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A review by artemisg
He Who Drowned the World by Shelley Parker-Chan
challenging
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
While this was a genuinely really great sequel, this book was a bit too brutal for my taste.
In this book, we follow Zhu on her journey to become the emperor. She hatches some insane plans and joins in a tentative alliance with Ouyang, the eunuch general. I genuinely really liked most of their dynamic, both being outsiders in their society and outsiders to themselves. In addition to Zhu and Ouyang, we see many more surprising alliances and follow more ruthless players in their quests for power. While I appreciated the attempts at complexity within the characters, there were slightly too many people being genuinely evil for my tastes and too much torture and abuse. Some of the torture has its place (the examinations of grief and pain were somewhat interesting), but most of it was gratuitous, and the point of the brutality of Mongol-occupied China would have come across without it.
Like the first book, I enjoyed the discussion of gender, power, and identity. It was interesting to see powerful women (who were still powerless in many ways). I didn’t like the absolute refusal to acknowledge any forms of emotional attachment, and I hated Baoxiang. Also, like the violence, there were a few too many violent sex scenes. It got to a point of gratuity, and while the relationships were complex and interesting, the sex was not. I did like how Parker-Chan weaved the different parties together into a coherent overall scheme, and it felt realistic that things happened that the characters weren’t aware of. Finally, Ma didn’t get enough screen time.
In this book, we follow Zhu on her journey to become the emperor. She hatches some insane plans and joins in a tentative alliance with Ouyang, the eunuch general. I genuinely really liked most of their dynamic, both being outsiders in their society and outsiders to themselves. In addition to Zhu and Ouyang, we see many more surprising alliances and follow more ruthless players in their quests for power. While I appreciated the attempts at complexity within the characters, there were slightly too many people being genuinely evil for my tastes and too much torture and abuse. Some of the torture has its place (the examinations of grief and pain were somewhat interesting), but most of it was gratuitous, and the point of the brutality of Mongol-occupied China would have come across without it.
Like the first book, I enjoyed the discussion of gender, power, and identity. It was interesting to see powerful women (who were still powerless in many ways). I didn’t like the absolute refusal to acknowledge any forms of emotional attachment, and I hated Baoxiang. Also, like the violence, there were a few too many violent sex scenes. It got to a point of gratuity, and while the relationships were complex and interesting, the sex was not. I did like how Parker-Chan weaved the different parties together into a coherent overall scheme, and it felt realistic that things happened that the characters weren’t aware of. Finally, Ma didn’t get enough screen time.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Self harm, Torture, War, and Sexual content
Moderate: Sexual violence