Book Review: Queen of Mercy | Natania Barron

Queen of Mercy by Natania Barron
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Oh, such a brilliant, brilliant ending to The Queens of Fate Trilogy.

I think it's been noted somewhere that while you can read the second book, Queen of Fury, as a standalone, you really need to have read both that and Queen of None before you read this one as all the overarching threads and events in those books culminate in this one. (I did a re-read of Queen of None after reading this to remind myself of some key points, since I'd forgotten who Nimue was, lol)

Queen of Mercy begins ten years after Queen of Fury, and everything that Anna Pendragon set into motion in Queen of None is now bearing fruit. The glimpses we had of Morgen le Fay were varied and scattered in the earlier books, her true motives unclear, but here, we finally get to see from her perspective. We struggle with Morgen as she fights to retain her magic and protect Carelon in the wake of the loss of Vyvian du Lac, amidst a struggle for supremacy between the rising Christian faith and the dying old (magic? pagan?) ways of Avillion.

With each successive book, Barron increases the POVs - and here, whilst Morgen is the primary focus, there's a lot going on elsewhere. Morgen's daughter, Llachlyn le Fay, returns to court, along with Galahad - Lanceloch & Anna's son - and Percival - a squire who is purportedly a random king's bastard - and kicks off a quest for a new graal. Gawain & Hwyfar find themselves swept up in court events again in their bid to protect their young cousins, whilst Queen Mawra and Lanceloch scheme against Arthur in the background. It almost seems too much is going on, but Barron weaves it all together so tightly that you don't actually get overwhelmed.

Whilst it's a story of consequences, it's also one of redemption. Morgen faces her past and redeems it, finding peace with all the things that had been done to her and all the things she'd been compelled to do to others. Barron's Arthurian world is a bleak one for noble women, but she also shows how the women close to Arthur (Anna, Hwyfar, Morgen) find ways to shift things in their favour. There's also growing support from their loved ones - Bedevere, Gawain, Coel - as they learn to understand and depend on each other.

And because I'm always interested in representations of faith in novels, Barron presents a growing Christianity which is corrupt in its grasping for power, with adherents who are in it mostly for what they can get. Not much is said about the source of magic - its representation of good and evil is primarily based on what it is used for - though it's set against Christianity as a clash of religions/gods. In the midst of this, there is a beautiful passage from Galahad that encapsulates a true, pure encounter with God perfectly, at least in my mind. Barron mentions something in her afterword about her struggles with Christianity, so make of that what you will.

Note: I received a digital ARC of this book from Solaris/Rebellion Publishing via NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

View all my reviews

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Other books in the series:

Book 1: Queen of None 

Book 2: Queen of Fury

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Wanna get hands on a copy?

Amazon affiliate link: Queens of Fate Series page

PBAKL GIVEAWAY

I'm procrastinating HARD, so I decided to revive a very, very old method of building my mailing list, which has been languishing for a while.

I mean, I'm also in the midst of refreshing my e-book freebie (the very thing I'm procrastinating on), so here's how you get a headstart on it! 

Do the six (6) things on this rafflecopter (embedded below) for entries to win paperback & ebook copies of the Absolution series! If you've ALREADY got The Making of a Jurusihir, which was launched at last year's PBAKL, you can already do like three tasks. Note that each task completed gives you a different number of entries... 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Besides the procrastination and the mailing list shenanigans, I'm also doing this because I had last minute plans to do a Meet & Greet at PBAKL which were derailed by the ASEAN summit because the actual (paid) work meeting that was being scheduled is now deferred. So now I sad. lol

Anyway, everyone else benefits and I get to send out some books to new readers.

The last rafflecopter option asks you to share your favourite Malaysian book/author. Looking forward to hearing about them!

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Some T&Cs: 

• The ebook giveaway is open internationally, so you can try your luck wherever you are! 
• However, the paperback giveaway is restricted to MALAYSIAN ADDRESSES. 

Book Review: OBJECTS OF DESIRE: 10 Malaysian Chinese Short Stories in Translation

OBJECTS OF DESIRE: 10 Malaysian Chinese Short Stories in Translation by Lee Hao Jie


Interesting things I have learnt about Mahua, which I think is different from English lit:
- naming the main protagonist is, apparently, almost unheard of. OMG like 8/10 stories do not name the MC and sometimes not even the other characters T.T And one of them, I'm not actually sure if the MC was named or not, so maybe that's 9/10 lmaoooo
- the writers reference English classics, which is interesting, because I wouldn't expect any English works to reference Chinese lit!
- there are a lot of stories around memories and losing the past. Maybe this is an outflow of how Malaysian Chinese feel like we're slowly losing our culture to time and modernisation.
- also a lot of family feels.
- maybe also a preoccupation with death... idk, I feel like only 2 stories don't mention death (or a dead person) in any form.

How Mahua is similar to English literary short stories:
- the writers have an obsession with affairs, sex, and the penis. 
- some of them have really weird endings? Like what? What am I supposed to get from this? Is this story even complete? IS THIS A FEVER DREAM.
- these are the same reasons I rarely read (or write) in the "literary" genre lol.

Anyway, notable stories, or stories I thought were really strong:
Xia Mei’s Clock by King Ban Hui, Yee Heng Yeh (Tr)
This is the story where the title comes from:

“At one point, he had swiped through the photos of these girls who, through the way they dressed, presented themselves as objects of desire on the website. Whoever they once were had been reduced to just their name, age, body measurements, and nationality.”

Xia Mei’s Clock is a pandemic story, where interpersonal connections are fraying and time has lost its meaning. The protagonist (also unnamed, unless that stray mention of ‘Xing Ye’ towards the end is his name?) requests for a human prostitute at the clock hotel instead of a silicone doll. Yet as the story slips from the protagonist, to Xia Mei, then back again; and as COVID rages and time skips; there’s an underlying surrealness to the story, making you question if Xia Mei is actually human.
As much as I thought this was a really iffy premise, this is a solid story on connection, the male loneliness epidemic, and the ravages of time.

Our Years on the Mountain Top by Tew Pak Ching, Lai Suk Yin (Tr)
If I had to make a snap judgement on Mahua based on this book, it would be the fact that Malaysian Chinese writers are somehow obsessed with penises. This heartwarming story of sibling love (and rivalry) as well as a mother’s sacrifice for her children (both evident in the mother and grandmother in this story) is framed by the very strange peeing competition in the morning, and the younger sister’s preoccupation for looking at her brother’s pee-pee. Like why.

Yesterday’s Sunken Fragrance by Chan Yeong Siew, Foo Sek Han (Tr)
A chance look at a Malaysian news headline reveals the truth behind the long silence from Liu Chen Xiang’s lover, Ma Yao Han.
Actually, the most exciting thing about this story is that finally, finally EVERYONE IS NAMED. It’s a weird thing to note, because like a predominant writing advice in English is to name your characters upfront and all these stories so far have gotten away with having a lot of unnamed characters. But I digress.
Yesterday’s Sunken Fragrance dwells in memories and loss, and also secrets and the grief that comes from them. It’s bittersweet, and yet also tinged with practicality as Chen Xiang says her goodbyes in the city she’s long left behind.

Panas by leemuzmuz, Ooi Yining (Tr)
Panas is a hard-hitting story of sexual assault in school, flitting from her present trauma to the past events that created them. It’s a painful look at how the perpetrators are often protected and victims told to just suck it up and move on. And that last haunting question: would none of this have happened if she were a boy?

All in all, this was a fascinating exploration of literature that I would normally never read, either because of the genre or because of the language.

Looking forward to the next in the series!

View all my reviews

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