittingly fell down a flight of stairs in public with her wig and mask thrown askew, thus revealing her true grotesque condition publicly.
revenge! can someone please tell me what chapters those events happened in?
I’m curious as to wether which one of the princes becomes the emperor
Definitely won’t be Wei Yang’s first husband haha. Wei yang was foretold to have a queen’s destiny, and her first husband, that of a king. But no way she was going down the same tragic path again. And she totally obliterated her first husband’ s ambitious dreams.
@Inori I tried to read that one. I think they have same main theme as ‘rebirth’ with revenge as the MC’s goal, MC’s naive way before her rebirth and maybe a bit of male lead’s mysterious background. With these I thinj the similiarity is just 5%. Plotwise, i think its different.
I thought I was the only one who was late in discovering this novel..I hope the rest of the chapters will be translated even if it’s slow..I really like the plot..I needed a strong plausible revenge plot where the protagonist is focused and consistent till the end.
I gave up on this novel around the 2/3 mark, which is after the fall of Chang Le (evil elder step sis) n Tou Ba Zhen (heartless husband in her first life). The plots are quite enjoyable but sometimes Wei Yang is too incredibly … powerful? clever? to foil all the attempts to frame/rape/capture her, to the point of being unbelievable. I like most of the characters, even villains like Tuo Ba Zhen, First Mom, Jiang Hua. etc because i can understand their fears n ambitions. Some of their jealously are pretty questionable but in the general scheme of things, everything clicks..
I have no regrets skipping the last 1/3 chapters or my eyes would have gone blind. It is a pity to miss Empress Pei but … no regrets. If you are like me n have no confidence to read the entire novel, trust me that it is quite ok to abandon ship halfway without leaving a bad impression of the book.
Overall, this is quite a good read. Some of the scenes can be pretty revolting – the scabby bald head of Chang Le, the eyeless corpse left behind by one violent princess, the roasted human pig…. But yeah, I like the sadistic parts too so do give the book a try.
i think this book is quite enjoyable. i like how every revenge’s works and i like that weiyang isn’t a weak female character. slowly waiting for the next chapter will be release eventhough i can read it using pleco but chinese novels are killing me with the description words.I mean every paragraph literally describe every characters’s feeling then the scenery or even clothes… and the point only a small bit so gladly to see there is someone that translated this novel haha
I manage to skim through the second half in the past week n I must this story is quite interesting. Given its length, it is highly unlikely to be translated. I’m glad that Lie Yang is at least the Princess’ son. Unwanted but at least he fully deserves the Emperor’s doting.
So many good books to put on my que!! I don’t know, been pretty allergic to time-travel novels for a while, but the 重生 type is one of the exceptions. Gotta rush to this one before the drama comes out though!
Hello, additional VN translation source, since http://noline412.wordpress.com dropped it at chapter 147: http://diendanlequydon.com/viewtopic.php?f=144&t=314460. Up to chapter 250 has been translated. Enjoy!
@Dee thanks so much for answering my thoughts on the elder sister. Though I always wondered why her first husband killed her in the first life when he hates her that much. Then goes right around to seemingly love her in the second life?
Well @indomnianoodles, Tuo Ba Jun doesn’t have any memories of his “first life” because Wei Yang is reborn back into her younger self. Tuo Ba Jun hasn’t even lived his life yet at this point.
@indomnianoodles @tranzgeek, actually, Tuoba Zhen does get his memories back! It’s true he didn’t have them throughout the whole story, but fell in love with Wei Yang for real the second time around, and it turned into this really great love/hate dynamic, but towards the end, on the eve of fulfilling his big plan, Jiang Hua (he’s Wei Yang’s cousin of sorts, one of her great enemies in the first half of the novel, son of the Jiang family from which Jiang Rou, Wei Yang’s stepmother is from) gives Tuoba Zhen some sort of magic potion he got while he was in Yuexi that would allow one to see memories from his past life. The old sorceress who gave it to him said that Tuoba Zhen was fated to be king and Li Wei Yang was fated to be queen, but because there was so much hatred and obsession that that fate has been messed up. So Tuoba Zhen keeps seeing all the memories of his past life in his dreams and it haunts him. At first, Tuoba Zhen doesn’t believe it to be true, but then as events unfold at the very end, he believes those memories that he saw in his dreams.
@raini: It’s raini! It’s been so long since I’ve been on shushengbar, glad to see an old friend is still here!
