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story_singer_101 's review for:
The Last Tiger
by Brad Riew, Julia Riew
I've apparently been on an Asian literature kick recently, and it's been fascinating to me to see all the different perspectives as I sample literature from different the different cultures and contexts. For example, I recently read "When Sleeping Women Wake" by Emma Pei Yin, and that book also dealt with the Japanese invasion of continental Asia and the consequences, but it was historical fiction and focused on Japan's actions in China. Going into this book, therefore, I was excited to see the story through the historical fantasy lens and also through a Korean perspective. The fact that it was based in a real-life romance and story only added to the intrigue (also, the cover artist deserves a raise. That cover is stunning!).
There were a couple things that I thought were really fun about this book. First, I thought the animal symbolism/magic in the story was a fascinating approach, and I loved being able to see how that played out and how it connected to real-life events that happened during the Japanese occupation (thank you author's note! I never would have noticed the connection otherwise). Second, I loved being able to connect the dots between this book and the other books I've read recently that dealt with the same time period and see the similarities and how this book was grounded in historical fact.
I think my biggest complaint with this book is that it seems to be telling two very different stories. Story one is the story of the main characters: Seung and Eunji and their romance. Story two is the story of the authors' grandparents and their romance. From the blurb and the marketing, I had expected the two stories to be largely the same story, but the author's note explained right out of the gate that one of the biggest plot points that defined Eunji as a character just... was the exact opposite of the real life story? That paired with the quotes from the authors' grandparents at the beginning of each major section only served to highlight the apparent differences between the fictional story and the grandparents' real life story, and that bothered me. Now, in all fairness, I don't actually know the grandparents' story, so maybe I'm missing something. It just seemed like the story the quotes told had several similar elements to the fictional story while telling an very different narrative. Both stories were interesting on their own, but, if I'm being honest, my curiosity about the real-life story and the ways it seemed so different from the fictional story made me significantly less invested in the fictional one, which meant that the fairly standard YA plot that the fictional story used bothered me much more than it normally would. So, yeah. I'm pretty confused about the choices the authors made in how they connected the two stories because from my perspective they felt like two fairly distinct stories that happened to have similar situations. (If the authors ever want to write a nonfiction account of their grandparents' story, though, I will read it because I am now very curious.)
If you love YA or are new to the genre, then you'll probably enjoy this book as it sticks pretty close to the standard YA formula with the fun exceptions of the historical Korean setting and the magic system. I've seen some other reviewers talk about how this would be a good book to give to much younger YA readers, and I think they're right--especially if the child is old enough to have a conversation about war crimes and the atrocities that the Japanese committed during WWII. I think it just wasn't quite right for me, and I was too invested in the story the authors weren't telling.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!
There were a couple things that I thought were really fun about this book. First, I thought the animal symbolism/magic in the story was a fascinating approach, and I loved being able to see how that played out and how it connected to real-life events that happened during the Japanese occupation (thank you author's note! I never would have noticed the connection otherwise). Second, I loved being able to connect the dots between this book and the other books I've read recently that dealt with the same time period and see the similarities and how this book was grounded in historical fact.
I think my biggest complaint with this book is that it seems to be telling two very different stories. Story one is the story of the main characters: Seung and Eunji and their romance. Story two is the story of the authors' grandparents and their romance. From the blurb and the marketing, I had expected the two stories to be largely the same story, but the author's note explained right out of the gate that one of the biggest plot points that defined Eunji as a character just... was the exact opposite of the real life story? That paired with the quotes from the authors' grandparents at the beginning of each major section only served to highlight the apparent differences between the fictional story and the grandparents' real life story, and that bothered me. Now, in all fairness, I don't actually know the grandparents' story, so maybe I'm missing something. It just seemed like the story the quotes told had several similar elements to the fictional story while telling an very different narrative. Both stories were interesting on their own, but, if I'm being honest, my curiosity about the real-life story and the ways it seemed so different from the fictional story made me significantly less invested in the fictional one, which meant that the fairly standard YA plot that the fictional story used bothered me much more than it normally would. So, yeah. I'm pretty confused about the choices the authors made in how they connected the two stories because from my perspective they felt like two fairly distinct stories that happened to have similar situations. (If the authors ever want to write a nonfiction account of their grandparents' story, though, I will read it because I am now very curious.)
If you love YA or are new to the genre, then you'll probably enjoy this book as it sticks pretty close to the standard YA formula with the fun exceptions of the historical Korean setting and the magic system. I've seen some other reviewers talk about how this would be a good book to give to much younger YA readers, and I think they're right--especially if the child is old enough to have a conversation about war crimes and the atrocities that the Japanese committed during WWII. I think it just wasn't quite right for me, and I was too invested in the story the authors weren't telling.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!