She Who Became the Sun

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First edition (publ. Tor Books)

She Who Became the Sun is a 2021 fantasy novel by . Parker-Chan's debut novel, the novels tells a re-imagining of the rise to power of the Hongwu Emperor in the 14th century.

The book is a finalist for the 2022 Lambda Literary Award for Transgender Fiction.[1]

Summary[]

Zhu Chongba, the son of a family in an impoverished village, is foretold in a prophecy to achieve greatness. However, after a bandit attack leaves the village devastated and most of the family dead, he dies of heartbreak. His sister then assumes his identity to go study at a Buddhist monastery, and begins plotting her own survival and her own path to greatness.

Themes[]

The novel has been noted to touch on themes of gender, sexuality, and diasporic identity.[2][3][4] In an interview with the South China Morning Post, Parker-Chan described the novel as "a queer reimagining of the rise to power of the founding emperor of the Ming dynasty. It’s also a fun story about gender," adding that mainstream white Australian culture had "a particular type of Australian masculinity that is held as the ideal. This excludes every other kind of masculinity, especially queer masculinity and Asian masculinity."[5]

Reception[]

Writing for USA Today, Eliot Schrefer gave the book 3,5 stars out of 4, saying that it was "an important debut that expands our concept of who gets to be a hero and a villain," but that it had a "restricted emotional range," as "scenes of kindness and compassion are nearly absent."[6] Writing for Locus, Liz Bourke called the novel "expansive, epic novel, filled with politi­cal manoeuvering, armed conflict (and a lot of it), and intense emotions," and that there were few other novels that "attempts the same kind of re-imagining, and especially not such a queer re-imagining." Also writing for Locus, Alex Brown said that "fantasy elements aren’t as grand in this book as they might be in other epic fantasies" and that the "political scheming here makes the A Song of Ice and Fire series look like child’s play."[7] Lee Mandelo of Tor.com said the book was "propelled by the intense, grasping, often amoral desires of two queer protagonists whose deeply complicated relationships to gender and their bodies are center-stage" and that the novel pulled "no punches with its gnawing ethical quandaries about the foundations of empire."[8] Publishers Weekly wrote that "though Parker-Chan’s unrelentingly grim view of humanity bogs down the middle of the novel, her nuanced exploration of gender identity and striking meditation on bodily autonomy set this fantasy apart."[9] Yaameen Al-Muttaqi of The Daily Star wrote that the novel was "quite transparently a tale of identity: shaping your own space in a world that does not want you, and making that shape yours despite what others think you should be," and that the book had a sombre, introspective tone, "not concerned with the grand battles and heroic moments."[10]

References[]

  1. ^ "Current Finalists". Lambda Literary. Retrieved 2022-03-16.
  2. ^ Macallister, Greer (28 July 2021). "Gender and Greatness in "She Who Became the Sun"". Chicago Review of Books. Retrieved 26 November 2021.
  3. ^ 墨客, hunxi (4 August 2021). "Rewriting the Tradition: Destiny and Diaspora in Shelley Parker-Chan's She Who Became the Sun". Tor.com. Retrieved 26 November 2021.
  4. ^ Harper, Rachael (17 December 2020). "She Who Became The Sun: Interview with author Shelley Parker-Chan". SciFiNow. Retrieved 26 November 2021.
  5. ^ Kidd, James (20 November 2021). "'Keanu Reeves was all we had': literary fantasy author Shelley Parker-Chan on growing up without role models as a queer Asian kid in Australia". South China Morning Post. Retrieved 26 November 2021.
  6. ^ Schrefer, Elliott (20 July 2021). "Review: 'She Who Became the Sun' is an important entry in the LGBTQ fantasy canon". USA Today. Retrieved 26 November 2021.
  7. ^ Brown, Alex (30 July 2021). "Liz Bourke and Alex Brown Review She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan". Locus Magazine. Retrieved 26 November 2021.
  8. ^ Mandelo, Lee (28 July 2021). "Neither One Thing Nor the Other: She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan". Tor.com. Retrieved 26 November 2021.
  9. ^ "She Who Became the Sun". Publishers Weekly. 2021. Retrieved 26 November 2021.
  10. ^ Al-Muttaqi, Yaameen (23 September 2021). "Shelley Parker-Chan's 'She Who Became The Sun': A song of identity and fate". The Daily Star. Retrieved 26 November 2021.
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