"-Ils m'ont enseigné la broderie, dit Kaede.
Mais on ne peut tuer personne avec une aiguille.
-Détrompez-vous, assura Shizuka, d'un ton désinvolte.
Je vous montrerai comment faire."
"Vous êtes amoureux de la mort, comme tous ceux de votre classe."
"Toutes les apparences étaient trompeuses."
I've read this book translated from English to French by
Philippe Giraudon.
This review contains spoilers.
3 / 5
Writing : The writing is undoubtedly efficient. The author has studied the work and it shows. It is fluid, with a rich vocabulary, and free of clumsy mistakes. This said, I did not find it particularly remarkable.
Plot and characters: As slick as the writing is, we cannot say as much about the story. The setting is intriguing: low fantasy, medieval, Japanese-inspired country. But the worldbuilding is not even present. See, our main character starts developing some supernatural abilities; acute hearing, dexterity, and more… Why? Because it's hereditary. No other explanation. And of course, these only appear at puberty, how convenient for it to be during the time frame of the story. Therefore the setting becomes boring: we don't get anything more than the typical (and stereotypical) images associated with Japanese culture; the samurai, the ninjas, the empires, the monks… Don't get me started on the romance: love at first sight. It's lazy, it's uninteresting, and it's a dead end.
One good point: The ending was clever. I love that Kaede killed the bad guy, and her appearance with his sword in one hand and his head in the other was one badass scene.
Diversity : Obviously all the characters are Japanese. Although it tries to some extent, the book is still quite misogynistic, the female characters are left aside, and Kaede still wants to be married at 15 to a boy she's talked to like 3 times, or… die. Not so cool.
Edition: Beware as the characters are quite small.