Fathomfolk by Eliza Chan

Pages: 439

Publisher: Orbit 

Released: 29th of February 2024 

Welcome to Tiankawi – shining pearl of human civilization and a safe haven for those fleeing civil unrest. Or at least, that’s how it first appears.

But in the semi-flooded city, humans are, quite literally, on peering down from skyscrapers and aerial walkways on the fathomfolk — sirens, seawitches, kelpies and kappas—who live in the polluted waters below. And the fathomfolk are tired of it. When a water-dragon and a half siren join forces, the path to equality is filled with violence, secrets, and political intrigue. And they both must decide if the cost of change is worth it, or if Tiankawi should be left to drown.

What I Have to Say 

I enjoyed this book so much. I loved the different types of Fathomfolk and the idea of a half sunken city. Everything added up to create a really interesting society that I was really excited to explore. I was especially interested in the sea witches, because there was so much to explore with their deals and ink. 

The themes of immigration and prejudice as well as the dangers of radicalisation that made up the book, were really well done. My heart ached for Nami as she was being manipulated by the Driftbacks. I wondered while reading if maybe we should have seen how much she was being manipulated so early on, but it did mean I was alert to all the signs and could really see how it was happening. 

The ending was really intriguing. I'm really looking forward to see where Tiankawi will go from here and what's in store next for the characters. 

4 stars 

My thanks goes to Netgalley and Orbit for providing me with this gifted copy for review. 

Forty Words for Love by Aisha Saeed

Pages: 304 

Publisher: Kokila

Released: 22nd of August 2023 

In this tender genre-bending young adult novel by New York Times bestselling author Aisha Saeed, two teen protagonists grow from friends to something more in the aftermath of a tragedy in their magical town.

Moonlight Bay is a magical place—or it was once. After a tragic death mars the town, the pink and lavender waters in the bay turn gray, and the forest that was a refuge for newcomers becomes a scourge to the townspeople. Almost overnight, the entire town seems devoid of life and energy. The tourists have stopped coming. And the people in the town are struggling.

This includes the two teens at the heart of our Yasmine and Rafay. Yasmine is a child of the town, and her parents are trying and failing to make ends meet. Rafay is an immigrant, a child of Willow Forest. The forest of Moonlight Bay was where people from Rafay’s community relocated when their home was destroyed. Except Moonlight Bay is no longer a welcoming refuge, and tensions between the townspeople and his people are growing.

Yasmine and Rafay have been friends since Rafay first arrived, nearly ten years ago. As they've gotten older, their friendship has blossomed. Not that they would ever act on these feelings. The forest elders have long warned that falling in love with "outsiders" will lead to devastating consequences for anyone from Willow Forest. But is this actually true? Can Yasmine and Rafay find a way to be together despite it all?

What I Have to Say 

This book was bursting with metaphor and themes and everything that make English Lit students happy. I loved the idea of a pink and lavender sea and enjoyed thinking about it. And the absence of it made a really powerful metaphor for grief, especially after the tragedy that happens in the first chapter of the book. This book is about the town grieving from a tragic event. It was beautifully constructed to show that. 

The only problem was that because there's so much grief and emotion in the town, it made the first half of the book really depressing to read. It wasn't hard to get into, but it was just a lot of very hopeless sentiment. It did get better though in the second half of the book when there was more hope to be had. 

The ending was beautiful as well. It made me gasp at points and ended in exactly the right way. I thought I knew how it would end from about a quarter of the way into the book, but I was so wrong. It really left an impression on me. 

4 stars 

My thanks go to Netgalley and Kokila for providing me with this gifted copy for review. 

Peach Blossom Spring by Melissa Fu (audiobook)

 

Pages: 400

Narrator: Eugenia Low

Publisher: Headline 

Released: 17th of March 2022

Peach Blossom Spring follows three generations of a Chinese family on their search for a place to call home.

With every misfortune there is a blessing and within every blessing, the seeds of misfortune, and so it goes, until the end of time.

It is 1938 in China and, as a young wife, Meilin’s future is bright. But with the Japanese army approaching, Meilin and her four year old son, Renshu, are forced to flee their home. Relying on little but their wits and a beautifully illustrated hand scroll, filled with ancient fables that offer solace and wisdom, they must travel through a ravaged country, seeking refuge.

Years later, Renshu has settled in America as Henry Dao. Though his daughter is desperate to understand her heritage, he refuses to talk a

bout his childhood. How can he keep his family safe in this new land when the weight of his history threatens to drag them down? Yet how can Lily learn who she is if she can never know her family’s story?

Spanning continents and generations, Peach Blossom Spring is a bold and moving look at the history of modern China, told through the story of one family. It’s about the power of our past, the hope for a better future, and the haunting question: What would it mean to finally be home?

