#Review: The Empress of Salt and Fortune (The Singing Hills Cycle 1) by Nghi Vo

[melaniem54]

Review: The Empress of Salt and Fortune (The Singing Hills Cycle #1) by Nghi Vo

Rating: 4.75🌈 I’m not sure how I came across this incredible author and series. Perhaps it was that amazing cover or the hints of cultural magic mixed with references to strong women within an ancient history fantasy setting in the description. The Hugo award helped. Doesn’t matter. It doesn’t prepare a reader for the sheer beauty, the quiet cruelty, and vastness of the world found here. Love.…

[jujireads]

Books I’ve Read in 2022

continually updated, goodreads reviews are linked. reminder that my goodreads reviews range from serious to meme-y bs. 

A Good Girl's Guide to Murder (A Good Girl's Guide to Murder, #1) by 

The People in the Trees by Hanya Yanagihara

V for Vendetta by Alan Moore, David Lloyd

Graceling (Graceling Realm #1) by Kristin Cashore

The Empress of Salt and Fortune (The Singing Hills Cycle #1) by Nghi Vo

Clementine Book One by Tillie Walden

The Order of the Pure Moon Reflected in Water by Zen Cho

Wilder Girls by Rory Power

The Cabinet by Kim Unsu, Translated by Lin Halbert

What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher

From Below by Darcy Coates

The Bear and the Nightingale (The Winternight Trilogy #1) by Katherine Arden

Illuminae (The Illuminae Files #1) by Amie Kaufman, Jay Kristoff

Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick

Gideon Falls Vol. 1: The Black Barn by Jeff Lemire, Andrea Sorrentino, Dave Stewart

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

The Down Days by Ilze Hugo

Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk, Translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones

Mysterious Affair at Styles (Hercule Poirot #1) by Agatha Christie

The Round House by Louise Erdrich

The Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kingston 

Diving into the Wreck by Adrienne Rich

Ash by Malinda Lo

[cathygeha]

REVIEW

The Brides of High Hill by Nghi Vo

The Singing Hills Cycle #5

Unsure what to expect, I stepped into the fifth story of this intriguing story that made me think of fairytales read when young or perhaps a darker more fantasy laden story than Wind in the Willows. It packs a punch and has a deadly bite that with a twist I wasn’t expecting.

The plot, pacing, setting, and writing gave a definite Asian feeling. The descriptions had me seeing the story in graphic detail. The characters came alive on the page making me think about and feel with them. The twist at the end, and I am one that reads the end first sometimes, was a complete surprise – so well done on that!

I can see this as a graphic novel, animated, or perhaps even in a movie. I would love to read more about Cleric Chih and wonder what I have missed not having read the first four novellas in the series.

Did I enjoy this story? Yes

Would I read more by this author? Yes

Thank you to NetGalley and TOR Publishing for the ARC – This is my honest review.

4.5 Stars

BLURB

The Hugo Award-Winning Series returns with its newest standalone entry: a gothic mystery involving a crumbling estate, a mysterious bride, and an extremely murderous teapot. The Cleric Chih accompanies a beautiful young bride to her wedding to an aging lord at a crumbling estate situated at the crossroads of dead empires. But they’re forgetting things they ought to remember, and the lord’s mad young son wanders the grounds at night like a hanged ghost. The Singing Hills Cycle has been shortlisted for the Lambda Literary Award, the Locus Award, the Ignyte Award, and has won the Hugo Award and the Crawford Award.

The novellas are standalone stories linked by the Cleric Chih, and may be read in any order.

The Empress of Salt and Fortune

When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain

Into the Riverlands

Mammoths at the Gates

The Brides of High Hill

About this Series

https://us.macmillan.com/series/thesinginghillscycle

Set in a gorgeously realized world inspired by East Asian and Southeast Asian history and mythology, Nghi Vo’s “remarkable” (NPR), award-winning Singing Hills Cycle follows the archivist and cleric Chih as they record the stories of empresses, handmaidens, cultivators, ghosts, bandits, and many more. The series begins with The Empress of Salt and Fortune, which won the Crawford Award and the Hugo Award, and was named one of the twenty best fantasy debuts of all time by Book Riot.

The novellas of The Singing Hills Cycle are linked by the cleric Chih, but may be read in any order, with each story serving as an entrypoint.

