Review by ashkitty93 - Lady Tan's Circle Of Women

ashkitty93 's review for:

Lady Tan's Circle Of Women by Lisa See

3.0

dark emotional informative inspiring mysterious sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

The opening and closing (and I believe, legitimate) pieces by Tan Yunxian's nephew framed this nicely, and while I loved the portrayal of Yunxian and especially Meiling and the bond they had, this bordered on trauma porn a bit more than I liked. It also seemed like Lisa See packed in way too many elements and it negatively affected the pacing; there's the straightforward historical fiction, plus a (murder) mystery, and then various nasty bits, some of which didn't seem warranted, at least in the amount of detail given.

cw for foot binding, pregnancy/miscarriage/stillbirth and other death, blood, vivid smallpox depiction, corporal punishment, parasites, and probably a few more that I've forgotten or blocked out.

Nicely read by Jennifer Lim.

Content Warnings