Reviews tagging 'Toxic relationship'

She Who Became The Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan

30 reviews

therainbowshelf's review against another edition

dark sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

War epics are not my cup of tea, but if they're yours you might enjoy this one! Set in ancient China and packed with destiny, epic battles, political intrigue, betrayal, the occasional ghost, and clashes between Chinese and Mongol powers, this book tells the epic story of a girl who didn't starve to death claiming a name and destiny that might not have been hers.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Classism, Death, Dysphoria, Abandonment, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Death of parent, Gore, Torture, Xenophobia, Transphobia, Animal death, Body shaming, Child abuse, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Misogyny, Outing, Murder, Physical abuse, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Sexual content, Grief, Homophobia, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, and War

storykath's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

The monk Zhu Chongba is swept up in an ongoing war between Mongolian rulers and Nanren rebels, but there is much more to the situation, the adversaries, and Zhu herself than meets the eye.

This book felt longer than its 400 pages, which was both a strength and weakness. There's so much that happens - towards the end, I found myself looking back at the beginning with incredulity about how much the situation and characters had changed. I had truly been taken on a journey with the protagonists. On the other hand, I also found that some parts of this book dragged. When the plot became saturated with politics or an ongoing battle, I found it hard to stay invested, but it was always worth it to power through. Parker-Chan guides us through all the intrigues and betrayals fairly well; there's generally enough context to keep up with the revolving cast of characters and their various motivations, but at times there were intentions that were implied and not totally clear.

The changes in perspectives were engaging, and I enjoyed seeing each protagonist from the others' perspectives. Zhu Chongba in particular comes across very differently depending on whether we see her from her own perspective or someone else's. The characters were all enjoyably complex and morally nuanced, and while I can't relate to the overarching themes of fate, greatness, and vengeance, I could clearly see how those factors drove the characters in their every decision and action.

I'm curious to see what comes next in this series, and I hope that we can continue to explore these characters and see their continued redemptions and/or corruptions.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Gore, Murder, Sexism, Death, Death of parent, Physical abuse, Violence, and War

Moderate: Grief, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Misogyny, and Slavery

Minor: Alcohol, Medical content, Animal death, Child death, Infidelity, and Xenophobia

justamy's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

Great book. Recommend read.

I find that the secondary protagonist of this story is more understandable. His goals are very clear, while the primary protagonists goals are sort of fuzzy. This might be on purpose and I don’t think it takes away from the book.

 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Sexism, War, and Misogyny

Moderate: Violence, Homophobia, Murder, Sexual content, Death, Grief, Toxic relationship, and Emotional abuse

Minor: Death of parent, Child abuse, Child death, Classism, Infidelity, and Slavery

bluejayreads's review against another edition

adventurous dark

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I put a hold on this audiobook at the library, and I’ll admit, when it came ready I wondered what I was thinking. I’ve read a lot of Chinese- and East Asian-inspired fantasy lately, including a completely different one that was also a fantasy version of a real ruler of China’s journey to power. But I’ve also DNF’d many, many other similar books recently. So I was a little skeptical going in. 

Everything on the back cover is basically the setup for the story. The girl does not get a name, either because her father and brother don’t think her important enough to use it or her family never bothered to give her one in the first place. Surrounded by famine so terrible that people have resorted to truly terrible means, there was no reason to put effort into keeping a daughter alive when you could instead save a son. 

But the girl lives. She takes her brother’s name and identity to enter a monastery where there would be food. There she discovers how far she will go to survive. She believes her true fate is nothingness and death, but if she has a strong enough will, she can convince Heaven itself that she should live. 

That is the story. It is a monk who is not a woman* but who must hide her woman’s body, whose choices are nothingness or greatness and who will sacrifice anything, even breaking her own heart in the process, to seize her fate. As a girl child in a world that would rather let a girl die than let a boy be uncomfortable, she chose to live by any means necessary. 

She is not a good person, but she is a strongly compelling character, a queer anti-hero who does many things that are morally dubious or outright wrong but who I still want to see succeed. 

Her journey is set against a war – the Red Turban Rebellion – as the Chinese attempt to overthrow their Mongol rulers. And hers is not the only perspective in the story. There is also the eunuch general of the Mongol rulers, biding his time in dubious favor with various Mongol nobility until he can get revenge for his slaughtered family. There is also Ma, engaged to the son of a Red Turban leader as the rebellion’s leadership jockeys for power, who gets significantly less page time but no less importance than the other two. The threads of fate surround everyone and draw them ever closer to their glory or doom. 

This review is poetic because that’s what this book evokes. The writing style isn’t poetic, and the book itself is full of violence and gore and hatred, but the story feels like an epic saga, the kind of thing that gets put to song and sung throughout the land. I occasionally had a difficult time keeping the names straight – though I’m pretty sure that’s a limitation of reading it as an audiobook – and the sheer excess of misogyny was hard to read at times. But I was surprised by how much I enjoyed this book. The sequel hasn’t even been announced yet, but there is going to be one and I can’t wait. 

*About gender and pronouns in the book: Though raised as a girl until age 9-ish, Zhu declares herself not to be a girl. She presents as a man and uses he/him pronouns with others, but declares herself to be in a space between or outside the two genders, neither male nor female. The parts of the book that are from her perspective use she/her pronouns for her, so that’s what I use in this review. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Child death, Death, Misogyny, Sexism, Blood, Gore, Ableism, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body shaming, Death of parent, Toxic relationship, Alcohol, Classism, and Racism

Minor: Vomit, Animal death, Dysphoria, Cannibalism, and Fire/Fire injury

armontheroad's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

READ THIS BOOK! This is heavy on the supernatural, light on the magical fantasy, but an absolute gem. I loved all of these characters, even though I really should not. The historical setting was such a breath of fresh air. Adored the trans-nonbinary rep, the queer rep, the asexual rep, and the disability rep. This book had everything I could ever want, with political intrigue as the cherry on top. Cannot wait for the sequel.

Content Warnings: Eye gore, etc (see listed below)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Body horror, Death of parent, Slavery, Alcohol, Violence, Colonisation, Sexism, Misogyny, Toxic relationship, Excrement, Cursing, War, Blood, Ableism, Homophobia, Sexual content, and Death

sunsetcity's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Gore, Trafficking, Violence, Toxic relationship, Child death, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Medical trauma, Murder, Blood, Sexism, Body horror, Colonisation, War, Classism, Cursing, Death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, Slavery, and Torture

cnohero's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

The 2 stars represent my enjoyment not on the quality. While it was well written. I felt bummed out and angry though the book. The last few chapters have some very upsetting events I can’t make peace with. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Death, Child death, and Sexual content

Moderate: Cultural appropriation, War, Violence, and Toxic relationship

saltycoffee's review against another edition

challenging dark sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Infertility, Sexism, Slavery, Toxic relationship, and War

gracewiley's review against another edition

medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Dysphoria, Body horror, Gore, Violence, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, and War

Moderate: Cursing, Murder, Toxic friendship, Torture, Toxic relationship, and Death

Minor: Outing, Pandemic/Epidemic, Ableism, Animal death, Child death, Death of parent, Homophobia, Abandonment, Blood, and Slavery

wrenxavier's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Alcohol, Blood, Colonisation, Cultural appropriation, Cursing, Death, Dysphoria, Genocide, Grief, Gore, Misogyny, Murder, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Sexual content, Slavery, Violence, and War

Minor: Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Medical content, Sexual harassment, and Toxic relationship