“A quiet, wrenching tale of resistance, resilience, and court intrigue.” —#1 New York Times bestselling author R. F. Kuang

“A stunning gem . . . celebrates the wonder of queer love. I could read about Chih recording tales forever.” —New York Times bestselling author Samantha Shannon

[lizabethstucker]

The Empress of Salt & Fortune by Nghi Vo

3 out of 5

The Singing Hills Cycle 1

Now that the Scarlet Lake has been declassified, Cleric Chih from the abbey in the Singing Hills decides to divert there from his travels to see the new Empress. He discovers an old woman called Rabbit in the former Empress' compound. When Chih discovers that Rabbit was Empress In-yo's handmaid, he begs for stories in exchange for any work the old woman wants done. In the process, Chih learns about a woman determined to gather back power she had lost in her marriage and a friendship beyond the common.

Despite the novella not even reaching 200 pages, it is a dense tale packing weight into each word and scene. It is also quite flowery as would befit a tale from China's antiquity. I knew, based on previous experience with SIREN QUEEN, that it would take me a bit to get into Vo's writing, but I didn't expect that it would be a failure. As much as I was looking forward to this read, I didn't manage to enjoy myself much at all.

The story felt disjointed. The bones are there, but they are too twisted and broken to connect. Yes, this might be a cultural thing, yet I've rarely had this issue when reading books by and/or about other cultures in the past. I also found the storytelling aspect distanced me from the characters and the situations that Rabbit was relating. A sad disappointment.

While there is an audience for this novella, just look at the previous reviews, I am not one of them. My star rating actually hovered just below 3, but I can recognize the potential enough to give it a slight nudge. However, I've decided this isn't for me and will not be continuing the series.

[smalltownfae]

Book Review: “The Empress of Salt and Fortune” by Nghi Vo

Rating: 4.5/5

Title: The Empress of Salt and Fortune (The Singing Hills Cycle series #1)

Author: Nghi Vo

Pages: 112

Publication date: March 24th 2020

Publisher: Tor

Review:

This is such a charming novel!

The book starts with Chih, a cleric, and a talking bird, or neixin, called  Almost Brilliant, encountering an old woman that goes by the name of Rabbit. Everyday Rabbit tells the cleric the most important events of her story from when she was a servant of the empress In-yo. The entire book has that quiet feeling I get from animes like “Mushishi” and “Kino’s Journey”  and I could see this being the first book in a series where Chih and Almost Brilliant travel in order to record stories. So, I am glad to see that there is already a sequel and it seems like there are more books planned following Chih. I am very excited for that! I already own the second book.

Given the type of book it is, this means that there are some time jumps in the story. That means that we don’t spend that much time with the characters in the story being told, except for Rabbit. What is important is the message being told each day to the cleric. At the end of each story the old woman asks Chih if they understood the meaning and their interactions are short, but wonderful every time.

Another interesting bit that I loved is that Chih is referred to as “they” and this is the first time I see it in a fantasy novel. They are a very intriguing character that I hope to know more about in future books.

The empress In-yo is a strong and very admirable character. It was very interesting to follow her story along with Rabbit’s. Despite not spending much time with the characters, I still felt for them. The story rang very true as told from Rabbit’s perspective.

The writing is beautiful and there are some really great quotes.

Overall, I had a wonderful experience with his book and I must say the lenght helps when it comes to future rereads.

Quotes:

“You will never remember the great if you do not remember the small.”

“Better for it to exist than for it to be perfect and only in your mind.“

“Angry mothers raise daughters fierce enough to fight wolves.”

“That’s something I think peasants understand better than nobles. For them, the way down matters, whether you are skewered by a dozen guardsmen or thrown in a silk sack to drown or allowed to remove your robe and walk down to the shores of the lake before you gut yourself. Peasants understand that dead is dead.”  

“Look to your records, cleric. Honor is a light that brings trouble. Shadows are safer by far.”  

[rosemariecawkwell]

TBR Pile Review: The Empress of Salt and Fortune, by Nghi Vo

TBR Pile Review: The Empress of Salt and Fortune, by Nghi Vo

Paperback, 128 pagesPublished March 24th 2020 by Tor.comISBN:125075030X (ISBN13: 9781250750303)Series: The Singing Hills Cycle #1 With the heart of an Atwood tale and the visuals of a classic Asian period drama, Nghi Vo’s The Empress of Salt and Fortune is a tightly and lushly written narrative about empire, storytelling, and the anger of women. A young royal from the far north, is sent south…