Review: She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan
It turns out that everyone loves this book because it is fantastic.
She Who Became the Sun begins following the Zhu family, specifically their innovative and ignored daughter. She is the last girl alive in her community because the famine has caused food to be prioritized to the boys, but she is luckily able to catch her own food, a feat the local boys seem unable to match. Her father takes her and her brother, Zhu Chongba, to a fortune-teller who says that Chongba's future is greatness and that the girl's future is nothingness. After a bandit attack, it is Chongba who dies, so the daughter takes up his name and goes out to seek his destiny as her own.
This book is a multi-point of view political fantasy (the fantasy element is relatively light but seems like it might increase in sequels) that follows the rebellion in the mid-1300s in China trying to overthrow the Mongol rulers. The story touches on themes of poverty, violence, gender, sexuality, power, and its imbalances. Obviously, there is quite a bit of serious material in this book, it does follow a war, but it is compulsively readable and kept me glued to the pages. This book absolutely grabbed my attention and did not let me go. As I read I just kept thinking 'I am going to LOVE my reread of this book.' This is not to say I didn't love my first read, I did, I am just already ready to read this story again. I was so invested in this story as I was reading. If I was not reading this book I was probably thinking about when I could read this book next.
Ouyang is the other main character in this story, he is a eunuch general for the Mongols, though his family were all executed by the man he works for. His story is partly Zhu and Ouyang being rivals, but they are more each other's opposites, or the catalysts for the other's destiny to progress. Ouyang is a fascinating character whose loyalties are so divided and drought. Reading from his perspective, and reading about him from others' perspectives are both fascinating.
The writing itself is just beautiful. Parker-Chan just writes in such a captivating way that keeps you sprinting through the book, but I would occasionally read a line that just hit me, and made me read it multiple times before I went ahead. I was just continually impressed by the language, I am so excited for a reread to be able to think about the prose more directly while I read.
This is a kind of big book, and a lot happens during it, so I don't want to write about specific events and spoil anything, but also so much happened that it is all still rattling around in my brain as I write this (I finished it about an hour ago), this is certainly a story I will be thinking about for a while after reading.
