Iron Widow

by Xiran Jay Zhao

hardcover, 384 pages

English language

Published Sept. 20, 2021 by Penguin Teen.

ISBN:: 978-0-7352-6993-4

(56 reviews)

Science fiction and East Asian myth combine in this dazzling retelling of the rise of Wu Zetian, the only female emperor in Chinese history

The boys of Huaxia dream of the celebrity status that comes with piloting Chrysalises - giant transforming robots that battle the aliens beyond the Great Wall. Their female co-pilots are expected to serve as concubines and sacrifice their lives.

When 18-year-old Zetian offers herself up as a concubine-pilot, her plan is to assassinate the ace male pilot responsible for her sister's death. But on miraculously emerging from the cockpit unscathed after her first battle, the Iron Widow sets her sights on bigger things. The time has come to take on the entire patriarchal military system.

11 editions

el dang reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Vicarious revenge fun; sometimes a bit too video game for my taste

4 stars

This is a very cathartic book in which the heroine goes magnificently all-in on a revenge that grows from the initial single person target to patriarchy itself. It does suffer a bit from the YA tensions getting resolved too quickly/tidily syndrome, and I found its setup a little too video gameish, but I'll probably still read the sequel.

At first I was very annoyed with the simplification of qi into categories and a precisely measurable "spirit pressure", but I can see how doing that sidestepped having to do a hundred pages of worldbuilding before anything much happens.

Nomad Scry reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Iron Widow

3 stars

Interesting subversion of certain tropes and well crafted telegraphing. It didn't hit quite right for me, probably because I'm currently in an argument with the "special boy/girl" model of fantasy.

Nomad Scry reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Iron Widow

3 stars

Iron Widow is a sci-fantasy story that incorporates various genre tropes, but they are covered in a fresh and interesting skin. I appreciated that certain recognizable beats were, at least so far in the story, subverted or not followed through. Despite that, and probably for personal reasons rather that book-related ones, I was not invested and didn't have that anxiety and delight that I feel with the best stories.

Teabat reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Review of 'Iron Widow' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

Abandoned book

Felt like I was playing AO3 bingo....

SaraLeon reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Review of 'Iron Widow' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

I didn't know what to expect when I bought this book, based on Zhao's great video essays. It catched me right away with the complex, fleshed out characters. The final twist was logical, but I still didn't see it coming - also the layers of societal critique she waved in so effortlessly

isabel reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Everything All At Once

3 stars

I like Xiran Jay Zhao. They're a great content creator and their Twitter is something to behold. So it was only a matter of time until I got to Iron Widow. That time was this week when I had a 5 hour bus journey in front of me and needed something to entertain me.

It was certainly a quick read for my standards. But then, I always seem to eat through YA literature as opposed to everything else I read, even if I go out of it with a sense of dissatisfaction. Which is not really something I felt here, even though the book has left me wanting in the worst possible way. The characters are... fine. Wu Zetian is the main character and thus the most fleshed out. The two love interests (it's an actual love triangle!) are somewhat shallow and everyone else is either window dressing or someone …

That comes at the cost of narrative depth though. There's so many elements to this scifi-fantasy version of medieval-modern China that are essential to the story - most importantly the concept of qi, which the pilots of the giant animechs people use to fight - that obviously have a lot of thought behind them but are explained so badly that, even after reading the book, I still have no idea what any of them are supposed to do. There's so many instances of "so I combined my Metal qi with his Wood qi" or whatever and I just kind of glossed over it as technobabble. Which is really disappointing because, again, there seems to be an actual system to this whole thing?

But none of that is explained in a satisfactory way because we need to get to the next fight, battle, torture, or romance scene as quick as possible lest the book lose the interest of its readers. It seems to have worked, as evidenced by the speed I read the book with. But it really didn't give me any opportunity to just let the whole thing sink in. There is no space to breathe between the pages which would've been necessary considering the onslaught of stuff that is happening. It also doesn't provide enough space to explore any of the character's motivations. Zetian is driven by revenge against a patriarchal society, that much is established. But she goes from "I hate my family" to "The. World. Must. Burn." so quick, it gave me whiplash.

I'd still say it's a decent read. And I'll probably read the second installment, as this seems to aim to be a series. But it neither left me hungry for more, really. Nor did it satisfy in a narrative sense.

Blackberry Jim reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Iron Widow Is Fine

3 stars

Content warning Spoilers beneath a break at the bottom!

