Dramatic, fun, thoughtful, clever, and (literally) punchy.
A prophecy is unexpectedly foiled and a chosen hero cast adrift in this first of a fantasy trilogy inspired by Chinese martial arts films.
Elderly, one-armed, but still incredibly able war artist Ling Taishi is invited to view the progress of the Champion of the Five Under Heaven, prophesied to be the doom of the Eternal Khan, foe of the Zhuun Empire. Taishi discovers that the so-called hero, Wen Jian, is a poorly trained spoiled brat; nevertheless, she sees some potential in him and resolves to train the boy herself. Then a Zhuun foot patrol blunders into the naked, profoundly drunk Khan and kills him themselves, turning Jian into a political liability and forcing the new master-disciple team to go on the run. Under an assumed name, Jian toils resentfully as a novice and servant at a war artist school; Taishi dodges assassins and searches for the temple where the prophecy was made to learn how and why it failed. Meanwhile, Salminde, an elite warrior and close friend of the late Khan, looks first for her sister and then for some way of helping her people, forced into indentured servitude in the aftermath of the Khan’s death. Author Chu uses his knowledge and experience as a martial artist, stuntman, and actor to craft an exceptionally easy-to-visualize work with expertly blocked fight sequences; it’s impossible not to picture how everything would look on screen (of course, the trilogy has already been optioned for television). This novel is squarely directed at kung fu, wuxia, and wire-fu fans who adore Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; Hero; The Legend of Drunken Master; Kung Fu Hustle, and the like, providing a story with an epic sweep punctuated with dashes of humor and sharp-edged banter. Although Jian provides the initial spark for the plot, the novel is marvelously dominated by strong women, including the hot-tempered and fierce Taishi, who occasionally learns that rudeness is not always the best policy; the passionate, grieving Salminde, searching for meaning after her world has ended; and the mercurial, psychopathic shadow assassin Maza Qisami.
Dramatic, fun, thoughtful, clever, and (literally) punchy.Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-23763-2
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: June 7, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.
Using mystery and romance elements in a nonlinear narrative, SenLinYu’s debut is a doorstopper of a fantasy that follows a woman with missing memories as she navigates through a war-torn realm in search of herself.
Helena Marino is a talented young healer living in Paladia—the “Shining City”—who has been thrust into a brutal war against an all-powerful necromancer and his army of Undying, loyal henchmen with immortal bodies, and necrothralls, reanimated automatons. When Helena is awakened from stasis, a prisoner of the necromancer’s forces, she has no idea how long she has been incarcerated—or the status of the war. She soon finds herself a personal prisoner of Kaine Ferron, the High Necromancer’s “monster” psychopath who has sadistically killed hundreds for his master. Ordered to recover Helena’s buried memories by any means necessary, the two polar opposites—Helena and Kaine, healer and killer—end up discovering much more as they begin to understand each other through shared trauma. While necromancy is an oft-trod subject in fantasy novels, the author gives it a fresh feel—in large part because of their superb worldbuilding coupled with unforgettable imagery throughout: “[The necromancer] lay reclined upon a throne of bodies. Necrothralls, contorted and twisted together, their limbs transmuted and fused into a chair, moving in synchrony, rising and falling as they breathed in tandem, squeezing and releasing around him…[He] extended his decrepit right hand, overlarge with fingers jointed like spider legs.” Another noteworthy element is the complex dynamic between Helena and Kaine. To say that these two characters shared the gamut of intense emotions would be a vast understatement. Readers will come for the fantasy and stay for the romance.
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2025
ISBN: 9780593972700
Page Count: 1040
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: July 17, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
An engaging, imaginative narrative hampered by its lack of subtlety.
The Medusa myth, reimagined as an Afrocentric, feminist tale with the Gorgon recast as avenging hero.
In mythological Greece, where gods still have a hand in the lives of humans, 17-year-old Medusa lives on an island with her parents, old sea gods who were overthrown at the rise of the Olympians, and her sisters, Euryale and Stheno. The elder sisters dote on Medusa and bond over the care of her “locs...my dearest physical possession.” Their idyll is broken when Euryale is engaged to be married to a cruel demi-god. Medusa intervenes, and a chain of events leads her to a meeting with the goddess Athena, who sees in her intelligence, curiosity, and a useful bit of rage. Athena chooses Medusa for training in Athens to become a priestess at the Parthenon. She joins the other acolytes, a group of teenage girls who bond, bicker, and compete in various challenges for their place at the temple. As an outsider, Medusa is bullied (even in ancient Athens white girls rudely grab a Black girl’s hair) and finds a best friend in Apollonia. She also meets a nameless boy who always seems to be there whenever she is in need; this turns out to be Poseidon, who is grooming the inexplicably naïve Medusa. When he rapes her, Athena finds out and punishes Medusa and her sisters by transforming their locs into snakes. The sisters become Gorgons, and when colonizing men try to claim their island, the killing begins. Telling a story of Black female power through the lens of ancient myth is conceptually appealing, but this novel published as adult fiction reads as though intended for a younger audience.
An engaging, imaginative narrative hampered by its lack of subtlety.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9780593733769
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Aug. 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
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