Interesting @atsu. I have been really curious for a long time as to who Wei Yang’s fated other is (as many people prvsly mentioned someone named Yuan something?) and how they get together if her personality is so “unapproachable” (or at least…it seems from her evil schemes mentioned)?
@tranzgeek: It’s tranzgeek! Thank you for doing all the recaps of the drama! They are awesome 🙂
Haha, you’ll be shocked. LOTS OF SPOILERS BELOW: Her fated other in the book is Yuan Lie, also known as Li Min De! That’s right, her adopted younger brother (who’s technically not younger than her but whatever it’s complicated). She saved his life when they were very little (I think Da Fu Ren was trying to drown him but Wei Yang saved him) and he just followed her around adoringly as a little kid. In her previous life, he died in the drowning, so by saving his life, she changed the course of her whole life. After his adopted mother San Fu Ren dies, Li Wei Yang takes care of him sort of like an older sister, but Li Min De was always in love with her. 9th Princess was in love with him (just like she is in the drama), but he only has eyes for Wei Yang and eventually 9th Princess grows up to marry somebody else. Li Min De grows up to be the most beautiful man in all of Dali (and all of Yuexi), and he’s a fox, just as cunning and cold as Li Wei Yang. They are each other’s soft spots.
I doubt much of this next part is going to be in the drama but, here goes: Li Min De has a secret identity, and it’s that he’s Yuan Lie, the secret son of the Emperor of Yuexi and his sister, Princess Xixia. He thinks because he was born out of an incestuous relationship, that’s why he was born so beautiful (because it’s wicked or something like that). The Queen of Yuexi, Queen Pei (I never know how to translate these Chinese names. Anyways, she’s the major antagonist in the second part of the book – again, I don’t think the drama is going to go there) is out to get him. Queen Pei is also the one that massacres Wei Yang’s family (including Bai Zhi, her grandmother and her birth mother). Li Wei Yang leaves Yuan Lie behind to go by herself to Yuexi to get revenge on Queen Pei, and becomes Guo Jia, the long lost daughter of one of the 4 most powerful families in Yue Xi. Yuan Lie also goes back to Yuexi and adopts the title Prince Xu, the son of one of the king’s brothers. But he and everyone else (including the king) suspects that he’s the illicit child.
So long story short, together, Yuan Lie and Li Wei Yang succeed in turning another royal family in a different land on its head and they get their happily ever after. But at the end, Queen Pei reveals to the king as they are dying that Yuan Lie is not his son, but the son of Princess Xixia and Queen Pei’s brother and that the Crown Prince Yong Wen (who was cornered by the king and committed suicide) was actually his son with Princess Xixia.
So the book has two halves: the first taking place in Dali, the second in Yuexi. The Dali half ends with 3rd prince Tuoba Zhen (who is the basis for Tuoba Yu in the drama) becoming a half-blinded cripple. 7th Prince Tuoba Yu (who is the basis for Tuoba Jun in the drama, I think although except for personality, the two characters are pretty different trajectory wise) thinks he will become king. He’s married Ping Ting Junzhu to get power but is still so much in love with Li Wei Yang, and tries to seduce her but she undoes his plan and tells him that he will never become king. And true enough, the wise old fox also known as the King of Dali put 8th prince Tuoba Cong on the throne instead. (8th Prince is 9th Princess’s older brother, the one she pretends to be all the time). It was all part of his plan and Li Wei Yang knew it all along. But eventually, Tuoba Yu goes to the dark side and kills his brother to get the throne of Dali.
END SPOILER.
I doubt the drama is going to go into the second book at all, but I think elements of everything are incorporated a little. The book is a different animal but the drama’s pretty fun too.
Also, has anyone else seen the character list on Baidu? It’s crazy long and pretty amazing.
I’m a little wary that this story is 500+ chapters. I read a similar reborn-into-younger-self story recently called 媚公卿 and really like that sort of time-travel much better than the usual modern-to-ancient kind. It usually promises a FL that is very strong and calculating. After seeing the drama trailer, I realize I’m going to be much happier reading the audiobook afterall. Super allergic to Vanness Wu lol!! Plus the costume designer needs to be fired for putting braids on him, making him even more deadly.
The audiobook link on ximalaya seems to be taken down or the link is broken I think? Is the audiobook male+female voice?
@atsu hey there!! Yeah I disappeared for a long while. Recently got back into the hobby of listening to audiobooks again. So surprised someone still remembers me!!
