Reviews

The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang

adapperdanman's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-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? Yes

3.5

monaluffy's review against another edition

dark emotional sad 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

jardeley's review against another edition

4.0

4.5

littlestream's review against another edition

challenging dark sad tense slow-paced

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

2.5

alibraryoftales's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-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

4.0

alexandra296's review against another edition

challenging dark medium-paced

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

3.0

junyan's review against another edition

2.75

2.75/5 I love the heroine in this book. She’s strong, intelligent, and independent. But this whole book is too YA-ish to me. I expected more and deeper discussions about human condition, the logic and effects of war, self discovery and so on. Especially, this book is based on real and cruel historical events happened in my homeland, so I naturally asked for more. This book kinda fell flat for me. I didn’t plan to continue this series, but I've read yellowface and babel and I loved them both. I definitely am looking forward to more books from Kuang.

gracelh's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.75

jalroberts's review against another edition

dark sad tense medium-paced

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

4.25

Very solid character work

joanna1905's review against another edition

4.0

I was pretty high hopes for The Poppy War since I’ve heard such great things about it for years - and after reading Babel and Yellow face I was even more intrigued - and it did not disappoint.

The poppy war is a well written and Intriguing fantasy novel, for the most part the grim dark tag doesn’t feel totally accurate, however, towards the end there is an extremely fucked up chapter that incredibly dark.

I’m really interested to see where the rest of the series goes, it feels as if book one broke the mould of what we tend to expect in a fantasy books - and I have super high goes that she continues with this vibe.