The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Imagine a history of 19th century revolutionary China where Mao Tse Dong was a teenaged girl with magical powers.

The protagonist, Rin, is a complicated character. I’m not sure if I like her, though I still want to inhabit her world through her point of view. Sometimes that’s because I’m pulling for her to succeed, and other times its like not being able to pull your eyes off an accident unfolding on the highway.

Rin’s not the typical YA heroine, though some parts of the book do feel painfully YA (the academy – all of the academy). That’s excusable, because the author was a teenager when she wrote this debut novel. That alone should tell you that her talents are formidable. The book is superbly written, whether you love Rin or not.

There were some things that pulled me out of the narrative, like the way Kuang shows a character’s feelings through action, then tells you their feelings in narrative, sometimes at length. Its a small thing, but she does it a lot.

That said, Kuang surprised me several times, flirting with disaster and (view spoiler)[ then going there. All the way there. Kuang does the things most authors contrive to narrowly escape. While averting some big disaster drives the plots of many books. Kuang subverts the norm impressively and on a grand scale. (hide spoiler)] In that way, Kuang demolishes the mold.

Kuang writes with a deep understanding of Chinese culture and mythology. While not a literal history of the region, the book approaches elements of historical fiction. While my American education did not equip me to recite the names and dates of key events in Chinese history, The Poppy War conveys a sense of Chinese thinking, values, and historical experience that’s more felt than informational, and in many ways more valuable for it.

Glad I read this, and I’ll finish the series.



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