SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Dragon of Jin-Sayeng by KS Villoso: https://t.co/mg694uyTd5
— Josh (garik16) (@garik16) April 26, 2021
Short Review: 8 out of 10
1/3
Short Review (cont): The finale to the Chronicles of the Bitch Queen trilogy sees Tali fighting for her people and for the life of her son and herself to be anything other than what her father schemed for her as warlords and monsters close in around her. A strong ending.
— Josh (garik16) (@garik16) April 27, 2021
2/3
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 May 4, 2021 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 of Jin-Sayeng is the third and final book in K.S. Villoso's epic fantasy trilogy, "Chronicles of the Bitch Queen." The Filipino-inspired epic fantasy trilogy, which began with "The Wolf of Oren-Yaro" (Reviewed Here) and continued with "The Ikessar Falcon" (Reviewed Here). It's been one of more interesting epic fantasy series I've read over the past few years, with at its center a heroine who is utterly a mess, screwed up by expectations of others, the machinations of her father, the acts of her arranged husband, and a world that is perhaps as harsh at times to its rulers as its peasants. The first volume, which I loved, dealt with themes of class, imperialism, sexism and double standards, but the second volume expanded the setting tremendously and instead seemingly focused upon the impossibility of doing the right thing when everything's against you, and the struggle against fates that everyone, from your father on down, seem to have set up for you. It was an interesting winding book that I didn't quite love as much as the first, with it perhaps being a bit too ambitious in how much it was trying to setup at once.
And for its part, The Dragon of Jin-Sayeng absolutely pays off all of the many many plot threads setup by its predecessor and in the process creates a really interesting conclusion to the trilogy. Its a really really dark book, for an already dark series, especially in the book's final act, as it follows our heroine, Talyien, as she struggles first to save her son and then to save her country from monsters, from magic, from a madman, and perhaps most of all, from the ambition of her father from beyond the grave. It's a story of a woman desperately trying to do the right thing while not having her life be defined by what others believe her fate to be, and of a woman who doesn't know if there's any possible love or happiness for her to feel on her own. And the result is a book that's damn hard to put down, even as I'm not 100% sure I loved where it wound up.
TRIGGER WARNING: Rape (not depicted on page, but it happens to a side character), Animal Cruelty, Torture, Suicide, and possibly more I'm missing. This gets really bad in the book's third act and honestly....it's excessive and kind of unnecessary and I wish the book hadn't gone there.
Spoilers for books 1 and 2 are inevitable below. Note that this book, like the 2nd book, contains a recap of book 2, so there's little need for a reread if you haven't read book 2 in a while.
------------------------------------------------------Plot Summary-----------------------------------------------------
Talyien of Oren-Yaro, Bitch Queen of Jin-Sayeng may finally be home, but she is absolutely not in control. Her son has been captured by a power hungry warlord and is out of her hands. Her people are alleging that her son is a bastard and the warlord in charge of Oren-Yaro's greatest forces is acting against her, keeping her imprisoned until a farce of a trial can be held over her infidelity. And of course the Ikessars, led by her husband Rayyel's prideful and powerful mother, are coming for her blood.
But none of that really matters, as Talyien knows full well - for the land of Jin-Sayeng is beset by chaos, with a magical rift in the sky turning the populace into monsters at an ever increasing rate. And to make it worse, Talyien's worst enemy, the mad and magically-powerful Prince Yuebek, is surely coming for her and her father's plans from beyond the grave to betroth her to him seem impossible to thwart.
With only a few friends left to her - her husband who has betrayed her so many times, a con-man for whom she has clear feelings but can't afford to let be harmed, and a mage once loyal to her husband and to a foreign god - Talyien has few choices left as to how to proceed....and her desperate need to save her country prevents her from simply running to freedom. But how can Talyien save her country if doing so only leads her down the dark path her father set forth for her, a path where Talyien has no power except through her blood, where the prospect of her own happiness seems impossible to even think about?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Like its predecessor volumes, The Dragon of Jin-Sayeng is told from the first person perspective of Talyien (Tali), as if the volume was written at some point in the future. Unlike its predecessors, this book actually explains how that's possible, which was a nice touch, but really isn't that important. What is important is how it centers Tali, whose journey is what makes this trilogy, and this book, so special as it finally comes to its ultimate end.
