Aunt Tigress by Emily Yu-Xuan Qin

[james_davis_nicoll]

News that her supernatural aunt has been murdered upends a young woman's life.

Aunt Tigress by Emily Yu-Xuan Qin

Comments

[dranon]

I love this book so much. It might be a little overstuffed, and the first few chapters were slow going for me, but once I was in I was in.

I found it a fascinating mix-up of all sorts of things, including the immigrant experience, Chinese stories, First Nations stories and issues, magic, atonement, growing up, taking responsibility, and difficult families. Even though were some brittle interpersonal relationships that could have done with the characters actually talking to each other, the reasons they didn't felt real and not contrived.

The character of Aunt Tigress is suitably nasty, and, both from the text and an interview with the author, can be taken as a criticism of Cultivation, or, at least, certain forms of it. It certainly is a one of cultural appropriation.

I did think that having the main characters be named Tam Lin and Janet was overly twee, but I also saw that some people liked it, and it doesn't affect much except Janet's pep talk to Tam at the very end anyway.

When I finished it, I turned around and reread it from the start. I can see why it wasn't the thing for James, but it hit the spot for me.