Ono Fuyumi - The Twelve Kingdoms: Sea of Shadow

This is the first of a series of books set in the twelve kingdoms universe, although from what I've heard, all the books are only loosely connected and don't need to be read in order.

Nakajima Yoko is an average girl, save for her naturally brown-red hair (I see anime and manga influences!). Until one day, a strange man appears, gives her a sword, and transports her to the land of the twelve kingdoms. Yoko doesn't want to be there, but there's not much she can do.

Unlike almost all the other person-from-our-world-transported-to-another books I've read, the introduction of the new world is miserable. Yoko hates it and hates it and hates it, and had I not been warned that it gets better, I might have given up reading. Also, I'd seen the first five episodes of the anime prior to reading the book and really disliked it. I didn't hate Yoko as much as I did in the anime, possibly because I knew more what to expect, possibly because the book gives more of a look at Yoko's thoughts, possibly because Yoko learning to fight in the book only takes a chapter or so instead of several episodes.

The book often feels slow and episodic, which isn't helped by the occasional giant infodump. However, things really start to fall into place in the final quarter, and although the final bit is extremely infodumpy, it is infodumpy in that kind of "Ohhhh, so that's what all that meant!" way, which I kind of miss from all the fantasy series I read as a teen. Plus, the big reveal was surprising and really cool, and I ended up loving Yoko by the end.

The prose frequently felt flat to me. I'm not sure if it's the style of the original or the fault of the translator. That said, I'm really glad the publishers kept the illustrations, which I love, and I am so happy they kept all the Chinese characters in the book! I don't know how confusing they were to other people, but it helped me a lot when it came to keeping track of stuff.

I also loved the worldbuilding, which, as previously mentioned, is explained in infodumpy ways, but is cool enough that I was looking forward to the infodumps. It's extremely Chinese, and I kind of love that a ton of it is about government and ruling correctly. Well, that and people growing from trees!

In conclusion: a little clunky at times and somewhat slow to start, but the ending really made all the build-up worth it.

Also, there is a cute rat!

Question: Is the anime just an adaptation of this book? Or does it include other volumes as well?

Links:
- rachelmanija's review

Shawl, Nisi - Filter House

I was actually a little afraid to read this because I know I frequently bounce off short stories and off science fiction short stories in particular—the amount of worldbuilding to figure out in a short amount of pages makes my brain hurt. Also, it didn't help that I read some of it while extremely sleep deprived.

Possibly because of that, the stories I loved most tended to be the ones that felt like folktales or the ones from a child's POV that gradually introduced you to the fantasy in the world, while the ones I categorize as needing a reread (or many) are the ones with much denser worldbuilding.

One of my favorites was "Wallamelon," with its focus on growing up and growing apart from people, along with the growing joy of learning about something. I also liked the mix of the child-POV in "The Rainses'" with the ghost story and the mystery and the legacy of slavery; I laughed at the narrator thinking an actual railroad ran underground because I think I had the same impression as a kid. I also loved the land of the dead and the overall feel in "The Beads of Watu," and "The Pragmatical Princess" made me laugh with delight. The latter isn't a deep story, but I love the dialogue between the princess and the dragon, and I really loved having a Muslim princess in a type of story that's usually Eurofantasy.

I don't think I fully understood "Shiomah's Land" or "The Water Museum," but I liked them nevertheless for the setting and the characters, especially Shiomah and the examination of love and pregnancy and children.

I think I need to reread "Deep End," "Momi Watu," "Good Boy," and "Maggies" because there was a lot of worldbuilding in there that I couldn't concentrate on. The world in "Deep End" reminded me of a short story in So Long Been Dreaming. I liked the tense, paranoid atmosphere in "Momi Watu," need to reread all the bits about computers in "Good Boy," and even though I am still not quite sure how the worldbuilding works in "Maggies," I like the main relationship between the POV character and the maggie, as well as the creepy literalness of "getting under your skin."

And even for the stories I didn't get, I love all the emphasis on female relationships. I can't even single out a particular story for it because there are so much, romantic and sexual and intergenerational. I loved all the mothers or grandmothers or parental figures nurturing young and not-so-young girls, the oral transmission of knowledge, the teaching. There's just so much there, and normally it feels like I'm going through fiction with a fine-toothed comb just to find a fraction of the women there are in this book. I am so glad it won the Tiptree.

And, of course, I love that the entire collection is so grounded in non-Eurofantasy, that space is populated with brown people, that Shawl writes about an America built on slavery and racism and violence instead of simply erasing the past and the people in it (*cough*unlike certain pioneer fantasies*cough*).

Even with my not getting all the stories, I feel like there's so much in here; it is so rich with things I did not even know I was looking for.