Poppy War

by R. F. Kuang

No cover — R. F. Kuang: Poppy War (2018, HarperCollins Publishers)

English language

Published May 15, 2018 by HarperCollins Publishers.

ISBN:: 978-0-00-823982-4

(99 reviews)

A brilliantly imaginative talent makes her exciting debut with this epic historical military fantasy, inspired by the bloody history of China’s twentieth century and filled with treachery and magic, in the tradition of Ken Liu’s Grace of Kings and N.K. Jemisin’s Inheritance Trilogy.

When Rin aced the Keju—the Empire-wide test to find the most talented youth to learn at the Academies—it was a shock to everyone: to the test officials, who couldn’t believe a war orphan from Rooster Province could pass without cheating; to Rin’s guardians, who believed they’d finally be able to marry her off and further their criminal enterprise; and to Rin herself, who realized she was finally free of the servitude and despair that had made up her daily existence. That she got into Sinegard—the most elite military school in Nikan—was even more surprising.

But surprises aren’t always good.

Because being a dark-skinned peasant girl from the …

But surprises aren’t always good.

Because being a dark-skinned peasant girl from the south is not an easy thing at Sinegard. Targeted from the outset by rival classmates for her color, poverty, and gender, Rin discovers she possesses a lethal, unearthly power—an aptitude for the nearly-mythical art of shamanism. Exploring the depths of her gift with the help of a seemingly insane teacher and psychoactive substances, Rin learns that gods long thought dead are very much alive—and that mastering control over those powers could mean more than just surviving school.

For while the Nikara Empire is at peace, the Federation of Mugen still lurks across a narrow sea. The militarily advanced Federation occupied Nikan for decades after the First Poppy War, and only barely lost the continent in the Second. And while most of the people are complacent to go about their lives, a few are aware that a Third Poppy War is just a spark away . . .

Rin’s shamanic powers may be the only way to save her people. But as she finds out more about the god that has chosen her, the vengeful Phoenix, she fears that winning the war may cost her humanity . . . and that it may already be too late.

8 editions

V171 reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Goodness gracious, what a read. Let me start by saying that overall, I enjoyed this book. I thought it was a really strong entry into the trilogy as well as a very good story in and of itself. However what stood out to me the most was its very unique structure. Many aspects of this book were solidly YA. The characters were written very YA, the relationships were extremely YA, and the story beats (girl has to prove herself to get into school against all odds, girl has to prove herself at school against all odds, girl has to prove herself in battle against all odds, etc.) This was most prominent in the first third of the book, to the extent that I was convinced that the book had been mislabeled as 'Adult fantasy'. And it was these aspects of the book that were my least favorite. I felt that the characters were fairly flat and the story beats were predictable.

But in the last 2/3rds of the book (mainly the last third) the story took a HEAVY dark turn. I mean a near genre shift to hard grimdark. I really commend the author for her incredibly gritty and realistic depiction of the horrors of war because this was extremely brutal. The lighthearted cast of kid characters we grew to know were put through horrific, cruel encounters and completely traumatized, if not graphically slaughtered outright. The main character's "chosen girl" qualities were quickly overshadowed by her poor childlike decisions. But this was not frustrating because she is literally a child making decisions one would expect a child to make. Again, the author expertly crafted a realistic narrative for how children would act in traumatic circumstances. While I never felt that the characters met the level of 'well-developed' the decisions that they made did feel authentic.

The pacing of the story was okay, often times rapidly moving through story points in a few pages, other times lingering on details for just as long. I'd love to see improvements in character development and pacing in the subsequent books, but I'm really excited to continue this story.

Chris M reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

This one started out really slow and I almost gave up before the real sparks began to fly. It ended up being very good and had enough unique qualities make me want to continue reading this series.

Jamie reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

Giving this four stars because it is excellent for what it is, but not really my cup of tea. It has quite a lot of graphic violence and gore, and when it's not violent and gory, it's very philosophical.

Balise reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

No rating

This was both fantastic and completely not for me :) I'm glad I read it, I won't be reading the following books.

WardenRed reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

None

4 stars

The Empire didn't need someone reasonable. It needed someone mad enough to try to save it.

Wow. This was really quite a ride. And now I struggle to put my conflicting feelings into words, but I guess I'll try.

I really wanted to like this book, and the thing is, it has all the makings of a dark fantasy novel for me to love. (There were parts that were incredibly disturbing to read, especially knowing that they were essentially a retelling of actual history, but hey, I've seen the content warnings and knew what I was getting into.) I like dark fantasy, on occasion. I like fantasy world build upon cultural backgrounds different from the "so, this is basically Western Europe but fantasy" usual. I like flawed, tragic antihero type protagonists who go from "genocide is horrible" to "so I'll genocide you right back." I like stories about gods and magic. I like magic that comes at a high cost.

This book has it all, and yet in many regards, it falls flat.

Maybe it's the somewhat uneven pacing. Maybe it's the somewhat messy worldbuilding; at the start it seemed like a medieval-ish world (although some of the language used, particularly in dialogue, kept making me feel like this was a later period), then as the story progressed and the author drew more and more from the actual 20th century history... well, I'd like a smoother transition from "we're starting the story in a medieval military school" to "chemical warfare and science labs." Occasional namedropping straight from the real world didn't help immersion, either.

Or maybe it's the characters. I always connect to the stories through characters first and foremost, and The Poppy War didn't make it easy. Among the secondary cast, there were some characters who held my attention, all of them introduced pretty early on: Altan, Kitay, Nezha. Others had their moments, but didn't feel fully developed to me. Rin, the protagonist, was the hardest case. I expect the protagonist to be the one who anchors me to the story. I don't have to like them, but I have to get them. Rin was really hard to get for at least half of her story.