@raini of course I remember you! We all had so much fun together back then! I’ve recently gotten back into audiobooks too.
I read 媚公卿 as well and like you, I much prefer the reborn-into-younger-self story much more than the modern-to-ancient kind. The female lead in this one is much more calculating than Chen Rong in 媚公卿 though. I read 媚公卿 after this one, and thought she was a little like a clawless kitten in comparison.
Vanness Wu is being dubbed by one of my favorite dubbers so that lessens the impact, but he still feels super modern, braids and all. The drama is so different though and not half as addictive as the book.
For 锦绣未央 you want to listen to the 全小全 version. It’s only one female narrator but in my opinion, her version sounds like a multiple voice version (don’t know how she does it), and I like it a lot more than the other version. Do you have 蜻蜓fm? You can get it on your phone just like ximalaya. Sending you the link here: http://neo.qingting.fm/channels/75422
🙂
@atsu thanks for the rec! I will definitely give it a try then. Haven’t tried 蜻蜓fm, but can’t go wrong with another source of audiobooks.
Is this story very palace-like 后宫 type conflicts between women or more political? I just read in the summary and the comments that she’s involved with the prince. Is he the ML?
@raini Hehe, I have all sorts of radios installed! It’s so different from the old format (cxt8) but I’m getting used to it.
I’ve always thought we had similar tastes in books! I also read 顾盼生欢 and some 君子以泽!
I think it’s pretty 后宫-type conflict at the start, but she also makes a ton of political enemies as a result of the “battles” at home. For instance, in the first part 大夫人 Jiang Rou is one of her earliest enemies and as a result of everything that happens, the whole Jiang family, which is a big political family with a lot of military power in Dali becomes her enemy. And as the novel goes on, her plots and plans get bigger and bigger, eventually impacting the succession to the Dali throne (she pits one prince against the prince that was her ex-husband). By the time we get to the second book in Yuexi, it’s not really 后宫 at all. She takes on a whole family and the Queen as part of her revenge and it’s pretty great. It’s not really court politics either though, so there’s none of that stuffy talk, but court politics do matter and make a difference in the story, if that’s what you mean. So it’s not exactly 甄嬛传 but also not 康熙王朝. Li Wei Yang makes Zhen Huan or even Chen Rong seem like a clawless little kitten.
She’s involved with one of the Tuoba princes in the drama version, but not in the book. Have you read 知否?知否?应是绿肥红瘦?It’s a little like that where there are a lot of guys in love with her (some of them princes), but the ML doesn’t start as a prince (but he eventually becomes one in part 2, which is a long story). I made the mistake of jumping on the wrong ship at the beginning and was in for a long, heartbreaking ride.
The book is split into two halves, and the first one is definitely more fun because she really goes all out and is pretty heartless. In the second part, Li Wei Yang sort of grows a heart and there are some pretty awesome characters, more than in the first part. But it’s also pretty gory and disturbing torture parts so, fair warning! I skipped some of those because it was just too much…
@raini: the audiobook is much better than the drama. I watched two eps and gave up. They changed the whole story. I dont even know why they use the title of the book if they were going to change the whole story. I gave up because they changed my most hated character into the male lead. Every time they say his name, i couldnt help but think of the bad things he did in the book. To spare myself from the torture i will not be watching the drama. If they have named it something else i wouldve watched it since the first two eps were not bad. But they had to use the same name for a conplete other story.
Btw i listened to the female only voice and it was pretty good. You should give that a try.
Taking on Jiang Family is fun especially who could had any suspicion that the fall is due to a 15-year old concubine’s daughter move except those who has inkling of her ability.
Game of Go between Jiang 3rd Smart Son and WY, I was expecting him to vomit blood and die there like those old chess battle of experts but alas it is not expected to be.
omg so Vanness isn’t even supposed to be the main lead? That’s funny, why would they do that? People need to start controlling these drama producers, makes me fear for the ones coming up. Is it really that hard to just stick to a book??
全小全 version doesn’t have male voice? I think i’ve been spoiled too much…
*edit, ok so who is the main lead? care to spoil??
can someone please tell me who the male lead is sposed to be?? ive never read the book just started the drama and im super loving tuabajun!! but then just found out he married chang le which is my hatest character wtf.. can someone tell me pleaseeee
@ml – which version you are referring to?
C-Drama is an alternate universe with similarities in names only. Drama WY is atypical damsel in distress waiting for hero to save her most of time.