It’s fine! Nice light bombastically melodramatic reading, though with a lot of content warnings (I do like that they’re at the front of the book). I’m a sucker for mecha, especially weird, slightly more organic mecha, and this generally scratched that itch. The prose style doesn’t quite work for me and I don’t… think that it’s especially well written? But I’m giving it 3 cos I did enjoy it and was happy to suspend judgement of quality in order to have a nice time. The main character manages imo to be a Tough Female Character Who Hates Emotion and also very easy to root for, and it has some nice juicy twists of the sort that are fun to encounter in a YA novel.

Spoilers now:

There seemed to be a lot of potential for a genuinely complicated and difficult political situation, where the main character wrangled with complicity and compromise a little more, without a big heroic/villainous moment at the end where she gets to keep all of her power through essentially the ‘I am the House’ ending option in Fallout New Vegas. It was a fun power fantasy ending, but it felt like a way to avoid wrangling with more complex politics. But themes of complicity are not neglected, it seems to be deliberately focusing more on personal relationships and identity, and after all this kind of thing might come in more in the sequel that the book is very much aiming toward. Also all else unchanged it would have been a fairly miserable book without a moment where the beaten-down protag finds a way to somehow break out of the system she hates.

Additionally it must be said that the scenes of intimacy before they fade to black are just not great. There’s no real awful bits but, at least for me (which is a big disclaimer), I wasn’t even entirely sure what they were trying to tap into with the sensory description.

I would also have liked to see a little more of the time between Zetian meeting Shimin and hating him, and her being angry at him in a I’m-mad-I-have-feelings-for-you way. We get snippets of how his violence reminds her of her father and grandfather and makes her want to flinch and make herself small, and she confronts him about the deaths of women that he’s complicit in, but when she gets closer to him it didn’t come off to me as a serious and dramatic change in opinion, only as her feeling the same attraction and empathy for him since almost their first meeting. Which is allowed! It just feels like it dilutes the initial situation of, from her perspective, very justified fear and anger. I would have liked to see them trust each other less quickly and their relationship as something they each had to put more emotional work into. But, yknow, I kind of don’t want more time spent on the love triangle, so this works.

A nice way to spend a few tired hours :)

M Is For Awesome reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao

Review of 'Iron Widow' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

The trouble with reviewing a book you really like is toning down the firehose of feelings into a readable piece that isn't just a bunch of heart emojis and squeeing. I'll give it a go however for the sake of the Iron Widow because I really enjoyed this book for very specific reasons.

The Rage - This is by far the best thing about the story. Women just don't get to be ANGRY in stories for very long and certainly not to their benefit. The main character of the Iron Widow is furious from the moment we meet her with damned good reason and instead of tripping her up it fuels her rise to greatness. God its so refreshing.
Even better - that reason is not because someone raped her. Yes, world, women can be angry about a number of things just like real people.

The Battle Scenes - Having been bored silly by fight scenes in several books this year, it was so fun to find a some that delighted and excited without bogging down into bloodthirsty detail for the sake of it. This is a book about giant battle suits after all so the temptation to take them out for a spin more often than the plot needed must have been enormous.

The Non-Romance - Don't get me wrong, there is love in this book and sex, but there is no Romance. Love doesn't make the main character suddenly re-evaluate her life goals. Sex doesn't make her weak. Relationships don't spring forth fully formed at first kiss. It is in fact wonderfully free of the love-at-first-sight tropes which get shoe-horned into so many unsuspecting books.

There were some minor things some readers might find an small issue with which I will outline only to show I haven't been driven entirely uncritical by my enjoyment of this deadly romp. The tone of the dialogue can be glib at times, and the ending feels rushed - so much happens but there is no time to really sit down and explore all the rapid fire events which crowd the last few scenes. And the ending leaves you with more questions than it answers, which might be a feature not a bug for some readers.

Final thoughts - I read the book in practically one sitting and I loved every minute. I hope it brings such joy to many others!

Phillip Santiago reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Burns Quickly, Leaving Ash

3 stars

Relentless pacing that eventually crashes into the wall of its ending. It's pretty great worldbuilding and plotting, but I wish it had cut some of the subplot revolving around the Yellow Dragon Chrysalis and spent more downtime exploring with that pilots do when they're not beating each other senseless.

David Bremner reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Solid adventure, some thought provoking aspects

4 stars

I found my self making time to listen to this audiobook by doing things like taking the dog for extra walks. So that in itself is a pretty good review.

The protagonist is an interesting character, who is quite relatable. I'm not sure I would make some of the choices she does, but I haven't lived her life either.

From a genre point of view, it was (for me) closer to fantasy than "hard" science fiction. That might depend on how familar one was with traditional Chinese Chi theory. I'm not even familiar enough to say how close the book is to tradition.

