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halfcactus's reviews
73 reviews
A Coup of Tea by Casey Blair
hopeful
2.0
Miyara is a sheltered princess who wants to do something more meaningful for her people, so she decides to run away, permanently throwing away her birthright. She takes temporary shelter in a teashop, sees firsthand the gentrification and systematized oppression of the immigrant community, and tries to overhaul society from the ground. Somewhere along the way she realizes that she wants to be a Tea Master, which is a prized, influential, and extremely respected title in society. To become a Tea Master, she has to take a once-in-a-lifetime exam, and for plot reasons she has to take it as soon as possible, while managing a teashop and, idk, solving racism.
I've seen this described as a "feel-good book" and personally—and probably uncharitably—I think it's feel-good if you enjoy the privileged perspective or want to feel better about having one. At the very least what it offers is a comfortable, privileged, outsider perspective to discrimination and oppression.
The cultural elements are an aesthetic mix-and-match which I found disorienting at best and infuriating at worst. In spite of the tea ceremony being a crucial plotpoint and skill that Miyara is trying to perfect, I have no idea what it entails, other than vaguely Asian vibes.
The romance was bland, obligatory het with no chemistry. I found it insulting that the ML (a self-made craftsman) could have been a good character is his own right, but mostly felt like a prop for Miyara's social justice causes.
Other than... all of that... the book itself is very readable—Miyara's character arc is of that of a woman who has to to learn to take up space, and I think that would have been nice if 1) it was less ambitious about the social justice messaging; 2) if Miyara got to pay a real price to sustain her choices; 3) the PoV had been of that of any of the other characters. I enjoy wish-fulfillment fantasies about changing society, but it's hard for me to root for someone who's not really an underdog.
I've seen this described as a "feel-good book" and personally—and probably uncharitably—I think it's feel-good if you enjoy the privileged perspective or want to feel better about having one. At the very least what it offers is a comfortable, privileged, outsider perspective to discrimination and oppression.
The cultural elements are an aesthetic mix-and-match which I found disorienting at best and infuriating at worst. In spite of the tea ceremony being a crucial plotpoint and skill that Miyara is trying to perfect, I have no idea what it entails, other than vaguely Asian vibes.
The romance was bland, obligatory het with no chemistry. I found it insulting that the ML (a self-made craftsman) could have been a good character is his own right, but mostly felt like a prop for Miyara's social justice causes.
Other than... all of that... the book itself is very readable—Miyara's character arc is of that of a woman who has to to learn to take up space, and I think that would have been nice if 1) it was less ambitious about the social justice messaging; 2) if Miyara got to pay a real price to sustain her choices; 3) the PoV had been of that of any of the other characters. I enjoy wish-fulfillment fantasies about changing society, but it's hard for me to root for someone who's not really an underdog.
The Half-Inch Himalayas by Agha Shahid Ali
4.0
Wherever you were, Faiz, that
language spoke to you; and when you heard it,
you were alone — in Tunis, Beirut,
London, or Moscow. Those poets’ laments
concealed, as yours revealed, the sorrows
of a broken time. You knew Ghalib was right:
blood must not merely follow routine, must not
just flow as the veins’ uninterrupted
river. Sometimes it must flood the eyes,
surprise them by being clear as water.
The Carrying: Poems by Ada Limón
emotional
4.0
Will you tell us the stories that make
us uncomfortable, but not complicit?
Silver in the Wood by Emily Tesh
3.0
Lovely and very atmospheric novella about folklore and forest magic. I found the first half much stronger than the second, especially because it did not expect me to care about the characters the way the fallout did, but it's short, self-contained, and thoughtful enough for me to still walk away feeling positively about it. (And I think I also just wanted to know more about the cat. XD)
All Systems Red by Martha Wells
emotional
funny
5.0
Got this from the Tor bundle! It's a very fun, short, and lightly emotional read with an extremely funny and relatable main character who just wants to slack off but also is extremely protective of its humans. I thought it was most masterful in showing, and not just narrating, Murderbot's emotions, in spite of being in first person PoV.
I've been really struggling with reading books, so it was especially nice to find something I was into enough to read it all in one sitting (for the first time in years).
