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sabbox97 's review for:
The Burning God
by R.F. Kuang
I literally cannot speak more highly of this trilogy – it felt like a work of art from start to finish. Witnessing the development of Rin's corporeal AND internal journeys in tandem against the backdrop of a militaristic historical epic that had the elements of shamanism/magic beautifully woven throughout to lend it the intensity of a great fantasy novel created a phenomenal story.
1. It strays from the linear progression of the typical female protagonist's "hero journey"
"She understood now what she needed to do to cling to power: submerge the world in chaos, and forge her authority from the broken pieces."
Even though Rin starts out from a place of severe disadvantage (her station in life) and will need to overcome insurmountable odds, like many female MCs in the fantasy genre, the reader is able to see her slowly become the villain at the same time she herself is coming to that realization. I appreciated the near-constant internal struggles that Rin battled within herself that called in to question what was "right vs. wrong", or if anything can truly be that black and white.
“I am the end and the beginning. The world is a painting and I hold the brush. I am a god.”
2. Many issues that are still of much debate and consequence in the real world today are split wide open in the rawest way possible
“They’ll make you an outsider, because you’re not like them. That’s okay. Don’t let any of that discourage you. No matter what they say, you deserve to be here.”
Themes related to racism/colorism, sexism + sexual assault, genocide, and multiple types of trauma – including the cyclical patterns of abuse – are all brought to the surface in a way where they're not merely alluded to, but dropped right at your feet so they're impossible to ignore. Obviously, in Rin's case, many of these points are shaped by the extreme nature of her circumstances and the general plot; however, they're more or less ALL issues that we've experienced or thought about in one way or another, and the writing does a great job of not sugarcoating anything. Rin's internal dialogue, in many ways, mimics the raw and unfiltered way a normal person might work through these struggles. And as a much-needed resolution to some of these overarching conflicts, I love that she uses many of these systemic biases to build her inner strength.
“Let them think of us as dirt, Rin thought. She was dirt. Her army was dirt. But dirt was common, ubiquitous, and patient, and necessary. The soil gave life to the country. And the earth always reclaimed what it was owed.”
3. It shone a much-needed light on the duality of human strength
"The point of revenge wasn't to heal. The point was that the exhilaration, however temporary, drowned out the hurt."
Many heroins – and the majority of inspirational, self-care messaging – are usually cloaked in a shroud of unwavering strength, fortitude, perseverance, and so on. Of course, there's always at least a little bit of an internal struggle, but I think Kuang painted a much more accurate picture of the ups & downs when someone is truly fighting an uphill battle and what it means to fight yourself in order to claw your way out of that "dark" place. Our healing journeys are never linear and she does a fantastic job of portraying every messy stop along the way, apparent in how Rin initially tries to bury her trauma and suffering in the recesses of her mind before coming to the realization of where that actually gets her.
“It doesn’t go away. It never will. But when it hurts, lean into it. It’s so much harder to stay alive. That doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to live. It means you’re brave.”
4. What the concept of "love" looks like is challenged in a dozen different ways
“Theirs was a bond forged from necessity, hurt, and a shared, intimate understanding of hell.”
From her attempt to attain any semblance of self love in the face of so much external disdain for who and what she was from the outside world, to constantly trying to open her heart by placing a shred of her vulnerability in someone else's hands and having it mercilessly backfire, the theme of love in this trilogy is dissected from such a radically different angle than many fantasy novels. One of my favorite aspects about the books is that anything to do with love is often between Rin and herself, and the way that struggle shapes her relationships with other characters is simply a byproduct.
“He loves her. Of this he's certain. [...] In all of his worst nightmares, she's dying. She's fading away in his arms, helpless and whimpering, while hot, dark blood spills over his fingers. This he tells her. He doesn't tell her that his hand holds the blade.”
5. Rin's continuous desperate search for where she belongs in the world
“I have become something wonderful, she thought. I have become something terrible. Was she now a goddess or a monster? Perhaps neither. Perhaps both.”
