youshouldreadthisif 's review for:

The Death I Gave Him by Em X. Liu

4.5

dark emotional tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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 Am I glad I read it? Definitely! 

 

Notably, I believe Liu wrote under the assumption that the reader is familiar with the original story, which relieved some of the pressure of this book being a genre Mystery and instead allowed the focus to be on the psychologically messy characters and on the nuances of the near-future reimagining. Liu made some brilliant decisions, and it’s those details that really make this book really fascinating. 

 

Here are my favorite things: 

 

 HORATIO. Horatio - the spectator, the outside observer - written as the (surveillance & data interface) AI of the lab where the book’s events take place. I could write an essay on everything Liu has done with this character, INCLUDING the queer yearning! 

 

Liu did some really interesting things with the multimedia format and character POVs. The past tense, reflective tone of Felicia’s chapters. The inhumanly detailed, intimate closeness of Horatio’s present tense POV - and of Hayden’s, whose perspective we only get once his mind has interfaced with Horatio and has thus been stored in Horatio’s interface for future retrieval. Genius! 

 

 Liu played up and plays with Hamlet’s obsession with death and mortality and the body so thoroughly, visceral (literally) metaphors included. One of my favorite, and probably one of the most subtle, ways Liu plays with these themes is through the framing of the story: the book has been pieced together by some future history student putting together an undergrad essay. Ultimately, Hayden IS remembered, which is its own sort of immortality. Genius again! 

 

Here are my two complaints: 

I love that Felicia got, idk, a whole ass personality, but I can’t say I understand why we spend so much time (more than any other character & more frequently in the second half) in her POV. 

 

I think Horatio was somewhat underutilized. I wish we spent significantly more time in his POV (and, again, don’t quite understand why we didn’t). Also, while I loved the eroticism of the near-possession/body-sharing AI sexy times, I think Liu missed a major erotic opportunity with Horatio’s “body” being the lab’s building itself.