Silver Phoenix: Beyond the Kingdom of Xia

I'm finding this slow going

Loved this. It's very clearly a first novel, and uses the "and then, and then and then" structure a little heavily, but that's okay. It's a lovely story, vivid and engaging; I loved Ai Ling, I loved that she did not have a happily-ever-after with Chen Yong at the end, I loved the attention paid to food throughout. ( )

Up to a point, this review shouldn't be majorly spoilery about events (although it will be about themes). I'll let you know just before I do the spoilery part.

I had honestly never heard of Cindy Pon until the day before yesterday, and I might not have picked up her book to read even if I had. Mostly because I'm not supposed to be buying new books at the moment, admittedly. But inkstone's post about it, here, a post about the whitewashing of the covers for this book, caught my eye. You can find other links on the matter here, including a place to preview the first seventy pages of the novel.

The story in brief: Silver Phoenix is a book heavily based on Chinese myth and history. The original cover is striking and beautiful, to my mind: it has the protagonist, Ai Ling, front and centre, dressed in a Chinese style. But... the book wasn't selling. This was partly because mainstream bookstores didn't stock it, although I know that this isn't a surprise, at least in the case of Borders. In any case, the publisher, in making the paperback, decided to redo the cover. Now, according to Cindy Pon herself, she totally supports the decision of her publisher, and they are working to include Chinese elements and keep those elements strongly present in the covers. But looking at the covers, which you can see here, I don't see that. I see something that looks a lot more like urban fantasy. That looks like it might be the cover of any number of the YA books I've picked up (and usually, put straight back down again with a sigh). Her clothing, the little we can see of her face... she looks more like me than she looks like the original vision of Ai Ling.

In any case, in all this discussion, I got interested in the book and bought it -- the hardcover, with the original artwork. I'm told that this isn't going to help, but I wanted to read this book, and to be able to talk about it, and to have it with the original artwork.

I ordered it, it arrived today, and I finished it just before I started writing this. It's easy to read and very accessible, and the story surprised me in two very major ways and a couple of more minor ones. It really isn't anything like the Generic YA Book my brain conjured up on looking at the new covers. The mythology is somewhat new to me, and it's lovely to wander through a story in which what happens next isn't what I would expect from a typical Western fantasy novel. The plot is bold -- it doesn't shy away from rape and death, from men trying to force young girls to do what they want.

Parts of the plot felt a little thin to me, unfortunately. The sheer onslaught of the demons, and the way Ai Ling's powers quickly develop to handle any problem, are part of that, and also that I didn't feel that the problem, the climax, was quite worth the level of supernatural intervention we were seeing. I didn't feel major peril to the whole land of Xia, only to Ai Ling herself. That part is well written -- tense, a little difficult to read, in the way that it should be -- but it didn't quite seem to fit. And the freedom Ai Ling is given doesn't feel realistic -- although, granted, that's based partially on my own limited and Western understanding of the conditions in China for women in an equivalent sort of time period.

This next bit is spoilery, because I want to talk about the two big surprises and one of the minor ones.

The first surprise: we get to know and like a character who ultimately dies. I was so sure Ai Ling would go through with her plan to bring him back, but she doesn't. I think that's great. A touch of realism. Acceptance that you have to let someone go -- no matter how much you like them.

The second surprise: the potential love interests do not fall into each other's arms at the end. I expected it all along and was glad when it didn't happen. It's different.

The minor surprise of most note: Ai Ling loves to eat. Here is a girl who thinks food is important, who enjoys eating. I don't know to what extent the attitude is reflected in YA, but the girls I knew at the age of seventeen were all about being thin. Open enjoyment of food... well. Not really the done thing. But here is Ai Ling, enjoying food! It made me smile so much.

Overall, it was a story I enjoyed. I enjoyed the characters, the plot, the mythology, the clear and easy prose style. It isn't my top recommendation of this year, or anything like that, but it's a solid and entertaining story, and if this review has intrigued you in any way, I hope you'll pick it up.

08/02/2011: An edit to add in a couple of links! A critique of the 'feminism' of this book, and a critique of the writing and plotting. (Both are very negative toward the book; interesting reading, even if you enjoyed it -- perhaps especially if you enjoyed it, as you have to re-examine your feelings on the topic.) ( )

This novel has good things and not so good things. Quite a strong first novel but with the flaws that comes with it.

One of the really, really good thing: the world building is wonderful. I loved Xia, I loved the Immortals lands, the landscapes. I especially loved that both Ai Ling and Chen Yong knew these mythological, magical and sometimes evils beings, places from books. I even thought for a while that they came to life from Ai Ling's mind. Which would have been a nice twist.

Most of the characters are trying to find there footing but are likable even the really evil ones.

One of the really no so good things is the way the danger for Ai Ling comes almost exclusively from men and is all but some form of sexual assault. I know the period the author set up the novel implies that women were propriety but it became even more a thing I have problems with when the origin of all the assault was found.

A mix bag for me. Loved some parts a lot and I mean a lot. Others I just loathed. For a YA book, targeted for young women I do have problems with it has an adult. A teenager might not have those problems.

YMMV ( )

This is the first book in Beyond the Kingdom of Xia duology by Pon. The second book, Fury of the Phoenix, has already been released. I have not heard about any additional books after that one. This was a decent read, but a bit simplistic in writing style.

Ai Lang is the daughter of a couple of parents who married for love; her father is a well learned professor. He is forced to go on a journey to the palace and leaves Ai Lang a special necklace that is supposed to protect her. When her father doesn’t return for many months Ai Lang decides to leave her mother and journey on her own to the palace. Along the road she meets Chen Yong and finds that the road is plagued by many demons.

I enjoyed the story but found the writing to be a bit simplistic and the dialogue between characters a bit clunky and awkward sounding. This made it very hard to engage with the characters because they just come off as awkward and simplistic.

Ai Lang comes off as too timid and naive but occasionally, uncharacteristically, she does something brash and bold. The main hero of the story, Chen Yong, comes off as a colossal jerk...he constantly has boyish fits of anger and is at best dismissive to Ai Lang. Needless to say I had a lot of trouble connecting and engaging with these characters.

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When Ai Lang is nearly raped Chen Yong stomps off in a boyish fit and blames her for causing a scene. Ugh...really...it was the epitome of what is wrong with the society portrayed in this novel.
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There is a lot of emphasis put on women as male property and as sexual objects to males. Not my favorite type of society to read about, in fact I was a bit surprised by the emphasis on sex in this book. There aren’t any explicit sex acts described, but there is a lot of discussion about it.

The book is an okay read, but I just found everything about it to be okay. Nothing really blew me away. The story was fairly predictable. The magic system not all that well explained. Some parts of the story where the characters journey beyond Xia are fairly ambiguous as well.

On a side note Pon evidently likes her food a lot because there are a lot of detailed descriptions about what the characters eat in this book. Seriously they stop to eat a lot and by the end of the book I felt like I knew more about what food the characters liked to eat than the characters themselves.

Overall an okay read but not great. The writing style was too simplistic, the characters hard to engage with, and the story predictable. I usually love these type of adventure fantasy stories, but this one left me feeling cold. Looking back at this review there just wasn’t a lot I actually enjoyed about this book. At this point I don’t plan on reading Fury of the Phoenix...I have the book but will just pass it on to someone who wants to read it more than I do. ( )