Last year, everybody was talking about The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang. When I saw it on sale last year, I had to pick it up. I didn’t get around to reading it until this year though. It was an enjoyable, but fairly dense, book.
In a land resembling medieval China, Rin is struggling to make a tolerable life for herself. Being a poor orphan girl, she only has one shot: she needs to ace the Keju exams, or she’ll be forced into a marriage she doesn’t want. Getting a scholarship into the prestigious Sinegard academy may be her ticket out of marriage, but it won’t be the end of her struggles. Not only is the academy more difficult than anything she’s ever experienced, war is on the horizon.
What I Liked
There was a lot that I liked about this book. I liked Rin, the protagonist, and her determination. The supporting characters were interesting and unique. I also loved the Medieval China-ish setting. This is still a world we don’t see a lot of.
This is a very dense book with some heavy themes and philosophizing. I copied down several quotes into my book journal, like “the creation of empire requires conformity and uniform obedience” and “It was, simply, what happened when one race decided that the other was insignificant.” When war comes to this land, there is a race of people that wants to wipe out the other. The war is quite brutal.
Things to Note
There is magic in this book, but the magic doesn’t seem to be the central focus of The Poppy War. Rin doesn’t really start to develop her powers until later in the book, so later books in this trilogy might be different.
Like I said earlier, the war in this book is quite brutal. The Poppy War is a pretty heavy book. If you’re in the mood for a light contemporary, you might want to wait on this one. Some people might find the brutality in this book to be triggering. War is hell, especially when one of the parties doesn’t see the other side as worthy of humanity.
While I’m typically not a mood reader — I stick to my seasonal TBR pretty well, like to create monthly TBRs, and generally read my ARCs when they’re scheduled — I definitely want to read the sequel, The Dragon Republic, when I’m in the mood for something dark.