RogerBW's Blog

2021 SF, first of a duology. Zetian's older sister died as a pilot-concubine, co-piloting a giant mecha to fight off the aliens from beyond the Wall. She knows she will also die, but she plans to take someone down with her…

This is a fascinating book. It's filled with characters inspired by Chinese history, starting with Wu Zetian (624-705), but also including Li Shimin (598-649), Qin Zheng (259-210BCE), Gao Qiu (1076?-1126), Sima Yi (179-251), Zhuge Liang (181-234), An Lushan (703-757)… and I'm giving those dates to emphasise that these are not at all direct copies of the historical characters whose names they share, though they do borrow elements of their characterisation.

Indeed, this is a setting of the far future, with alien invaders and a new Great Wall to keep them out, and… why doesn't this annoy me the way The Tiger's Daughter did when it borrowed Japanese history wholesale for its fantasy world?

Maybe because Zhao does have Chinese cultural roots, though they moved to Canada as a child. But also because there's frankly more energy here, perhaps at times too much; this story is very much in the spirit of good mecha anime, which yes, has lots of giant robot fights, but also has serious things to say about the sort of people who will happily strap children into a war machine and send them off to die. And where you win battles not by having the better technology but by channelling your qi better, reconfiguring your mecha on the fly.

I mean, I know perfectly well mecha in the real world don't make any sense, but sometimes the fantasy of them as effective war machines is science-based (as in Fang of the Sun Dougram or for that matter BattleTech), and someties it's more explicitly fantastic, as in Evangelion or Sousei no Aquarion. This is very much in the latter camp.

And in between all that Zhao tackles institutional sexism (and other things) by means of Zetian saying "well, why does it have to be like that" and refusing to be fobbed off with non-answers. Various tools are used to manipulate her, and she gradually makes efforts to break free.

OK, maybe it's not advanced feminism, and if you don't have the residual love that I do for giant mecha done right maybe this won't work as well for you. I enjoyed it hugely.