This is probably one of the things I identify most with throughout the books. We're all just trying to find our way in this life, and Rin's struggle to do so is that much more apparent in the way she often uses the backdrop of war to frame her greater purpose on earth and avoid being swallowed up by those "deep" and "terrifying" questions about the meaning of life. Her focus shifted from avoiding the insignificant existence of an orphaned village peasant sold into marriage (by hopefully becoming an Imperial soldier), to bouncing between being a vessel for a god and forging herself as a "weapon" for various characters to wield, to potentially becoming a powerful ruler / conquerer all her own. Her fear of being unable to confidently find the place where she fit in the world was only compounded by the painful process of putting together the pieces of her peoples' tragic history – naturally, she was floating adrift when faced with the question of her future since there was no tether to her past OR her present, especially in the chaotic landscape of a country at constant war and unrest.
“That none of my beliefs about the world were true. That reality is malleable. That hidden connections exist in every living object. That the whole of the world is merely a thought, a butterfly's dream.”
6. The relationship between religion & technological advancement
“And so religion is merely a social construct in both the east and west,” Rin concluded. “The difference lies in its utility.”
Lastly, although I loved all of the parallels the books drew to real historical events and climates, the one I found the most intriguing was that between religious ideologies and technology / societal advancements. At least for me, it really made me more cognizant of how we view civilizations that are seemingly less advanced than our own. Not only that, but the cognitive dissonance revealed in the Hesperians' own belief system: how they supposedly attribute such an extremely methodical and scientific approach to their technological prowess, yet try and apply that same doctrine to the undeniable totality of their "Divine Architect". When in fact, they operate under a heavy layer of bias and false assumptions that would obviously never remain valid in a legitimate environment of scientific study (in other words, it seems that they let a lot of their desired conclusions build the framework for their earlier steps of discovery, which is an order to the scientific method that will never yield accurate, unbiased results).
“The great empires of the waking world were driven so mad by what they had forgotten that they decided to slaughter the only people who could still dream.”
As I reflect on all three books as a singular body of work, my heart can't help but break for how many times Rin is knocked back down after clawing her way back up when she thought she had nothing left to give of herself. It's something a lot of us can probably identify with in some way, and it speaks to our constant battle between the seemingly bottomless depths of pain and the sheer amount of strength and willpower we sometimes don't even know we possess until it's being drawn upon. Kuang was effortless in the way she layered complex themes and somehow made Rin's character extraordinarily relatable in so many ways while also creating a fantasy epic larger than our reality at the same time.
“Fear was impossible to eradicate. But so was the will to survive.”
1. It strays from the linear progression of the typical female protagonist's "hero journey"
"She understood now what she needed to do to cling to power: submerge the world in chaos, and forge her authority from the broken pieces."
Even though Rin starts out from a place of severe disadvantage (her station in life) and will need to overcome insurmountable odds, like many female MCs in the fantasy genre, the reader is able to see her slowly become the villain at the same time she herself is coming to that realization. I appreciated the near-constant internal struggles that Rin battled within herself that called in to question what was "right vs. wrong", or if anything can truly be that black and white.
“I am the end and the beginning. The world is a painting and I hold the brush. I am a god.”
2. Many issues that are still of much debate and consequence in the real world today are split wide open in the rawest way possible
“They’ll make you an outsider, because you’re not like them. That’s okay. Don’t let any of that discourage you. No matter what they say, you deserve to be here.”
Themes related to racism/colorism, sexism + sexual assault, genocide, and multiple types of trauma – including the cyclical patterns of abuse – are all brought to the surface in a way where they're not merely alluded to, but dropped right at your feet so they're impossible to ignore. Obviously, in Rin's case, many of these points are shaped by the extreme nature of her circumstances and the general plot; however, they're more or less ALL issues that we've experienced or thought about in one way or another, and the writing does a great job of not sugarcoating anything. Rin's internal dialogue, in many ways, mimics the raw and unfiltered way a normal person might work through these struggles. And as a much-needed resolution to some of these overarching conflicts, I love that she uses many of these systemic biases to build her inner strength.
“Let them think of us as dirt, Rin thought. She was dirt. Her army was dirt. But dirt was common, ubiquitous, and patient, and necessary. The soil gave life to the country. And the earth always reclaimed what it was owed.”
3. It shone a much-needed light on the duality of human strength
"The point of revenge wasn't to heal. The point was that the exhilaration, however temporary, drowned out the hurt."
