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A review by lsmith36
Serpentine by Cindy Pon
3.0
I’m a sucker when it comes to folklore, so when I saw this one was pulling from Chinese folklore I hoped on the wagon really quick. Chinese folklore is a hard thing to come by in American YA, especially Chinese folklore by a Chinese American. So I walked in with high hopes that were not really met.
Let me elaborate. Serpentine had a lot going for it from the start. It has a cool setup, cool idea, cool characters, and come on now we have description of periods! That’s an awesome thing to see and have addressed. (In fact my theory is that the entire book is just one big puberty metaphor, but let’s chalk that up to me being an English major for now.) Let’s also not forget two of the greatest things! Lesbians and sex scenes. The woman who Skybright serves, Zhen Ni, falls in love with another girl named Lan. Their relationship is described with all the flourish heterosexual romances receive in other YA novels, so it was very refreshing to see. There’s even a scene between them where Skybright walks in. No don’t worry, it’s tastefully done so that you won’t be scared forever. But that isn’t the only sex scene! Skybright and her love interest Kai Sen have one as well that is handled in very much the same way. I enjoyed having both of these because not only is sex talked about in a YA book (spoiler alert, young adults/teenagers have sex) but it’s done so in a non-awkward way that presents how real sex is.
For the entire review look here: https://aggietheskeletonreads.wordpress.com/2016/05/10/review-serpentine/
Let me elaborate. Serpentine had a lot going for it from the start. It has a cool setup, cool idea, cool characters, and come on now we have description of periods! That’s an awesome thing to see and have addressed. (In fact my theory is that the entire book is just one big puberty metaphor, but let’s chalk that up to me being an English major for now.) Let’s also not forget two of the greatest things! Lesbians and sex scenes. The woman who Skybright serves, Zhen Ni, falls in love with another girl named Lan. Their relationship is described with all the flourish heterosexual romances receive in other YA novels, so it was very refreshing to see. There’s even a scene between them where Skybright walks in. No don’t worry, it’s tastefully done so that you won’t be scared forever. But that isn’t the only sex scene! Skybright and her love interest Kai Sen have one as well that is handled in very much the same way. I enjoyed having both of these because not only is sex talked about in a YA book (spoiler alert, young adults/teenagers have sex) but it’s done so in a non-awkward way that presents how real sex is.
For the entire review look here: https://aggietheskeletonreads.wordpress.com/2016/05/10/review-serpentine/