I've been really struggling with reading books, so it was especially nice to find something I was into enough to read it all in one sitting (for the first time in years).
The Hands of the Emperor by Victoria Goddard
hopeful
slow-paced
- Loveable characters? Yes
4.0
If I had to add tags to this book: hypercompetent characters; loyalty and fealty; retirement fantasy; bureaucratic fantasy; the impostor syndrome of being of two worlds and belonging to none
This book is slow and long, but I read it when I was sick and I found it extremely comforting! It’s a social justice fantasy from the PoV of an immigrant who has worked himself up to being the hands of the emperor. Some of the scenes feel very self-indulgent and wish fulfillment-y, but I think that the characters were written solidly enough for it to work. Plus, Kip’s complicated semi-estranged relationship with his friends and family that he simultaneously loves so much but feels so distant from feels so plausible.
There’s not really any worldbuilding, but the fantasy parts just fill themselves in the background as you go along. It’s personally attractive to me because it explores dualities and dynamics of being both insider and outsider all the time. A recurring conflict is just Kip not really being able to find his own voice enough to make claims for himself. It largely reads like a first-person POV.
I liked the part where it brings to mind how sometimes it’s those who leave the community hold on to pieces of their heritage differently and renew their connections more intentionally. But some of the things Kip attributes to community values are really just his personality, which… yeah! Can also relate!
PS. Although Kip and the Emperor have an extremely slow-burn romance going on, the book is generally centered on platonic and familial loyalty. Plus, all of Kip’s palace friends have big war/calamity trauma where they have all lost their families and just want to live in a house together when they retire and be adopted by Kip’s legendary large family.
tl;dr - no plot, only characters, relationships, and competence; some interpersonal conflicts feel repetitive towards the end, but the heart of it is still Kip finding his place in the world.
This book is slow and long, but I read it when I was sick and I found it extremely comforting! It’s a social justice fantasy from the PoV of an immigrant who has worked himself up to being the hands of the emperor. Some of the scenes feel very self-indulgent and wish fulfillment-y, but I think that the characters were written solidly enough for it to work. Plus, Kip’s complicated semi-estranged relationship with his friends and family that he simultaneously loves so much but feels so distant from feels so plausible.
There’s not really any worldbuilding, but the fantasy parts just fill themselves in the background as you go along. It’s personally attractive to me because it explores dualities and dynamics of being both insider and outsider all the time. A recurring conflict is just Kip not really being able to find his own voice enough to make claims for himself. It largely reads like a first-person POV.
I liked the part where it brings to mind how sometimes it’s those who leave the community hold on to pieces of their heritage differently and renew their connections more intentionally. But some of the things Kip attributes to community values are really just his personality, which… yeah! Can also relate!
PS. Although Kip and the Emperor have an extremely slow-burn romance going on, the book is generally centered on platonic and familial loyalty. Plus, all of Kip’s palace friends have big war/calamity trauma where they have all lost their families and just want to live in a house together when they retire and be adopted by Kip’s legendary large family.
tl;dr - no plot, only characters, relationships, and competence; some interpersonal conflicts feel repetitive towards the end, but the heart of it is still Kip finding his place in the world.
The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon
adventurous
slow-paced
- Strong character development? No
2.0
I wanted so badly to like this (and to some degree, I did, at around the 30-50% mark!), but it became such a different book from where it started.
Charitably: I have read het high fantasies that I actively hated. At least this book had an attractive women-centric aesthetic, a canon f/f main pairing (that I did root for), cool action scenes, and some very interesting side characters! In fact I wish this had just focused on the main romance and let them have the chemistry and personalities they deserve, instead of letting the plot take that away from them.
THOUGHTS:
1.
The way that book has 1) the East and South as non-white regions while having real-life analogs, 2) the writing feeling supremely Eurocentric and white is uncomfortable to me, especially because they each feel like a mishmash of cultures/stereotypes lumped together. Specifically the language feels too Eurocentric even in POVs where the characters are from ~the East~. I’m putting this down as weak writing & worldbuilding, the geopolitics was not thought out.