What I Have to Say 

Following three generations, Meilin, Renshu and Lily, Peach Blossom Spring looks at war (both against the Japanese and the Chinese Civil War), immigration and what it means to be Chinese. Each character's perspective has a different story, starting with Meilin's journey across China and beyond with Renshu, then Renshu's path to America and finally Lily's struggle to find out who she is as a half Chinese girl growing up in America. It shows three very distinct stories that span three countries and the better half of a century. 

I struggled to get used to the narrator a bit at first and at the very start of the book there were a lot of Chinese names in a very brief paragraph, which I might have kept better track of if I had been reading traditionally instead of listening, but it quickly became clear that I only needed to keep track of a few characters. As I settled into the narrators voice, I loved the way she pronounced the characters names and other Mandarin words, as Mandarin is a very beautiful language. I also loved the way they did phone conversations and the TV broadcast later in the book, made to sound as if the person was actually at the other end of the phone or on TV. 

I also really loved the folk stories that were told by Meilin throughout the first few sections of the book.  The title, Peach Blossom Spring, is reference to one of these stories but I think my favourite was about the man who owed a very beautiful horse that was both a blessing and a curse. The other part I really enjoyed was Lily's story. I loved her as a character and was interested to see her try to navigate her Chinese heritage. It was really interesting how much Renshu was impacted by his war torn past and his need to navigate the political climate of China and Taipei. I really felt for both characters. 

I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who's interested in Chinese history and culture. It was a very interesting read. 

My thanks go to Netgalley and Headline for providing me with a copy of this book to review. 

Shades Within Us: Tales of Migrations and Fractured Borders edited by Susan Forest and Lucas K. Law

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Publisher: Laksa Media Groups

Released: 8th of September 2018 

Journey with twenty-one speculative fiction authors through the fractured borders of human migration to examine assumptions and catch a glimpse of the dreams, struggles, and triumphs of those who choose--or are forced--to leave home and familiar places. Who straddle borders within our worlds--and within us.

Migration. A transformation of time, place, and being . . .

We are called drifters, nomads. We are expatriates, evacuees, and pilgrims. We are colonists, aliens, explorers; strangers, visitors--intruders, conquerors--exiles, asylum seekers, and . . . outsiders.

An American father shields his son from Irish discrimination. A Chinese foreign student wrestles to safeguard her family at the expense of her soul. A college graduate is displaced by technology. A Nigerian high school student chooses between revenge and redemption. A bureaucrat parses the mystery of Taiwanese time travellers. A defeated alien struggles to assimilate into human culture. A Czechoslovakian actress confronts the German WWII invasion. A child crosses an invisible border wall. And many more.

Stories that transcend borders, generations, and cultures. Each is a glimpse into our human need in face of change: to hold fast to home, to tradition, to family; and yet to reach out, to strive for a better life.

What I Have to Say

There were some truly amazing stories in this anthology. It was wonderful to see so many different perspectives, so many different kinds of people from stories set in the past, present and future in countries all over the world, the one thing connecting them all being that they're tales of migration, facing the struggles, prejudices and barriers that come hand in hand with moving their lives across the boarders. 

I don't think there were any stories that I particularly disliked, but there were definitely some that stood out more than others. I adored the way that language played a big part in stories like Porque El Girasol se Llama el Girasol by Rich Larson, Inkskinned by Jeremy Szal and Devouring Tongues by S.L Huang. I also really loved Critical Mass by Liz Westbrook- Trenholm and The Travellers by Amanda Sun. 

The only real problem I had with this anthologies is as the subject matter can be so upsetting and dark, I found that reading them back to back was really quite depressing. I wouldn't take issue with the book itself, but I would advise readers to take a step back and read something else for a bit of a break, which as they're short stories is very easy to do! 

I wholeheartedly recommend this book though. There were beautiful, important and heartbreaking stories throughout the anthology and really show different ways of viewing the world.

My thanks go to Laksa Media Groups and Netgalley for providing me with this copy for review. 

The Survival Game by Nicky Singer

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Pages: 384

Publisher: Hodder Children's Books 

Released: 26th of July 2018 

In a world full of checkpoints and controls, can love and hope defy the borders? A searing, timely story, as arresting as it is beautiful. 

Mhairi Anne Bain owns only two things: a gun with no bullets and her identity papers.

The world is a shell of what it once was. Now, you must prove yourself worthy of existence at every turn, at every border checkpoint. And if you are going to survive, your instincts will become your most valuable weapon.

Mhairi has learnt the importance of living her own story, of speaking to no one. But then she meets a young boy with no voice at all, and finds herself risking everything to take him to safety.

And so Mhairi and the silent boy travel the road north. But there are rumours that things in Scotland have changed since she has been away. What Mhairi finds there is shocking and heart-breaking, but might finally re-connect her to her sense of self and to the possibility of love.

What I Have to Say 

I adored the first half of this book, but the second half was really, really dull. I don't think I've ever been this divided about the book. The first part is an amazing journey of survival in the face of immigration and guards who will lock anyone up for trying to cross the boarders. The second half though is all waiting and laws and although it was vaguely interesting to see the laws in place in Mhairi's home, I just really didn't need to read it. 

