soph (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sophia_sol) wrote2022-11-04 01:26 pm
sophia_sol) wrote2022-11-04 01:26 pm
Into the Riverlands, by Nghi Vo
The third novella in the Singing Hills cycle! I absolutely adored the first two, so I was extremely excited for this one. It's a series that is about storytelling, and about the ways in which the teller affects what the story is and what details you get, and I looooooove this.
But having read this latest book, I feel sincerely like I'm missing something. I feel fairly confident the book is doing something that connects the various stories told within the narrative to each other, and I think also with the character Lao Bingyi in particular, in order to say things about the series theme. But I have no idea what! I ended the book feeling a bit obtuse. PLEASE explain it to me if you've read this book!!!!
Anyway without whatever it is that pulls the disparate parts together, the book felt very episodic to me. Lots of lovely details and I enjoyed it on the surface level of "Chih goes on a road trip and hears some nice stories and nearly dies a few times" but on that level it doesn't seem to fit with the other books in the series. It was nice though to get to see more of who Chih is as a person, though! You get to see more of that in this book than the previous ones.
But really. Please explain what I'm missing here! Was I just too sleep deprived when reading it to put some obvious hints together??
But having read this latest book, I feel sincerely like I'm missing something. I feel fairly confident the book is doing something that connects the various stories told within the narrative to each other, and I think also with the character Lao Bingyi in particular, in order to say things about the series theme. But I have no idea what! I ended the book feeling a bit obtuse. PLEASE explain it to me if you've read this book!!!!
Anyway without whatever it is that pulls the disparate parts together, the book felt very episodic to me. Lots of lovely details and I enjoyed it on the surface level of "Chih goes on a road trip and hears some nice stories and nearly dies a few times" but on that level it doesn't seem to fit with the other books in the series. It was nice though to get to see more of who Chih is as a person, though! You get to see more of that in this book than the previous ones.
But really. Please explain what I'm missing here! Was I just too sleep deprived when reading it to put some obvious hints together??