It's also annoying to me that there's this talk about different languages and writing systems, but the only ~linguistic~ difference that is reflected in the text is that the characters from Virtudom and the South have a derogatory word for dragons ("wyrms").
2.
Ostensibly the point of dividing the book into these POVs is so you can get a sense of their different cultures and perspectives. Their different cultures and beliefs SHOULD BE points of major conflict, to the extent that they affect diplomatic relations, but other than Niclays, it's all so... toothless between the main characters?!? They just talk it out for friendship or the greater good, which is not really what I expected from an adult epic fantasy??? (Loth does grapple with his worldview being challenged, but everything else is just too neat. Maybe it's because I played too much Suikoden as a child haha.)
3.
Because the worldbuilding was just fantasy elements superimposed over existing countries and cultures, pieces of it didn't feel like it fit with the others. I was a little confused with the concept of queendom/matriarchal society that was still built on some sort of patriarchal system? I think it is meant to criticize many different aspects of Christianity, but with religious things you need more nuance than "ALL OF CHRISTIANITY was wrong, while the other religions were completely right about everything" as the message. There is a similar moral flatness to the rest of the novel which makes it a lot less interesting to me.
4.
I really struggled with the syntax and writing, which I felt didn't flow very well and definitely had parts I couldn't follow no matter how many times I reread them. The author didn't have a good grasp on which parts should be written down, and which can be left implied. And sometimes there were just passages that were very confusing when they didn't have to be.
5.
The character writing fell into the trap of women being too competent to have room for growth. With the exception of Tane, who was around much less, most of the development went to Loth and Roos, who were much more flawed, even though Roos' "development" was so ham-handed. On the other hand, if you like competent women who help each other out, this has an abundance of them!
6.
Plot is... uneven? It sets up a large and complicated backstory, but then at the present day it's plot convenience after plot convenience and sudden infodumps about how a character has come to this information because of a childhood mishap years and years ago lol.
Charitably: I have read het high fantasies that I actively hated. At least this book had an attractive women-centric aesthetic, a canon f/f main pairing (that I did root for), cool action scenes, and some very interesting side characters! In fact I wish this had just focused on the main romance and let them have the chemistry and personalities they deserve, instead of letting the plot take that away from them.
THOUGHTS:
1.
The way that book has 1) the East and South as non-white regions while having real-life analogs, 2) the writing feeling supremely Eurocentric and white is uncomfortable to me, especially because they each feel like a mishmash of cultures/stereotypes lumped together. Specifically the language feels too Eurocentric even in POVs where the characters are from ~the East~. I’m putting this down as weak writing & worldbuilding, the geopolitics was not thought out.
It's also annoying to me that there's this talk about different languages and writing systems, but the only ~linguistic~ difference that is reflected in the text is that the characters from Virtudom and the South have a derogatory word for dragons ("wyrms").
2.
Ostensibly the point of dividing the book into these POVs is so you can get a sense of their different cultures and perspectives. Their different cultures and beliefs SHOULD BE points of major conflict, to the extent that they affect diplomatic relations, but other than Niclays, it's all so... toothless between the main characters?!? They just talk it out for friendship or the greater good, which is not really what I expected from an adult epic fantasy??? (Loth does grapple with his worldview being challenged, but everything else is just too neat. Maybe it's because I played too much Suikoden as a child haha.)
3.
Because the worldbuilding was just fantasy elements superimposed over existing countries and cultures, pieces of it didn't feel like it fit with the others. I was a little confused with the concept of queendom/matriarchal society that was still built on some sort of patriarchal system? I think it is meant to criticize many different aspects of Christianity, but with religious things you need more nuance than "ALL OF CHRISTIANITY was wrong, while the other religions were completely right about everything" as the message. There is a similar moral flatness to the rest of the novel which makes it a lot less interesting to me.
4.
I really struggled with the syntax and writing, which I felt didn't flow very well and definitely had parts I couldn't follow no matter how many times I reread them. The author didn't have a good grasp on which parts should be written down, and which can be left implied. And sometimes there were just passages that were very confusing when they didn't have to be.
5.
The character writing fell into the trap of women being too competent to have room for growth. With the exception of Tane, who was around much less, most of the development went to Loth and Roos, who were much more flawed, even though Roos' "development" was so ham-handed. On the other hand, if you like competent women who help each other out, this has an abundance of them!