Initially, she wants to escape her crappy foster family and the prospect of an arranged marriage. And her only way to do so is by acing the super complex exam and getting into a super prestigious academy. Except it's not really her only prospects. She thinks of a few more in passing as she waits for the exam results. But that's the only one she cares for. Why exactly? It's... not very clear. Then when she's at the academy surrounding by people who outrank her from birth, she wants to prove herself and show them she's worthy of being here, which I get... until she suddenly decides that what she really wants is power. Okay, that's a great motivation, why does she want it? What exactly she's going to do with it? What's her reason to want power? Um, she just wants it.

It's only more or less mid-book that she can explain with both words and consistent action why she wants power: because then there's no one she won't be able to save. From about that point, I was drawn a lot more into the story and more invested into the events of it and Rin's quest for power (and the inevitable corruption it brings). The story still felt somewhat scattered, uneven, rocky, but at least the protagonist finally had a consistent motivation. If I were this invested from the beginning, the flaws re: pacing, worldbuilding, and plotting would be a lot easier to overlook. Unfortunately, I'd already spent half of the book noticing them all before I could get the protagonist.

I think the main problem for me here is that there's so much crammed into one book. Perhaps if it were split into two distinct novels, each of those two hypothetical books would flow a lot better, there'd be room for better character development, tighter plotting, and more coherent worldbuilding. It's not about word count, mind; more about the structure. It's like there are two stories, the one that starts in chapter one and ends somewhere in Part II, and another one, the sequel to the first one, that tries to start early in Part II, and they kind of overlap awkwardly.

Reading this book, overall, was like eating a salad made of all my favorite ingredients, but in the wrong proportion.

I still want to read the sequel sometime.

Sean Gursky reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Good but not great. The book started off just being average using a school setting to instruct our protagonist (and reader) about society, magic and such. I don't mind this method of world building but the delivery here was unexciting.

Each Part of the book escalated drastically and the Young Adult school setting from the start is a distant memory once the grim and horrific bodies start to pile up. There was enough to keep me entertained but I never felt fully invested in character or story either.

The final Part of the book was very gory and dark that it was equally disturbing and entertaining to read. With the enemy known and our hero aware of her powers I am intrigued to push on to Poppy War #2 but am not sold on the series as a whole so will see how I feel after the next instalment.

Chris Adams reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

This is hard book to rate: I liked much of the world building but the other reviews commenting on the uneven characterization and jarring increase in darkness certainly weren’t wrong. I’m not sure how to feel about the use of real historical atrocities, either: the book lacking the developed history left that part feeling unexplained — we have a generic explanation for the conflict but it didn’t feel real enough to explain the intensity without relying on your knowledge of real-world Chinese-Japanese history. Having one minor character return briefly solely to be motivational felt heavy-handed.

ospalh reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

I don’t know what it was. Maybe just too long-winded. Anyway, at some point i got bored with this.
In the middle of an action scene, no less.
It started out OK. Basically, you are not supposed to pass the kējǔ as a poor person, and when you do, the rich folks will look down on you. But then there wasn’t really all that much else.

Axl reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

The Poppy War : 4.5

A great fantasy with Chinese inspired elements, written by a Chinese author we love to see it ! Also the author wrote this at 19, and won many awards for this debut novel, the talent^^

Rin, a poor war orphan, gets into this elite military school and will face many difficulties and ennemies..and that's it for now! Just keep in mind that this is adult, and it contains hard topics related to war times.
Also I started this because I thought the final book was coming out in May, turns out it was pushed back to November, lol..

knizer reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Spoilers! Underdog self harming orphan girl is the Chosen One, joins X-Men assassin squad of child drug addicts, proceeds to turn to the Dark Side and genocide Nazis and civilian support cities with lava, in alternate universe historical China where gods granting magic is a thing. Problematical. Books 1 and 2 great, 3 goes off the rails. Strong female lead, not for kids. TW: drug use, self harm, violence, rape, atrocities

Nikko reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

This book started off as something I couldn't put down, and threw me for a loop a dozen times. It transforms from a fish-out-of-water university story to a spiritual pantheon epic, back around to a speculative-fiction take on the Japanese Imperial occupation of main-land China, back around to the internalized trauma of war, all while centering itself on the notion of choice(and lack-there-of in some cases), with compelling(but always flawed) characters pulling you through.

Looking forward to where book two takes me.

luddite reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Political theory, modern Sino-Japanese history and genocide interwoven with fantasy - this book was written keeping me in mind. So very good.

The pacing is very good overall, but it flags at the 60% mark. I think that's a deliberate choice - Rin lacks agency in this stretch of the book, being more of an observer, and that's reflected in the writing. Altan's character and the portrayal of the gods serves as a good canvas to reflect on how we ascribe external justifications for our violence, and the enduring effects of this violence.

It gets brutal and violently graphic later in the book; I had to stop reading for a bit. But I guess that's the point when you're talking about the unforgivable horrors of war. This particular portrayal will stay with me.

Pick up this book if you're a history buff and love the competitive school fantasy trope. This …

Laura Lemay reviewed The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang (The Poppy War, #1)

Review of 'The Poppy War' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Hugely ambitious epic fantasy set in an alt-universe China. Starts out light and familiar for fantasy (smart plucky girl goes to magic school) but then makes a abrupt left turn into a war novel that is unrelentingly violent and grim. Uneven pacing, thin supporting cast, protagonist makes baffling decisions, and very hard to read in the last third. I was impressed with the ambition but conflicted about the craft. The author is very young and this is her first novel. I'll give #2 a chance.