The Poppy War: Review

I just finished reading The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang. This is a grimdark fantasy novel based on Chinese history. In particular, it is based on the second Sino-Japanese war that started in the late 1930s, bled into the Second World War, and ends with two atomic bombs being dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The novel follows a character named Fang Runin, who is a war orphan, a child left parentless in the wake of conflict and given off to a family who does not love her. She decides to study for a major nationwide exam that would purportedly give her opportunities beyond the impoverished life of a slave that she is confined to.

This book is a visceral and violent experience, with nothing held back in terms of the brutality of war, or the troubles of class in the people's lives. The ending most of all, captures the horrors and the bleak nature of war, and what it does to people.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book, my enjoyment increasing the further into the novel I progressed.

Strides (Spoilers)

The first thing I want to comment on is the grimdark aspect of the story. I mentioned above that I thought the story was violent and visceral. Specifically, I am referring to the portrayal of violence at the hands of the Federation. While the fight scenes were violent in general, it was the behavior of the Federation that made this story so horrifying. I am sure there will be some people out there who think the violence goes too far, but not only is the story better for its visceral portrayal of war, but the violence actually has real world parallels.

In the story, when the city of Golyn Niis is taken by the Federation, they destroy everything in the city and kill all of the civilians. There is a number of descriptions about the aftermath, as the characters come upon the city afterwards. Included are descriptions of women being gang-raped by uncounted amounts of men, babies being boiled alive, people being decapitated, and games between soldiers competing to see who could kill the most people.

The real historical event that comes to mind in light of this is the Rape and Massacre of Nanjing, which happened during the Second Sino-Japanese War. During the Japanese capture of Nanjing there were mass rapings of women throughout the city, with numerous reports of women being desecrated with bayonets and bottles and canes. There is also a report of a killing contest between two Japanese officers, whose demise (and actions) crushes the romantic vision we got from Legolas and Gimli's own contests in their battles with orcs. The stories and pictures that come out of that real event are nothing short of grim.

The parallels do not stop there, continuing into the end of the story, which is what made me like the story as much as I did. Mugin, of course, is a parallel to Japan, while Nikara is a parallel to China, and the ending of the novel ends much like the war in real life. In our lives, the war ended when the United States dropped two atomic bombs on Japan, killing hundreds of thousands of people, most of them civilians. In the book, Rin uses her connection to the Pheonix God to completely annihilate the entire island of Mugin.

Aside from the parallels, the story brings up the obvious quandaries that result from destroying an entire civilization. Rin is driven by hatred and a desire for revenge given all of the violence that I described above. She thinks the Federation is evil and deserves to be destroyed. In contrast, Kitay is horrified by the action and suggests that she is no different from the people she is fighting against, making the poignant point that being caught up in your tribal conflicts often leads to hypocrisy; our notions of morality are context specific, and are an adaptation, rather than some conscious construction in line with our modern morality. Rin is in denial that she is as bad as them, showing great offense over the implication, and the thread is left to hang for the next book.

I also liked some of the twists of the story. For some reason, it never occurred to me that Jiang was the Gatekeeper, even though the twist seems kind of obvious in hindsight. I was pleasantly surprised when that reveal came. Jiang's whole character was rather enjoyable, with the first side we see of him being rather entertaining and endearing, and then the latter side of him being much more serious, but also wise. At the same time, the rejection of his perspective was understandable, and it makes sense that people would disagree with him. The appeal of destructive power in the time of war is irresistible.

Another point that comes to mind, off of Jiang's own character, was the portrayal of magic in the story. True to the overall grimdark tendencies, the magic system is fickle and dangerous. But, most of all, I enjoyed the connection it holds to drugs. The detachment that magic brings to its users is only more pronounced knowing that the dangerous drugs that destroy people in our world are used to instigate magic in this one. I'm not sure how novel this concept is. I'm not a fantasy buff, but it is something new to me.

I also like how the story does not deify the Nikara. Their enemies are nasty, but the Empress herself turns out to be a villain in her own right, and she is likely to become the major threat of the next book.

Missteps (Spoilers)

Among the things that I did not like so much was how Rin managed to pass the exam in the beginning of the story. Somehow, she managed to memorize entire works of literature instead of comprehending the content, which I would think would be even harder. Somehow, she managed to do it with a small book in the course of three days, when I wonder if most people could even read it one time through in that amount of time. Rin is a slave at that point, and it makes the point that she has a whole host of setbacks, yet she still scored the highest in her region. This was ridiculous to me, and it did nothing to encourage my reading, which is problematic given that this is the beginning of the novel. This is a minor thing, and it obviously didn't completely put me off, but it still comes to mind after the fact.

There are also the various death scenes involving Nehza. Nehza "dies" twice in the story, the first time being a miraculous recovery that makes no sense. That's not the criticism, by the way. It doesn't make sense to the characters in the story, and the obvious implication is that he has some kind of power that allowed him to recover. Nehza then "dies" a second time, which is obviously not final, since it is off-screen, and because it leaves a mystery unresolved. I didn't like this because it's so obvious that he is coming back. Now, when I read the next books and it turns out he does not come back, then I guess I'll have to swallow my words, but for now I am going to assume he is still alive. Overall, I am just tired of fake out deaths that don't work. You need to make it believable and it just isn't here.

Another minor thing that comes to mind are the swears in the story. And yes, this is very minor. I thought the insults were a bit juvenile for the story and the characters. Among the insults were statements like "tiger tits," which I just found to be cringey.

Conclusion

Overall, I liked the book. I will give it a 7/10.