This short and beautiful story was a delight to read. The author paints a very subtle picture of strong women in a royal court fighting against all odds to succeed their imprisonment and overthrow their imprisoners. The story ist embedded into a framework story, is written in a very poetic style and the characters are very convincing. It took me some pages to get into its rythm, but after that it was very intriguing. There is a mythic element and some fantasy mixed into it. Simply a pleasure to read - can't wait to read the other stories about the Singing Hills Cycle!

This book is a collection of tellings by rabbit who served the empress. Each chapter starts off by a trigger for the following story to come. I am not particularly fond of this kind of story telling. You are never fully involved in the story that is being told but rather observe what happened many years ago. This results in a very calm read that just teaches you about the history of the land in which it takes place, but do not expect any major twists or turns along the way. This is the equivalent of your grandmother telling you her storys over a piece of cake and some coffee.

This was confusing and not fun at all. First half I was just wondering what is going on and the second half if was just bored. I thought that maybe short novels are not mine and that I need my full 500+ pages books to get into the plot, world and build some emotions to characters. But after this read I picked up a 120pages novella from B. Sanderson (Emperors Soul) and I was already hooked and couldnt let his book down from page eight (!) on. I dont want to disrespect this book and I am happy for those who had fun with it, but this was just not mine.

Vo hat eine ganz besondere Art zu erzählen, sehr intensiv und atmosphärisch. Die Geschichte ist sehr feministisch, queer und rebellisch und dabei gespickt mit asiatischer Mythologie und Kultur. Ich freu mich sehr auf die Folgebände, die wohl ebenfalls alle in sich abgeschlossen sind.

unpopular opinion: i didn't enjoy it. the characters were so hard for me to connect to, so, in turn, i didn't feel connected to the story that was told by rabbit. it's probably just me, but i wasn't a fan of the writing style either. i don't know what it is about it, but IT JUST DIDN'T GRIP ME.

4.5* Da die Geschichte nur etwas mehr als 100 Seiten hat möchte ich nicht zu viel zu The Empress of Salt and Fortune von Nghi Vo verraten. Ich möchte aber eine ganz grosse Empfehlung aussprechen, denn was die Autorin auf nur so wenigen Seiten schafft ist wirklich beeindruckend. Die Geschichte ist wundervoll geschrieben, voller Magie, faszinierenden Figuren und kann sogar mit einigen unerwarteten Wendungen überzeugen. Die Geschichte ist feministisch und vielfältig, wunderschön und emotional. Sie wird mir noch lange im Gedächtnis bleiben und ich werde sie auch sicher noch einige weitere Male lesen.