Mhairi's journey across to Scotland though was amazing. It was gripping, suspenseful and full of the ways that Mhairi has had to cope with things she's done and seen, all the trauma that she has to compartmentalise because dealing with it is impossible to do while also trying to keep herself and the boy alive. 

I loved Mhairi' character, her communication with a boy that can't speak. The flashbacks to what happened in her life before she got to Heathrow and the journey that she had to make, avoiding the guards and escaping capture. 

It really was great. It's worth reading just for the first half. I just wish that the second part had been as good. 

My thanks go to Netgalley and Hodder for providing me with this copy for review. 

The Toymakers by Robert Dinsdale

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Pages: 320 

Publisher: Ebury Digital 

Released: 8th of February 2018 

Do you remember when you believed in magic?

The Emporium opens with the first frost of winter. It is the same every year. Across the city, when children wake to see ferns of white stretched across their windows, or walk to school to hear ice crackling underfoot, the whispers begin: the Emporium is open! 

It is 1917, and London has spent years in the shadow of the First World War. In the heart of Mayfair, though, there is a place of hope. A place where children’s dreams can come true, where the impossible becomes possible – that place is Papa Jack’s Toy Emporium.

For years Papa Jack has created and sold his famous magical toys: hobby horses, patchwork dogs and bears that seem alive, toy boxes bigger on the inside than out, ‘instant trees’ that sprout from boxes, tin soldiers that can fight battles on their own. Now his sons, Kaspar and Emil, are just old enough to join the family trade. Into this family comes a young Cathy Wray – homeless and vulnerable. The Emporium takes her in, makes her one of its own. But Cathy is about to discover that while all toy shops are places of wonder, only one is truly magical...

What I Have to Say 

I loved this book so much when I was reading it. But it's one of those that ends up leaving you a bit sad. It was a beautiful book though. Full of amazing things. I love books with this kind of magical surrealism. I love books that take an aspect of life and add something amazing to it. The emporium is a place that you will fall in love with. You'll want to visit and buy toys from it. Until it all goes wrong of course. 

The whole thing with the toy soldiers, for me, was the perfect metaphor for the conflict of the pre-WW1 mentality that war is glorious and the post- WW1 disillusionment that most of the soldiers suffered. It was really interesting to see these two mentalities go up against each other, as they must have done constantly with soldiers who had been to war and people who hadn't. To see this argument be played out over a bunch of toy soldiers was a really cool was to do it. 

I think this is a book that will stay with me for quite a while. I loved the characters so much and elements like the toy soldiers and the paper trees and Sirius the patchwork dog are all things that I'll remember fondly for some time. 

My thanks go to Netgalley and Penguin Random House for providing me with this copy for review. 

Defy The Stars by Claudia Gray

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Pages: 480

Publisher: Hot Key Books
Released: 1st of April 2017 

Noemi is a young and fearless soldier of Genesis, a colony planet of a dying Earth. But the citizens of Genesis are rising up - they know that Earth's settlers will only destroy this planet the way they destroyed their own. And so a terrible war has begun.

When Noemi meets Abel, one of Earth's robotic mech warriors, she realizes that Abel himself may provide the key to Genesis' salvation. Abel is bound by his programming to obey her - even though her plan could result in his destruction. But Abel is no ordinary mech. He's a unique prototype, one with greater intelligence, skill and strength than any other. More than that, he has begun to develop emotions, a personality and even dreams. Noemi begins to realise that if Abel is less than human, he is more than a machine. If she destroys him, is it murder? And can a cold-blooded murder be redeemed by the protection of a world?

Stranded together in space, they go on a whirlwind adventure through Earth's various colony worlds, alongside the countless Vagabonds who have given up planetary life altogether and sail forever between the stars. Each step brings them closer - both to each other and to the terrible decision Noemi will have to make about her world's fate, and Abel's. 

What I Have to Say 

I've really liked Claudia Gray's writing before, but this book just fell short for me. I haven't really been in the mood to read Sci-fi lately, so that could account for some what I found boring about this book, but I don't think that's all. I found the romance to be basically non-existent to be honest. Or at least one sided. I could kind of see it happening with Abel, in his own way of not knowing why he does the things he does, but I just didn't see anything on Noemi's side until the very end. 

The look at immigration was something that was interesting about this book Noemi comes from Genesis, a world that is fighting for it's independence from Earth in order to keep their planet from being destroyed and used up in the same way that Earth and the planets under it's control are being. But as Noemi sees more of the universe and what is happening in and around the other planets, she has to rethink her opinions. 

It was a really good look at the ramifications of immigration as well as the reasons why we should be sensitive to the plight of refuges. 

Even though I didn't get on well with this book, for those reasons, I do think this is a good one to read. 

My thanks go to Netgalley and Hot Key Books for providing me with this copy for review.