Reviews - Bitter Medicine | The StoryGraph

563 reviews for:

Bitter Medicine

Mia Tsai

3.74 AVERAGE

edamamebean's review against another edition

4.0

adventurous emotional funny hopeful 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: N/A

I didn’t know anything about this book going in and kind of picked it up on a whim, but wow I really enjoyed it. In the author’s note, Mia Tsai says that she wrote the book for herself without the intention of anyone else reading it and I think that is one of the book’s strengths. I’ll definitely be excited to see more from this author in the future.

wallisch's review against another edition

3.75

adventurous emotional funny hopeful mysterious fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

alea_uncharted's review

5.0

adventurous emotional funny 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

onethatsavesme's review against another edition

3.75

adventurous emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

kaneebli's review against another edition

2.0

emotional tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I despise Tony.

Tony literally lets countless people die of illness because he doesn't FEEL LIKE going home and healing them with magic, something apparently only he can do.

Tony puts his own happiness above all else, including the lives of others and the happiness of his siblings. Is Tony supposed to be a likeable, endearing character? Because i hate him. Like I really really hate him. he's so obnoxious.

Pg 164

“The three of us…are [Shennong’s] descendants…Tony is the firstborn of our generation. Which means that when he consults our copy of Shennong’s journal, he gets special privileges.”

Pg. 187

“Her level of expertise isn’t enough for this. She can’t heal the girl. But, she realizes, excitement striking through her, Tony can. Or rather, Tony could.”

This is some infuriating bullshit that Mia Tsai has introduced about the magic of this world. Maybe my way of thinking is too “Western” but the idea that birth order is related to importance/privilege/rights/abilities/etc is stupid. Basically, no matter how hard Elle works, or how dedicated she is, or how much effort she puts in, she will NEVER be as powerful as Tony was. Because Tony is the firstborn, and that automatically gives him ultra super powers. And her abilities will always be less than his. Ultimately, her best efforts are not good enough, and that’s not an opinion, that’s a fact of the world of this book.

also, ummmmmmmmmm it's kinda wild and stupid that Elle would rather destroy Tony's magical lifeforce thing rather than allow Yiwu to take it and use it to force Tony to.........heal people ??????? like Tony just do your fucking job???? why would Elle be so supportive of Tony fucking off and letting people die because he straight up doesn't give a shit about anyone but himself, to the point that she destroys his laes,???? why would she not be on Yiwu's side???? she believes Tony's right to have fun and party is more important than other people's lives???? huh?????

This book has a lot of problems, but Tony is the biggest one imho.

Content Warnings