Some of the twists are not quite as surprising as the author might have intended. It is very much set up for a sequel, which I understand the author needs to make some more money to write. So I hope my USD13 helps (or whatever small share …

I found my self making time to listen to this audiobook by doing things like taking the dog for extra walks. So that in itself is a pretty good review.

The protagonist is an interesting character, who is quite relatable. I'm not sure I would make some of the choices she does, but I haven't lived her life either.

flashy_dragon reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Review of 'Iron Widow' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

Zeitan is intent on getting revenge on the Chrysalis pilot that killed her sister. After succeeding, her list of people and groups to get revenge on slowly grows.

Zeitan falls in love?… I’m not sure if love is actually present, but as presented on the page, a love triangle forms between her, her pilot, and her friend. That is, she falls for each of them, they fall for each other, and each of them fall for her. It's hard to tell that anything developed, because I feel there is very little weight to any particular decision or action for the characters. I didn't feel that decisions, when choices were presented, came with serious, character (or world) altering repercussions. The world is superficial. The characters are flimsy and shallow. There is little substance, little depth to be had. The book seems more of a vehicle for the author’s profound thoughts, dropped regularly, on everything from cherishing and inspiring someone, to pregnancy and slavery.

I particularly didn’t enjoy that the entire premise for Zeitan is that she isn’t like other girls. That’s nearly the full extent of her character. Perhaps most frustrating is that Zhao clearly cares about what they are writing and why, they’re anger is tangible and real. But that anger, that drive doesn’t make up for my perceived lack of depth.

I felt that it over promised and under delivered.

Axl reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao

Review of 'Iron Widow' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

Zetian is just not like other girls but in a good way, it's hard to remember another character that was anything like her, Yizhi and Shimin were also a good surprise and I would have liked even more scenes between all of them. The writing was simple but fluid and the plot with all the sci fi elements was great, it was not too much or too weak, this book was easy to fly through and finished with a bang and so of course i'm anticipating the next book with impatience already lol

Tsundoku reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

UNLIKEABLE CHARACTER AHEAD WOO WOO (and) Ignore the Comp title, but read this book

5 stars

Content warning CW: Abuse of all kinds, death, misogyny, footbinding

Comp Titles, if you don't know, are where you get that "X meets Y" and if you are like me, get you mad when you read a book because it was nothing like what you imagined when you smooshed those things together.

Comp titles are basically required to sell books. There's a lot of detail I could go into here, but it's better to think of them as "has elements of X" and "Has elements of Y".

This, if you may not know, was at least pitched to ME as "Pacific Rim meets the Handmaid's Tale" I am sorry to say I have not seen Pacific Rim, but I know it's a mecha movie with kaiju and people liked it.

Okay. The problem is, if you're like me, you're a little Tired of the Handmaid's Tale. Do not imagine the Handmaid's Tale. This is a futuristic fiction (once again they have mechs) and is very clearly, NOT an analogue of the US.

Basically our Protagonist Wu Zetian, (yes named for that historical empress) has a problem for YA fiction. She's very "unlikeable". Not to say I DIDN'T LIKE HER. On the contrary, I LOVED her. But basically in YA fiction (and I think elsewhere too, but this is the closest thing I have to expertise) you'll see in reviews "ugh this Bitch was so unlikeable because she did a bad thing that a male protagonist would have been allowed to do".

Let me be clear: Zetian does a LOT of fucked up shit in this book. That's partially the point, this is a fucked up system. It basically requires a fucked-up response (at least in this book). But I personally quite liked Zetian once I understood her.

And let's talk for a moment. There is "technically" a love triangle, but as many of you probably know, this goes into poly territory. And while I at least don't Think I'm poly, I thought it was handled well, but ask someone with experience in those relationships.

Anyway if you need a con about this book, I can give you one (that is not the book's fault)

The sequel is not out until 2023, and yes Xiran Jay Zhao is writing something else right now, entirely because they understandably want to be paid for their writing so they can, you know, eat: ( nitter.net/XiranJayZhao/status/1511894731764109316#m )

I do encourage you to read it now anyway, because while it does end with a sequel in mind, it's a good ride, and I've honestly seen more pressing of cliff-hangers.

SharonC reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Review of 'Iron Widow' on 'Goodreads'

1 star

What a terrible book. Cardboard characters behaving irrationally
Lazy, boring "world building"

Non-sensical dialogue choices

Archbishop reviewed Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (Iron Widow #1)

Review of 'Iron Widow' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

This is genuinely my favorite book ever. When I started it I’d been in a reading slump for a while, and this book got me out of it. It was so well written and has such good character development. Character development is one of the most important things, and you nailed it. Thank you so much for writing such an amazing book and I can’t wait for the sequel. You’re an amazing author!