6.
Plot is... uneven? It sets up a large and complicated backstory, but then at the present day it's plot convenience after plot convenience and sudden infodumps about how a character has come to this information because of a childhood mishap years and years ago lol.
The Bonesetter's Daughter by Amy Tan
3.0
A story of intergenerational trauma between a bonesetter/oracle bone collector, an inkmaker, and a ghost writer.
I was really engaged in Ruth's PoV, the conflicts and anxieties that arose from her traumatic upbringing, and the way she personified the themes of language and ghosts and writing. I'm so glad she found answers and got closure in the end, even though I wasn't very invested in the mystery of Bao Bomu's real name. I did really enjoy the novel's relationship with language and translation, and how Ruth's struggles with the language were very specifically a product of their time and place—matching radicals to the paper dictionary + her insinuation that only old or extremely specialized people could read traditional script. 😂
I couldn't stand Art or Art's kids and couldn't forgive them for how rude they and their families were during Mid-Autumn dinner. They were old enough to know better and school their children. May they never be invited to parties or community events ever again.
I actually think Lu Ling's chapters were the weak link because they weren't paced very well, and in spite of its intentions I think it failed to convey the emotional complexity in her relationship with her sister. The non-tragic relationships, in general, didn't feel earned.
Unrelatedly, I wish I'd paid more attention to the timelines of this book, because it feels like Ruth loses her voice around ghost month?
Content notes: this book contains suicide, drug addiction, and childhood sexual assault
I was really engaged in Ruth's PoV, the conflicts and anxieties that arose from her traumatic upbringing, and the way she personified the themes of language and ghosts and writing. I'm so glad she found answers and got closure in the end, even though I wasn't very invested in the mystery of Bao Bomu's real name. I did really enjoy the novel's relationship with language and translation, and how Ruth's struggles with the language were very specifically a product of their time and place—matching radicals to the paper dictionary + her insinuation that only old or extremely specialized people could read traditional script. 😂
I couldn't stand Art or Art's kids and couldn't forgive them for how rude they and their families were during Mid-Autumn dinner. They were old enough to know better and school their children. May they never be invited to parties or community events ever again.
I actually think Lu Ling's chapters were the weak link because they weren't paced very well, and in spite of its intentions I think it failed to convey the emotional complexity in her relationship with her sister. The non-tragic relationships, in general, didn't feel earned.
Unrelatedly, I wish I'd paid more attention to the timelines of this book, because it feels like Ruth loses her voice around ghost month?
Content notes: this book contains suicide, drug addiction, and childhood sexual assault
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual assault
Moderate: Suicide, Colonisation, and Racism
Minor: Torture, Addiction, and Drug abuse
Piranesi by Susanna Clarke
mysterious
slow-paced
3.5
I enjoyed the World, the mysteries, and the main character’s relationship with their identity, but mostly it made me miss GRIS. I think it'd be great as a videogame (though I'd be very bad at it)!
Nirvana in Fire 琅琊榜 by 海宴
3.5
I really appreciate this novel for its bones, but vastly prefer the storytelling of the cdrama adaptation. The novel ending does feel more right to me in terms of how it ends for Lin Shu, so I'm glad I read it all the way to the end! I also liked how much more quiet the final showdown was, how the shadow of Tainainai's death continues to loom over Lin Shu, and for how Lin Shu smiles at the end .
I'm a bit sad that the drama lost some of Liyang's backstory, and Yujin's more obvious deftness (his scenes carried the first volume for me too, as it was otherwise very slow), but their opaqueness in the drama made them interesting, still.
Overall, a good read (with lots of really, really great lines and details), but not one I would have read without being familiar with the cdrama first.
I'm a bit sad that the drama lost some of Liyang's backstory, and Yujin's more obvious deftness (his scenes carried the first volume for me too, as it was otherwise very slow), but their opaqueness in the drama made them interesting, still.
Overall, a good read (with lots of really, really great lines and details), but not one I would have read without being familiar with the cdrama first.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Terminal illness and Genocide
Minor: Rape