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A review by katieinca
The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison
3.0
Well written and often engaging, but just felt too didactic to me.
It moves along nicely despite the fact that 80% of it is basically the emperor taking meetings, and despite ALL THE CUMBERSOME NAMES (tip: there's a helpful appendix in the back about name structure and form of address that I would have loved to know about BEFORE I finished the book, plus a name glossary, but that has spoilers). And the characters are complex. And the world is well thought out. But it reads too much like Addison set out to write an instruction manual for leadership rather than having a story to tell, and I found Maia's ability to effectively combat racism, sexism, AND homophobia to be too optimistically pat.
But maybe all you people giving it five star reviews raised my expectations too high.
It moves along nicely despite the fact that 80% of it is basically the emperor taking meetings, and despite ALL THE CUMBERSOME NAMES (tip: there's a helpful appendix in the back about name structure and form of address that I would have loved to know about BEFORE I finished the book, plus a name glossary, but that has spoilers). And the characters are complex. And the world is well thought out. But it reads too much like Addison set out to write an instruction manual for leadership rather than having a story to tell, and I found Maia's ability to effectively combat racism, sexism, AND homophobia to be too optimistically pat.
But maybe all you people giving it five star reviews raised my expectations too high.