When we first met Tali in book 1, she was a brash, angry young woman, who believed that she deserved to rule based upon her father's teachings and her warrior skills among her people....and who was still heartbroken by the husband Rayyel she had convinced herself to love before he fled from her. But in her time in that foreign city, she learned her how little her birth could mean and how her husband had fled due to her one moment of weakness (never mind his own) and that her father, far from proudly preparing her to rule in peace, had perhaps instead been preparing to sell her off to a monstrous foreign prince in order to obtain power. And that knowledge broke her of her haughtiness, leaving her with nothing but her need to get home to save her son from potential assassins.
But in book 2, Tali was forced to journey across her own country and to discover how the peace she thought her marriage had bought was itself a lie. The warlords that ruled her country, supposedly under her rule, were still sparring for power, the country was cursed by a magical rift despite their historic hatred of magic, dragons were going mad, and people were even turning into monsters....and so it seemed like the country was falling apart. And meanwhile, as Tali began to be convinced that she had to do something to save her land, it seemed like more and more of the warlords and her trusted allies were secretly acting on her father's behalf to manipulate her, and Tali began to believe she had to throw away any chance of happiness or of love in order to save everyone...if that was even possible.
With this finale, Tali begins seemingly crushed, with her in the power of those who would seemingly want to follow her father's plans of marrying her to the madman from abroad...just seemingly for the sake of power. Tali may still be a deadly warrior, but she finds that everywhere she turns there are only reveals and more secrets that were hidden from her, secrets which suggest her father was right to use her in this way, and that she has no value as a person instead of a tool. And the only persons seemingly there for her are the man she once thought she loved and Khine, the con-man she knows she could and might be falling for...except to do so can only result in his death. And so Tali spends so much of this book trying to find a way forward that won't get him killed, that won't result in her father being right, that might allow her to save her people without giving in to what others want for her.
It's a really tough plot and the answers are not always easy to take, as Villoso does largely suggest that it is pretty near impossible to become something different than what our fathers and others have planned for us, even if they're already dead. And Tali's struggle between her duty to her people, a duty installed by that father whose will she's fighting against, and her potential to have some individual joy and love is tremendously well done. Oh and I should add that the plot works here for the most part really well, managing to tie in all the disparate plot elements from the last book - the blood magic, the dragon with a human mind, the rift, her father's plans, Yuebek, etc. Even the side characters - most prominently Khine, but also a number of other lesser ones we barely knew of in the prior books - work really well here. It's a hell of an epic fantasy conclusion, even if it's got a pretty grim perspective on how it all can end.
The biggest problem with this book honestly lies in the trigger warning above - in the third act, Tali is faced once more head on with Prince Yuebek and his madness. And while Yuebek never gets his hands on Tali's body (oh thank god), Villoso gives him scenes of rape, animal cruelty, torture, and more....and the only purpose it serves in the narrative is to reinforce how mad and evil Yuebek is. But we knew that already! We've known that for two whole books!
I guess the justification is basically - Yuebek is meant to represent the imperialist neighbor begged for help, all the while knowing that to do so will likely devastate one's own country and culture, and so the schemers put in a massive amount of planning to try and limit his damage....but his madness and power-hungriness is beyond the scope of even the best of schemers to limit, resulting in rape death and destruction (again, that's the symbolism I'm guessing). But it's still just too much and unnecessary given how much we've already seen from Yuebek and I wish an editor and told Villoso to take it all out.
If not for that, I'd wholeheartedly recommend the trilogy, but that's a pretty big negative to get over. Readers who enjoyed the first two books will be able to get over it probably, but if you were looking just to start this trilogy, it might be a thing to worry about. It's worth getting through it....but it really shouldn't be a thing that a reader should have to get through, which is just argg so frustrating.
Talyien of Oren-Yaro, Bitch Queen of Jin-Sayeng may finally be home, but she is absolutely not in control. Her son has been captured by a power hungry warlord and is out of her hands. Her people are alleging that her son is a bastard and the warlord in charge of Oren-Yaro's greatest forces is acting against her, keeping her imprisoned until a farce of a trial can be held over her infidelity. And of course the Ikessars, led by her husband Rayyel's prideful and powerful mother, are coming for her blood.
But none of that really matters, as Talyien knows full well - for the land of Jin-Sayeng is beset by chaos, with a magical rift in the sky turning the populace into monsters at an ever increasing rate. And to make it worse, Talyien's worst enemy, the mad and magically-powerful Prince Yuebek, is surely coming for her and her father's plans from beyond the grave to betroth her to him seem impossible to thwart.
