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A review by dhee_reads
A War of Swallowed Stars by Sangu Mandanna
5.0
Good: I love that Es is not the only one who is angry. Alexi is angry too. He blames her the same way she blamed him. We see him unravel. We see Es take in this change in Alexi. It's important for her growth. But it's also important for his growth as well. I live for confrontation scenes; Alexi, Bear and Es each get a moment. No one holds back on what they need to say. I love the moments when characters can finally say what they need others to hear.
So many of our dynamics between has changed: for gods, great beasts, mothers, kings, siblings, and hell our sentient warship too. The characters have crossed the chessboard; the layout of the story is so different from where we began. It feels like a transformation that is worthy of closing a trilogy.
We end the series on Alexi and Kirrin as main antagonists. For me, it had to end with them. Their paras (Arjuna and Krishna) are the heart of the Mahabharata. They're not maligned. They're just not softened. That's always been necessary. They're seen as duo both in this trilogy and the Mahabharata. But we have significant character moments with Alexi and Kirrin separately. I notice who they're becoming in the second half of book 2 a lot. Mandanna continues this exploration in this book. I feel more sympathetic to both them because we seen individual struggles and efforts.
Honestly, Mandanna doesn’t forfeit what the Mahabharata truly is. This is amazing because we center Karna i.e Es as our main character.It works because Es picks up Arjuna's main struggle. But Alexi our Arjuna para has other Arjuna problems.
I also love seeing weakness in gods. It touches me so much for gods to feel weight of their mistakes and to have real ties to other gods as well as humans. I felt this for Amba. I feel this for Kirrin too. It's made more powerful because Kirrin is Krishna. Krishna is very beloved and complex god. Tbh I'm still wrapping my mind around this part. There are lot of stories of Krishna as child and later as grown god. I feel like this Krishna is very much in the middle. It fits for me. But it's also a blank space. I personally don't know the stories occuring in that middle time period. I wonder about that a lot. It's not substitute but it's easier to accept this version of Krishna in part because this.
Con: The story speeds up because of Trimurthi paras. It forces Es to table her previous goals. But she was heading in that direction anyway.
Misc rant: I think Es runs out of steam. She hits a pt in the story where it's all too much. I love that rage can be exhaustive for the person raging too. I think it's important to admit she was forced to stop. Or rather it had to get to lowest pt in story to stick. The confrontations, the Trimurthi threat of total annihilation, finding love/fam and her own pre-existing moral code also helped. I think grief and rejection were always hiding behind her rage. It finally took the front seat.
So many of our dynamics between has changed: for gods, great beasts, mothers, kings, siblings, and hell our sentient warship too. The characters have crossed the chessboard; the layout of the story is so different from where we began. It feels like a transformation that is worthy of closing a trilogy.
We end the series on Alexi and Kirrin as main antagonists. For me, it had to end with them. Their paras (Arjuna and Krishna) are the heart of the Mahabharata. They're not maligned. They're just not softened. That's always been necessary. They're seen as duo both in this trilogy and the Mahabharata. But we have significant character moments with Alexi and Kirrin separately. I notice who they're becoming in the second half of book 2 a lot. Mandanna continues this exploration in this book. I feel more sympathetic to both them because we seen individual struggles and efforts.
Honestly, Mandanna doesn’t forfeit what the Mahabharata truly is. This is amazing because we center Karna i.e Es as our main character.It works because Es picks up Arjuna's main struggle. But Alexi our Arjuna para has other Arjuna problems.
I also love seeing weakness in gods. It touches me so much for gods to feel weight of their mistakes and to have real ties to other gods as well as humans. I felt this for Amba. I feel this for Kirrin too. It's made more powerful because Kirrin is Krishna. Krishna is very beloved and complex god. Tbh I'm still wrapping my mind around this part. There are lot of stories of Krishna as child and later as grown god. I feel like this Krishna is very much in the middle. It fits for me. But it's also a blank space. I personally don't know the stories occuring in that middle time period. I wonder about that a lot. It's not substitute but it's easier to accept this version of Krishna in part because this.
Con: The story speeds up because of Trimurthi paras. It forces Es to table her previous goals. But she was heading in that direction anyway.
Misc rant: I think Es runs out of steam. She hits a pt in the story where it's all too much. I love that rage can be exhaustive for the person raging too. I think it's important to admit she was forced to stop. Or rather it had to get to lowest pt in story to stick. The confrontations, the Trimurthi threat of total annihilation, finding love/fam and her own pre-existing moral code also helped. I think grief and rejection were always hiding behind her rage. It finally took the front seat.