CL is betrothed to TZ in drama but never actually married since she had to wait for 3 years for the mourning period to pass. Then CL is claimed to be missing and replaced by someone during the Jiang Family arc.
The drama is nothing like the novel except the names. But the novel is nothing to write home about because it is plagiarized work.
I’m willing to give the author the benefit of doubt but there’s no smoke without fire !!!
http://www.cpoplove.com/2016/11/27/princess-weiyoung-accused-plagiarizing-200-different-novels/
You can read Atsu’s comment (dated 19 Nov 16) which is quite informative. The male lead is her adopted brother. During the first half of the story, he is called Li Min De and in the second half of the story, he goes by the name of Yuan Lie.
@raini: SPOILER – the ML is Li Min De, her little brother, who is later known as Yuan Lie, Prince Xu
Haha, the single voice is good! Usually I don’t like single voices either but I don’t notice this one at all!
@A Fan of Chinese Novel – I heard about the plagiarizing too. I thought a lot of it also had to do with the torture scenes too? But it was still a fun read.
Is the Male Lead (Li Min De( still the Male Lead in the Drama Version?
Did the MC and the True Male Lead have a Happy Ending in the Novel? And no, I don’t really consider Open or Bittersweet Ending as a Happy one.
What’s up with these authors always getting sued of plagiarizing? I’m sick and tired of it. It seems a lot of very popular authors get accused of it, first Guo Jing Ming, then Cang Yue, Vivibear, Shu Ke, Tang Qi Gong Zi. If never went to see any of the evidence, but it really spoils the joy of reading. Good thing my favorite authors haven’t had any accusations yet, but I would be so heartbroken if they did. Being someone who’s played with writing stories in the past, I think coincidental similarities do happen and sometimes authors do inspire each other, but geez, 9 chapters worth of original writing out of 300? I’m sorry I can’t unsee that article.. My heart can’t take it. I still really want to read Cang Yue’s Mirror City though, even though Cang Yue is also swamped in plagiarization scandals. Just have to drill myself that authors are human too and although one or two books aren’t clean, doesn’t mean the rest of them aren’t and they can’t redeem themselves. Still, I’ve read my share of these authors before finding out what they did and although I died a little inside each time, lost a bucket load of faith in those authors that lead to me probably never wanting to touch anything under their names ever again, I still enjoyed the books while I read them. Creativity and integrity in online novels these days is harder and harder to come by I guess.
@gasanechi I watched a few eps of the drama amd I think the male lead is going to be Tuo Ba Jun. They totally made wei young into damsel in distress and I am totally close to giving up watching.
They even inserted the classic scene of wei yang dancing with butterflies which made TBJ looked at her with affection (…..yuck)
Younger brother Min De is still there but he seems more like a side character…. and they changed his age to match wei yang. No drowning no whatever.
And the poisoning scene of weiyang’s mother? She stupidly walked into the scene, caught redhandedly and punished by 50 whipping =___=
The grandmother strangely doted on her the moment she arrived at the manor for unknown reasons.
The male lead TBJ seems to be a superman cos he always come to her rescue everytime she was in danger. Wei yang can’t do anything to save her own ass.
Shortly, the drama is a BIG disappointment for those who love the novel. They changed almost everything. Rebirth? What rebirth? No such thing as rebirth, you got the female mc fresh straight from her sheltered life as a princess. Be prepared to do a facepalm every now and then.
Seems like they have something against cold and cunning female characters. Sigh
Seconded…. I am struggling with ththis drama as it progresses.
WY would be ended up in all sort of problem and the hero would come and saves the day. Gone is the calculating and cold demure except her coldness initially towards TBJ and ony him.
Even the infamous scene of WY bestowed with Anping Title due to Flood Relieve plan is reactive at best by WY and not dangling the carrot to CL and and her brother.
It would be a good drama if under another title and not as 庶女有毒 The Concubine’s Daughter is Poisonous. Probably that is why it is called Princess Weiyoung.
I heard that the drama will end with TBJ died 10 years after marrying WY bc of poison, that’s why in the OP song there’s only WY and her son walking to the palace.
Geez, why do they have to kill TBJ, why don’t they end it with TBJ & WY marry and they live HEA…
On the other side, can someone gave me spoiler about the fate of the princes of Dali?
from what i read in first chapter. This novel is totally about reincarnation and vengeance?? I search for tuo ba jun in real northern wei history and that man was totally jerk.
