Reviews - The Emperor of Gladness

2.56k reviews for:

The Emperor of Gladness

Ocean Vuong

4.24 AVERAGE

isaduck's review against another edition

3.5

emotional reflective sad slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

pegasusgm's review against another edition

3.0

challenging dark reflective slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I can’t honestly say that this is a “mid” novel, only that my experience of it was overwhelmingly “mid”.
I liked the characters. I liked the setting. I liked the premise. I would go as far to say I more than liked Ocean Vuong’s narrative style. But… I just felt a bit “meh” about the whole thing.
It was about 150 pages too long for me, and whilst it explored a lot of themes (that all felt either incredibly authentic to the author and his own story, or were incredibly well researched) I don’t feel like it explored any of them enough to really make me reflect for more than a few seconds.
I was touched by the relationship between Grazina and Hai - which is definitely the heart of the book, and their dialogue sections were often the bits that I highlighted.
Overall, I can’t say why this didn’t really work for me - only that it didn’t. I admire lots of things about this novel but I was never racing to pick it back up and it took me far too long to reach the end point.

brds82's review against another edition

5.0

emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

squidreads12's review against another edition

4.75

emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Vuong is a literary genius and an auto-read for me. Everything he does is so thoughtful and powerful and immaculately put together. I am a sucker for a quirky small town ensemble, and the crew at HomeMarket were so real and had such depth.
The metaphors in this are so well done, and the character work is exemplary. Nearly perfect.

Content Warnings

jtroth37's review against another edition

4.5

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Yes

tinnesooky's review against another edition

4.0

challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

iguana_mama's review against another edition

5.0

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

benjamou's review against another edition

4.75

emotional reflective slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

heyshelby11's review against another edition

5.0

emotional funny reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

denver9399's review against another edition

3.75

reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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