The Poppy War

This is a hell of a book for a first novel from such a young author. There is a lot going on here, it's a complex story. And with an enormous historical backdrop feeding it. Despite my admiration for the book I'm not sure I exactly enjoyed it. I was mildly annoyed by yet another "young adults in school" novel, although the narrative goes far from that in the second half. Partly it felt a bit wordy, like maybe it could have done with being edited to 90% of its length.

But mostly the book is entirely grim. What a remarkable twist on the usual "young person discovers their power and saves the world". To have the hero embrace world-cleansing destruction.. And so deliberately. She is presented with the choice many times, even has a spirit guide as well as a teacher who are trying to save her from the immoral path. And she explicitly chooses to demolish the world, for vengeance. And that choice is clearly hers to make, we are told explicitly the gods make no choices.

I greatly appreciate the fresh perspective the author brings to fantasy writing. Drawing on Chinese culture and World War 2 makes for a lot of depth. She walks a good line between using literal historical facts vs. keeping it a fantasy novel. It was obvious that the main conflict is China vs. Japan but between my ignorance of the details and the liberal modification for fantasy novel purposes, it stays mostly on the side of entertaining fiction. Well, at least until the ending quarter of the book. The Rape of Nanjing / Golyn Niis scene was really upsetting, particularly the graphic descriptions of sexual violence. Also concluding with "we choose absolute nuclear destruction of all of Japan" is a bit grim.)

Remarkable book all around, an impressive accomplishment.