Many heroins – and the majority of inspirational, self-care messaging – are usually cloaked in a shroud of unwavering strength, fortitude, perseverance, and so on. Of course, there's always at least a little bit of an internal struggle, but I think Kuang painted a much more accurate picture of the ups & downs when someone is truly fighting an uphill battle and what it means to fight yourself in order to claw your way out of that "dark" place. Our healing journeys are never linear and she does a fantastic job of portraying every messy stop along the way, apparent in how Rin initially tries to bury her trauma and suffering in the recesses of her mind before coming to the realization of where that actually gets her.
“It doesn’t go away. It never will. But when it hurts, lean into it. It’s so much harder to stay alive. That doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to live. It means you’re brave.”
4. What the concept of "love" looks like is challenged in a dozen different ways
“Theirs was a bond forged from necessity, hurt, and a shared, intimate understanding of hell.”
From her attempt to attain any semblance of self love in the face of so much external disdain for who and what she was from the outside world, to constantly trying to open her heart by placing a shred of her vulnerability in someone else's hands and having it mercilessly backfire, the theme of love in this trilogy is dissected from such a radically different angle than many fantasy novels. One of my favorite aspects about the books is that anything to do with love is often between Rin and herself, and the way that struggle shapes her relationships with other characters is simply a byproduct.
“He loves her. Of this he's certain. [...] In all of his worst nightmares, she's dying. She's fading away in his arms, helpless and whimpering, while hot, dark blood spills over his fingers. This he tells her. He doesn't tell her that his hand holds the blade.”
5. Rin's continuous desperate search for where she belongs in the world
“I have become something wonderful, she thought. I have become something terrible. Was she now a goddess or a monster? Perhaps neither. Perhaps both.”
This is probably one of the things I identify most with throughout the books. We're all just trying to find our way in this life, and Rin's struggle to do so is that much more apparent in the way she often uses the backdrop of war to frame her greater purpose on earth and avoid being swallowed up by those "deep" and "terrifying" questions about the meaning of life. Her focus shifted from avoiding the insignificant existence of an orphaned village peasant sold into marriage (by hopefully becoming an Imperial soldier), to bouncing between being a vessel for a god and forging herself as a "weapon" for various characters to wield, to potentially becoming a powerful ruler / conquerer all her own. Her fear of being unable to confidently find the place where she fit in the world was only compounded by the painful process of putting together the pieces of her peoples' tragic history – naturally, she was floating adrift when faced with the question of her future since there was no tether to her past OR her present, especially in the chaotic landscape of a country at constant war and unrest.
“That none of my beliefs about the world were true. That reality is malleable. That hidden connections exist in every living object. That the whole of the world is merely a thought, a butterfly's dream.”
6. The relationship between religion & technological advancement
“And so religion is merely a social construct in both the east and west,” Rin concluded. “The difference lies in its utility.”
Lastly, although I loved all of the parallels the books drew to real historical events and climates, the one I found the most intriguing was that between religious ideologies and technology / societal advancements. At least for me, it really made me more cognizant of how we view civilizations that are seemingly less advanced than our own. Not only that, but the cognitive dissonance revealed in the Hesperians' own belief system: how they supposedly attribute such an extremely methodical and scientific approach to their technological prowess, yet try and apply that same doctrine to the undeniable totality of their "Divine Architect". When in fact, they operate under a heavy layer of bias and false assumptions that would obviously never remain valid in a legitimate environment of scientific study (in other words, it seems that they let a lot of their desired conclusions build the framework for their earlier steps of discovery, which is an order to the scientific method that will never yield accurate, unbiased results).
“The great empires of the waking world were driven so mad by what they had forgotten that they decided to slaughter the only people who could still dream.”
As I reflect on all three books as a singular body of work, my heart can't help but break for how many times Rin is knocked back down after clawing her way back up when she thought she had nothing left to give of herself. It's something a lot of us can probably identify with in some way, and it speaks to our constant battle between the seemingly bottomless depths of pain and the sheer amount of strength and willpower we sometimes don't even know we possess until it's being drawn upon. Kuang was effortless in the way she layered complex themes and somehow made Rin's character extraordinarily relatable in so many ways while also creating a fantasy epic larger than our reality at the same time.
“Fear was impossible to eradicate. But so was the will to survive.”