Outside of a Dog

Tsundoku reviewed Cake Eater by Allyson Dahlin

Allyson Dahlin: Cake Eater (Hardcover, 2022, HarperTeen)

Decadent, thrilling, and romantic, this Black Mirror-esque retelling of the reign of one Marie Antoinette …

I'm Sorry Sir, I did not Mean To Do it...

5 stars

Content warning This is Marie Antoinette's life, so it's "Historical Fact + Robots" and talking about the differences

This is a YA SFF retelling of Marie Antoinette's Life until the Revolution / Reign of Terror Starts.

I cannot call my myself a Maria Antonia expert, because other than listening to Dana Schwartz cover her in the podcast Noble Blood (or the guest episodes on You're Wrong About) I haven't studied her heavily, beyond having listened to these episodes multiple times.

But if you listen to those episodes, you get the impression: Marie Antoinette's biggest crime was being Marie Antoinette. Like "The Affair of the Diamond Necklace" (does not occur in this book) but that's basically "Marie Antoinette says no to buying a hideously expensive necklace. Priest she hates gets catfished into thinking she's both in love with him and needs him to buy the necklace, despite the mountains of evidence Marie Antoinette did nothing wrong in this scam case, the general public believes it's a false flag operation because She TOTALLY Wanted the necklace." (I could go into more detail but just listen to Noble Blood)

Like to be clear, the revolution is more condensed in this book, and ends before she has any children (so you don't have to focus on THOSE Heartbreaking details of her life. I want to stress if you decide to look up those details there's a Major Bummer Warning / Fucked up Shit warning there)

There's changes of course. Louis is Asexual in this telling (that makes a lot of sense tbh) and instead of the mechanics of locks and keys he is more obsessed with programming / hacker shit (though I don't think he ever says "I'm in", sorry) her Sister-in-Law Elizabeth (who I know nothing about to be honest) has a relationship with a woman.

Marie Antoinette does not like Madame du Barry but there's no scandal for failing to acknowledge her, though I thought it was building towards one.
Maria Antonia's Dog, Mops is in the book.

There's some interesting implications that I hope get dug into with some sort of sequel, that a lot of these popular figures (Marie Antoinette, Robespierre, etc) existed in the past, but unless I missed it (and I may have, there were parts of this book where I was a sobbing mess) it didn't go anywhere with it.

Anyway, an excellent debut, I'd really love to see more from this author.

Tsundoku reviewed Zachary Ying and the Dragon Emperor by Xiran Jay Zhao

Xiran Jay Zhao: Zachary Ying and the Dragon Emperor (Hardcover, 2022, Margaret K. McElderry Books)

12-year-old Zack never had many opportunities to learn about his Chinese heritage. His single mom …

I'm gonna have to buy / own this book, aren't I?

5 stars

As a Note: The Audiobook has to be redone (The Narrator did not know Mandarin) so if you need to read books that way, you may want to wait some time.

In my Iron Widow review I talked about the issues with Comp Titles.

This one IIRC is Percy Jackson meets Yu-gi-oh.

While it does not include playing children's card games for much of the plot (but AR headsets and games do fit in to the story) I have ZERO issues with this comp title.

Zachary's gaming headset is possessed by his ancestor Qin Shi Huang, and when Zachary's mother's soul is snatched, leaving her in a coma, Zachary must go to China and team up with a couple other children to reinforce a seal before Ghost Month, or it spells the end of China if not the world, and his mother of course.

What …

As a Note: The Audiobook has to be redone (The Narrator did not know Mandarin) so if you need to read books that way, you may want to wait some time.

In my Iron Widow review I talked about the issues with Comp Titles.

This one IIRC is Percy Jackson meets Yu-gi-oh.

While it does not include playing children's card games for much of the plot (but AR headsets and games do fit in to the story) I have ZERO issues with this comp title.

What I really love about this book (other than everything) is that part of the conflict is how disconnected Zachary is as a Chinese diaspora to the mythos of Qin Shi Huang. Also, I can't think of a single other book I've read that mentioned Hui Chinese people. As such Zachary eats Halal (or Vegan if there are no other options).

This is not a book that speaks of how great China is. Zachary's father was executed years before the story started for standing up for Uyghur rights. Occasionally, while in China, there are mentions of how in certain areas, the Chef's knives are chained to their kitchens, that sort of thing.

This book also lead me to learn the Chinese healthcare system (from the payment side) isn't friendly to chronic issues, and I have to admit I'd simply assumed that China had good state-paid healthcare because I'm in the US, known healthcare-insurance-hell-hole. Now I will say I tried to look into this more, and the articles on wikipedia don't seem to be up to date, and there doesn't seem to be much information in English (unless you are willing to trust random websites, and as an American, I've tried to be really careful to not believe random bullshit about China). Basically I'm saying, I know the author has done loads of research, I'm just going to trust them.

Anyway, while I suspect if you know your Chinese history and mythology, you have an upper hand in the twists of the book, but if you don't, everything gets explained pretty well without overwhelming you with information.

All in all this is great, I don't remember the last time I loved a Middle Grade book this much. I'm gonna have to buy a hardcover copy of it (and Iron Widow) at some point.