Xiran Jay Zhao

In Huaxia, young men and women enlist to pilot giant mech in the fight against alien invaders. In a world where girls’ feet are still traditionally bound and families sell their daughters into the slavery of piloting the robots when the odds are good that the male pilots will survive at the expensive of the lives of the female pilots, Zeitan volunteers both to get away from her oppressive family and as part of a plot to avenger her sister’s death.

This one is intense and powerful from the show more first page and never lets up. Zeitan is possibly the strongest female character I’ve encountered in a long time. She pulls zero punches and it is freaking liberating to read. I immediately requested the second book and can’t wait to see what she does next. show less

Aliens have invaded the planet. For two hundred years humans have been battling the Hundun, using the spirit metal from their defeated enemies the humans have fashioned their own Chrysalises, giant robots, Mecha fueled by the pilots’ qi that that fuses their life force with that of the robots. It takes two to pilot a Chrysalis, a young male and his female concubine. Sometimes, to win, the concubine’s qi must be separated from her body, as a result she dies, but the battle is won for show more humanity, so it is a noble sacrifice.

When Wu Zetian the younger sister of one of the sacrificial victims, signs up to battle the Hundun, she is hoping to avenge her older sister by killing—not Hundun, but the male pilot who killed her sister. If she succeeds, she will be what’s known, but only to the strategists running the war, as an Iron Widow. A female whose qi is able to overcome that of the male pilot, so he becomes the one sacrificed. The public is not to know that this is possible. It would upset the social order which is based on a rigid patriarchy.

This is a dark fantasy of deceit, deception, disinformation, misogyny, betrayal, retribution, and revenge. An action and gore filled military adventure novel stuffed full of satisfying Sturm und Drang, and even some gruesome Shadenfreude to delight Riot Grrrls everywhere, as well as teens of all ages, sexes, sexual orientations feeling downtrodden by authority everywhere. It’s also filled with plot twists designed to twist the psyche and use the shock to raise consciousness.

"Humans...scourge of the universe..." … I drag my nails down my head and scream. Page 391

Contrary to the hype, this is not “Pacific Rim” meets The Handmaid's Tale. This is The Count of Monte Cristo slams into Ender’s Game. show less

I enjoyed this book! My sister bought it for me because apparently TERFs hate it, which was good enough for us both. Reading it, I can't really see anything to be mad about. It's a feminist book, all about women taking back their power when the institutions are rigged against them from the start.

I liked:

- The fact that you couldn't really tell who was a "good guy" or a "bad guy" from their initial behaviour. Or in other words someone being trustworthy or not is not related to how nice they show more are. Really emphasised the dangerous situation the characters were in and how hard it was to know who to trust.

- The solution to the "love triangle". FINALLY, an acknowledgement that it's possible to love more than one person an that you don't necessarily have to choose just one person to be with.

My only criticism is that sometimes the voices of the supporting characters don't sound tonally distinct from the main teen characters. Like we have a scholar/bureaucrat type saying things like "Geez" where "On the contrary" or "Indeed" might suit his character more.

Overall a good book and I enjoyed the no-holds-barred rage at society and the world-building. The hints at the true nature of the hunduns were handled really well. show less

This is what happens when you publish #ownvoices books (especially in SFF). You get a story with a rich and diverse cast of characters and it's effortless. None of these characters are thrown in for the sake of diversity. They belong there and they always belonged there. THIS should be the standard.

With that out of the way, this was a thrill to read the whole way through. I admit, it took me a minute to figure things out at the very beginning but I quickly figured out what was happening and show more I held my breathe from then on. There was constantly something happening. I struggled to put the book down to go and do adult things so naturally, I finished this in 3 sittings. Problem solved.

I'm really excited to see how the characters figure out this next hurdle! It was refreshing to have a set of characters that were simply to understand. They were neither bad, nor good, but somewhere in between and I loved that about them.

This book makes me feel hopeful about this next generation of writers. show less