venneh 's review for:

The Death I Gave Him by Em X. Liu

5.0

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I am a huge, huge sucker for when an author decides to tackle a complex story via what I call the Rashomon effect (multiple POVs, unsure of which is the "true" one), and even more of a sucker when an author decides to fuck around stylistically. Throw in the spine of a Shakespeare story (Hamlet, turned into a locked room mystery with Horatio as an AI, Elsinore as their remote lab, and our Hamlet main, Hayden (and yes I absolutely pictured Hayden Christensen, unsure if that was intentional on Mx. Liu's part) chasing after immortality), and you have what is perfect catnip for me. Mx. Liu's prose is amazing, and darts around from style to POV as we try to find out what happened. They also have some things to say about Ophelia, to say the least. Add in some A++ queer, fucked up human/AI sex as the cherry on top. I have a feeling this is going to pop up in the 2023 awards cycle, so preorder this now and enjoy the ride. Gonna have to see if I can find more of Mx. Liu's writing!