@Mint: I agree with you so, so much right now. I tried it for a while but it’s really just another Mary-Sue drama that Asia seems to like so much. If they were just going to use a couple character names, they didn’t even have to buy the rights to the book. Seriously.
@raini: I know, it’s pretty disappointing. I’m reading one of Su Jian’s earlier novels, and it feels like she took a lot of 锦绣未央 from that. There are also traces of 知否知否应是绿肥红瘦 too, but I don’t know which came first.
@Eis: It’s been a while, but this is what I can remember. I may get some of the details wrong though, but they all mostly end up dead.
Crown Prince was set up by Li Wei Yang so that he was caught in the king’s quarters with his concubine. Son sleeping with Emperor’s wife was a big no-no and he was locked up in his house, but then he was poisoned (by Li Wei Yang, I think), and made to look like it was 3rd Prince Tuoba Zhen’s doing. He was carried into the palace as he was dying and the Emperor felt really bad and Tuoba Zhen got into a heap of trouble.
3rd prince becomes a cripple. At the end, he also has dreams of their past life together before their final showdown so that was pretty satisfying.
5th Prince Tuoba Rui was a sucker of Li Chang Le. It’s been a while so I can’t remember exactly what happened, but I do believe he was led into a trap by 3rd prince Tuoba Zhen and the Crown Prince.
(This is going to be complicated) 7th Prince Tuoba Yu kept thinking that he would become the Crown Prince when Tuoba Zhen fell from power but in the end, it was all a setup for the king to put 8th Prince Tuoba Cong on the throne. After Wei Yang left Dali, he continued to plot, this time with the help of Ying Chu, who is the right hand man of Queen Pei (the main antagonist of the second half). They made some sort of deal, where Ying Chu helped him to become king and in exchange for Li Wei Yang, he would team up with the Kingdom of Zhou to attack Yuexi, which would mean that Wei Yang’s new family (all generals and military men) and Yuan Lie would have to leave the capital leaving Li Wei Yang vulnerable to attack (amongst many, many other plots). The King of Dali was killed in his quarters by a bunch of his concubines (which was part of Tuoba Yu’s plan), and Tuoba Cong was also killed by Tuoba Yu, who became the new king after that. He went to battle with Yuexi but eventually was taken down and imprisoned by his officials for his reckless actions.
8th Prince Tuoba Cong was mourning his father and fell dead, but nobody knew where the poison was. In reality, it was smeared on the king’s clothes (by Tuoba Yu) which Tuoba Cong treasured as a memento.
I don’t think the book really goes into what happens to Dali after Tuoba Yu is imprisoned by his officials. If it did, I forgot because this baby is a really, really long book,
As for Li Min De, he doesn’t become silly, but mute. He’s unable to talk and violent after the attack and frequently has bad dreams. But he’s hidden away by Li Wei Yang and eventually taken to her new family, the Guo family (who are AWESOME by the way), and they nurse him back to health. At the very end of the book, he’s seen horsing around with Wei Yang and Yuan Lie’s two kids.
@Zhilie: yup, totally about reincarnation and revenge. It’s probably copied from tons of places, but still addicting and leagues better than the drama if you’re watching that. Two very different animals. The drama is all lovey-dovey rainbows and unicorns while the book is somewhat like a cross between thriller/horror/period romance.
Hi newbie here, and a little bit confuse after reading all the discussion My only question will be : Is Li Min De and Yuan Lie a same person or not? because in the early discussion atsu said that Li Min De is Yuan Lie, but from above post it seems they are different person. Please be patient and help explain it to me. thank you ^__^
Li Min De and Yuen Lie is one and the same person as Li Min De is his adopted name in Li Household. Drama ending soon, kinda left me with a bit frustration.
@Nidji Li Min De (the one that was adopted by WY 3rd aunt) and Yuan Lie is a same person…
Later on in the story, WY’s birth mother got pregnant and bore a son. He was named Li Min something…. He’s the one that become mute….
@eis & tang phong soon
Now i understand. Thank you
@Nidji: I’m so sorry! In the above post, I meant Li Min Zhi, her little brother!
Li Min De is Yuan Lie, one and the same person. My bad!
