Monday, July 29, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Dragon Republic by R.F. Kuang




Full Disclosure:  This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on August 6, 2019 in exchange for a potential review.  I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.

 The Dragon Republic is the follow up to R.F. Kuang's debut novel, The Poppy War (Review Here), easily one of the strongest novels of 2018.  It was also one of the most brutal and dark novels by its end, being based upon real life events that took place during the Sino-Japanese wars, with a new fantasy bent.  I am not a fan of grimdark books that are dark for the sake of being dark, but Kuang used her fantasy parallels to real life events to powerful ends to a satisfying if incredibly dark conclusion, leaving a reader breathless by the story's end.

So The Dragon Republic has a lot to live up to as the follow up to The Poppy War, and it doesn't quite manage to pull it off, although it's still compelling through the end.  Whereas the first book dealt with the atrocities of the Sino-Japanese wars as its base, this book has parallels to the effects of Western Imperialism/Colonization, with the fantasy equivalent of Westerners showing up to ostensibly aid some of the parties in the conflicts/rebuilding that result from the end of The Poppy War.  Any readers who were shocked and surprised at what happened in the last book will almost certainly not be here, but the feeling of dread I felt instead was nearly equally as powerful, as the book's great characters try to find a way forward in the face of having perhaps nothing left. 

Trigger Warning:  Rape, War Atrocities, and Genocide.  The First Book in this series was based upon the Sino-Japanese Wars (particularly the second one), and as such analogous events occured in that book and those are referenced here.  This book deals with the after effects of this and parallels to Western imperialism in China, where the atrocities aren't always as overt...but they're there, so again, fair warning.

Warning: Spoilers for The Poppy War cannot be avoided below.  If you intend to read The Poppy War unspoiled, stop here.


---------------------------------------------------Plot Summary-------------------------------------------------
Having destroyed the Mugen Federation with the Phoenix, Rin finds herself with no purpose in life other than to continue her vengeance against the woman who betrayed her and her Shaman allies, the Cike, the woman who rules Nikara, the Vipress and Empress, Daji.   But Rin is hunted throughout the Empire of Nikara and there are fewer than 10 people - the remaining members of the Cike - who she can trust to help her.  And even worse, Rin can barely control the Phoenix itself, with the god's voice constantly in her head begging her to consume everything in flame, and her only moments of sanity coming under the influence of opium, when she's no good to anybody.

Yet against all odds, Rin finds an unlikely ally for her quest for vengeance in her old classmate and rival Nezha's father, the Dragon Warlord, who seeks to wage a quick civil war against the Empress to establish a "Dragon Republic."  Together with her old friend Kitay, Rin struggles to both control her power and to help in the war against the Empress, so that she may once again have a way forward.  But the Dragon Warlord, and his strange White helpers from the overseas country of Hesperia, may have their own plans for Nikara.....plans that may not include people like Rin, assuming Rin and her friends can survive this new war for Nikara against an Empress who is just as magically powerful, and as brilliant strategically, as any of Rin and her friends combined.....
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The Dragon Republic has a hell of a task before it, to follow up on the stunning ending of The Poppy War.  It also can't quite pull off the same deception that the first novel tried pulling over its readers' eyes - pretending to be a much more conventional, if dark, form of a typical work in this genre (where a lower class girl goes to an upper class warrior academy, learns power, gains friends and rivals, and eventually works with them to save everyone).  No, this time around, the reader, in addition to Rin herself, is expecting the worst at nearly all times, leading to a massive sense of dread hovering around this book as the reader waits for certain shoes to eventually drop in potentially catastrophic and horrifying ways.

Leading the reader through this world once again is Fang "Rin" Runin, now an absolute wreck after the events of The Poppy War, on the verge of being driven mad by the Phoenix, desperately out of her depth in a leadership position she's never wanted, and feeling so much guilt for the death of Altan, who she still sees as the one who should have survived instead of her.  The only thing Rin thinks she wants - the only thing she thinks she deserves - is her vengeance over Daji, and so when she's presented with a war to do just that, she goes along, even despite all the warning signs of what might be happening around her.  It's a pretty incredible book that can make its main character - the protagonist we're supposed to root for - the cause of genocide and still have us on her side, but Rin actually remains sympathetic to some extent under Kuang's writing (this is no antihero).

The rest of these characters remain excellent, from the big ones, to the minor ones.  Most prominent are of course the mysterious shaman Chaghan, who also struggles from the loss of Altan, and Rin's school friends Kitay and Nezha.  Kitay left off in the last book refusing to have anything to do with Rin for her actions, but events here return him, known as a brilliant strategist, to the fore and his and Rin's journeys are really well done, with his development taking some interesting paths from beginning to end.  And then there's Nezha, who was left for dead in The Poppy War but who was hinted to possibly have powers that could've helped him survive.  And sure enough he did, and he emerged into an interesting complement to Rin and Kitay, as they fight a war with leaders who might be leading them to ruin, and reveals are made of Nezha's past that pose the possibility to change everything.

I have mixed feelings about Nezha here honestly - whereas his transformation from enemy/rival to ally in The Poppy War worked rather well, I'm not sure the version of him seen here in this book is a logical end result of development based on what's happened to him, he's almost an entirely different character at times.  And he's a major character, so this is a bit of an issue in the book that can't be helped away.  Still I do think it works, despite my misgivings.  And I should point out the other minor characters, many of whom were introduced in the first book, remain excellent and natural complements to this world.

As I mentioned above, the plot of this book can't generally surprise the reader with the bad to come - although there are a few major shocks that the book still manages to pull off - but instead the book suffices the atmosphere with a feeling of dread throughout.  Any reader without utter insane naivete will be dreading reading on for instance the moment the White foreigners show up, knowing that their presence cannot possibly lead to anything good, and the book doesn't even try to pretend otherwise.  This atmosphere works generally well, and the plot never drags despite this being an even longer book than the first one, resulting in an epic conclusion that sets up the final book in the trilogy.  The end result is not as strong a book as the first novel - I'm not sure such strength would be possible after what happens there - but it is still compelling and worth your time.

So yeah, if you could survive The Poppy War and found it compelling, The Dragon Republic is worth your time, with this fantasy version of China still telling a tale worth telling, dark and brutal as it is.
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