“Life is too short to be ringed by other people’s expectations of proper behavior.”

Starting off by saying that the premise of this is absolutely exquisite from the vietnamese-inspired world to the politics and the sapphic romance. I could like in that premise alone but the execution just didn’t hit for me.

My favorite aspect was definitely the fact that this was set in a world where the norm is for women to be political, brash, and confident. Which is already different from the usual fantasy world where women are expected to be quite and soft spoken, so that was really interesting to me. The discussion on gaslighting and toxic relationships was also something that I liked and didn't expect going into this.

I loved that the story began as if in the middle of a scene and I liked learning more about the world as we carried on with the plot. But I really wished Aliette de Bodard leaned a little bit more on the fantasy political route. It started off strong in that regard but then I think there were decisions made in the end that I feel like didn't fit the narrative it was initially translating. I'm really trying so hard not to spoil anything because this book is so short.

“Just because it makes sense doesn’t mean it needs to happen that way.”

However, this fell in the novella curse for me with the romance and the plot. I feel like I just wasn’t emotionally attached to the characters enough. It didn’t feel like they were flushed out and it was a little difficult to understand their motivations. It doesn’t help that I thought one of the people in the love triangle was platonic so I was really surprised with some of the things that went down because it didn’t feel like there was much of a connection there. Even though the story is so short, I feel like there would still be a way to do that, like how I feel with Nghi Vo’s short stories. There was a lot of assuming on my end on why they wanted to do this and that, which wasn’t really enjoyable for me. I like getting to know each character in depth.

“If love is what it takes to make her remember a girl in the midst of a fire, then how much can you trust her? How much can you trust that love?”

At the end of the day, it was really difficult for me to figure out what the message of the story was and how it translated into the story but I do like the themes on societal views on women. I’m still curious about more books from this author though because i liked the commentary and (going against the norm)

↣ A relatively short and fast adult fantasy read with politics and sapphics. I do love a lot of the themes that it wanted to discuss so it wasn't entirely disappointing. It felt a little like too many things came out of nowhere but if you can look past that… you can try it and hopefully this is more for you. ↢

— 2.5 —
⇢ content warnings// Abusive relationship (emotional/physical), Arson, Attempted rape, Blackmailing, Gaslighting, Grooming (discussed), Trauma