@atsu I somehow suspected that they bought the rights just for the names and title so they could get the attentions of people who read the book =___= I am pretty sure it will just be another chinese movie and went unnoticed if it went by another name. Srsly, the script writer should have had an idea how we hated the stories where the women was potrayed as useless and had to be rescued most of the times!! Even, the heroines in barbie movies don’t need male mc to rescue them
I agree @Mint…Even the barbie doesn’t need to be rescued by her bf.Such a waste for the drama who shamelessly used novel name and characters but didn’t follow the plot line.We want strong heroine not the mary sue type.
I thought the casts would had supported the drama without the needs of leveraging on the novel readers base. Alas seeing how many times Jinyong Novels is being made and remade, i am speechless.
@Mint: That sounds so true =___= I hope they don’t do the same thing to 孤芳不自賞 because I love that book to pieces…
The ending was….so unsatisfying. Maybe they’re afraid that if they don’t do that, people won’t like the heroine or something.
@atsu
the characters in 孤芳不自賞 are all fictional, aren’t they? Since there aren’t forbidden theme in the book (reincarnation, history changing, etc), I suppose they’ll stay true to the book…
Although I’m disappointed about the drama ending, after I found out that TBJ is a real historical figure. so since they coupled WY with TBJ, the ending made sense bc in the history, TBJ only reign for 12….
But, I read in his wiki page that he ascend the throne at age of 12… and then I found that his empress’ history is similar to WY in drama….
There’s also 2 consort Li, one gave birth to the crown prince and then she was forced to commit suicide, while the other gave birth to a prince named Changle (he was also forced to commit suicide), huh……
@Eis Let’s hope! I have my fingers and toes crossed since I loved the book. But C-dramas don’t have the greatest track record for good adaptations. Look at what they did to Hua Qian Gu…
That must have taken a lot of work, trying to make it all fit into history! I don’t think 锦绣未央 was supposed to be based on anything either, so I hope they don’t try to fit 孤芳不自賞 into a historical time period.
I’m reading an earlier novel by the same author and she borrows a lot from herself. You can really see how she’s learned from the “mistakes” of the earlier novel and how she adapted 锦绣未央 to fit more of what readers wanted. Lots of drowning brothers and scheming sisters and one cold distant prince and one “fuhei” prince.
I’m watching the drama now and found this blog when looking up the book. The book sounds very dark and complex, and it’s a shame the drama makers couldn’t adapt it faithfully.
It’s probably not their fault though. From what I’ve gathered in these comments, the plot of the book hits pretty much every item on the list of “things you can’t show on TV in China.” Supernatural elements like reincarnation are frowned upon. You also can’t show anything that seems to glorify violence, sexuality, religion, capitalism, or anything else the government doesn’t like.
So basically, every C-Drama has to be a morality tale about squeaky clean heroes defeating over-the-top baddies by giving speeches about compassion and equality for all. If the drama makers didn’t erase everything that made the novel interesting, they might not have been allowed to air the show.
I just love how ruthless and merciless Wei Young is. But she never did anything to people who did not try to harm her AGAIN. And God do I understand her. She literally came back from Tartar.
In the other life and in this new life her ennemies haven’t changed one bit. I don’t find her too cruel, she could be even crueler. Everything she did is linked to what they put her through nothing less but also nothing more. I find her fair soooo fair, the type of fairness you can never get in real life where mostly the rich and powerful always win, even above the clever ones. At least here we can enjoy imagining them falling in their own trap and swallowing their own bitter medicine.
WY is the type of vilain I love most ( yes she’s our heroin but she is a vilain hi hi hi ) . Anything she does is on par with what she has already faced. She’s not scared of dying because she has already died an atrocious death. Just like Mishil in Queen Seon Duk and Gil Tae Mi in Six Flying Dragons, you will hate their cruelty but you will respect all they went through to get there and the talent that brought them there too.
I was looking for a revenge story a little like Lang Ya Bang, I’ve found it. And I’m so happy! Wei Young has a genius brain but she’s out for blood. Su Ge was out to right wrongs only. Ah ah ah ah ah *evil laugh.
Hihi in the end who is she with?
Isn’t the author being accuse of plagiarizing the story? A group found that of the 295 chapters only 9 of it was really the author. There was something like in some cases many were direct copy and the names were change.
Guys I think that in the Drama,the Northern Liang Princess is the “rebirthed” Wei Young as Wei Young died and the new Wei Young lived for revenge but also subsequently can’t escape love…
Does anyone know where the audio for the epilogue can be found? Really want some background story to empress pai’s last comment.
If i may ask, in the end, what happen to the two bodyguards of Wei young? Zhao yue and Zhao Nan?