With only a few friends left to her - her husband who has betrayed her so many times, a con-man for whom she has clear feelings but can't afford to let be harmed, and a mage once loyal to her husband and to a foreign god - Talyien has few choices left as to how to proceed....and her desperate need to save her country prevents her from simply running to freedom. But how can Talyien save her country if doing so only leads her down the dark path her father set forth for her, a path where Talyien has no power except through her blood, where the prospect of her own happiness seems impossible to even think about?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Like its predecessor volumes, The Dragon of Jin-Sayeng is told from the first person perspective of Talyien (Tali), as if the volume was written at some point in the future. Unlike its predecessors, this book actually explains how that's possible, which was a nice touch, but really isn't that important. What is important is how it centers Tali, whose journey is what makes this trilogy, and this book, so special as it finally comes to its ultimate end.
When we first met Tali in book 1, she was a brash, angry young woman, who believed that she deserved to rule based upon her father's teachings and her warrior skills among her people....and who was still heartbroken by the husband Rayyel she had convinced herself to love before he fled from her. But in her time in that foreign city, she learned her how little her birth could mean and how her husband had fled due to her one moment of weakness (never mind his own) and that her father, far from proudly preparing her to rule in peace, had perhaps instead been preparing to sell her off to a monstrous foreign prince in order to obtain power. And that knowledge broke her of her haughtiness, leaving her with nothing but her need to get home to save her son from potential assassins.
But in book 2, Tali was forced to journey across her own country and to discover how the peace she thought her marriage had bought was itself a lie. The warlords that ruled her country, supposedly under her rule, were still sparring for power, the country was cursed by a magical rift despite their historic hatred of magic, dragons were going mad, and people were even turning into monsters....and so it seemed like the country was falling apart. And meanwhile, as Tali began to be convinced that she had to do something to save her land, it seemed like more and more of the warlords and her trusted allies were secretly acting on her father's behalf to manipulate her, and Tali began to believe she had to throw away any chance of happiness or of love in order to save everyone...if that was even possible.
With this finale, Tali begins seemingly crushed, with her in the power of those who would seemingly want to follow her father's plans of marrying her to the madman from abroad...just seemingly for the sake of power. Tali may still be a deadly warrior, but she finds that everywhere she turns there are only reveals and more secrets that were hidden from her, secrets which suggest her father was right to use her in this way, and that she has no value as a person instead of a tool. And the only persons seemingly there for her are the man she once thought she loved and Khine, the con-man she knows she could and might be falling for...except to do so can only result in his death. And so Tali spends so much of this book trying to find a way forward that won't get him killed, that won't result in her father being right, that might allow her to save her people without giving in to what others want for her.
It's a really tough plot and the answers are not always easy to take, as Villoso does largely suggest that it is pretty near impossible to become something different than what our fathers and others have planned for us, even if they're already dead. And Tali's struggle between her duty to her people, a duty installed by that father whose will she's fighting against, and her potential to have some individual joy and love is tremendously well done. Oh and I should add that the plot works here for the most part really well, managing to tie in all the disparate plot elements from the last book - the blood magic, the dragon with a human mind, the rift, her father's plans, Yuebek, etc. Even the side characters - most prominently Khine, but also a number of other lesser ones we barely knew of in the prior books - work really well here. It's a hell of an epic fantasy conclusion, even if it's got a pretty grim perspective on how it all can end.
The biggest problem with this book honestly lies in the trigger warning above - in the third act, Tali is faced once more head on with Prince Yuebek and his madness. And while Yuebek never gets his hands on Tali's body (oh thank god), Villoso gives him scenes of rape, animal cruelty, torture, and more....and the only purpose it serves in the narrative is to reinforce how mad and evil Yuebek is. But we knew that already! We've known that for two whole books!
I guess the justification is basically - Yuebek is meant to represent the imperialist neighbor begged for help, all the while knowing that to do so will likely devastate one's own country and culture, and so the schemers put in a massive amount of planning to try and limit his damage....but his madness and power-hungriness is beyond the scope of even the best of schemers to limit, resulting in rape death and destruction (again, that's the symbolism I'm guessing). But it's still just too much and unnecessary given how much we've already seen from Yuebek and I wish an editor and told Villoso to take it all out.
If not for that, I'd wholeheartedly recommend the trilogy, but that's a pretty big negative to get over. Readers who enjoyed the first two books will be able to get over it probably, but if you were looking just to start this trilogy, it might be a thing to worry about. It's worth getting through it....but it really shouldn't be a thing that a reader should have to get through, which is just argg so frustrating.
No comments:
Post a Comment