DNF.
Again.*sigh*
It is 2022.
Once again I am fooled by a long novel with a gorgeous cover, an eye-catching title, and an East Asian fairy tale-style setting. First 'Six Crimson Cranes' and now this.
Is it me or are they all the same? Don't a lot of books of this silk ilk follow the same stringent and safe formula? I hope the Chinese government has got nothing to do with it.
I was into 'Daughter of the Moon Goddess' at first. It had a fast pace, some good characters, enriching worldbuilding on the moon from Chinese mythology, and a nice, developing mother-and-daughter relationship, made unique by them both being immortal, yet imprisoned in a palace on the moon for an indefinite amount of time.
However, I was deeply cautious, and worried that as soon as the imminent and inevitable love interest was going to show up - after the goddess mother is damseled and out of the tale until the very end of the long saga - all the goodwill I had for the whole story and the characters who inhabit it would plummet like a sinkhole. I'd learned from seasoned, wary experience that this would be the case.
I was right.
The love interest - who of course is a prince; as well as immortal, like everyone else - is simultaneously bland, annoying, a git, a smartarse, a sage who always knows best (yet the concept of personal boundaries and tact escapes him), and a hypocrite. The Crown Prince pontificates poetry about how sad he is to be so wealthy and privileged, and how he cares so much about those below him in the oppressive caste system of his kingdom, and how he wants to challenge it and help the less fortunate...when he does practically nothing to improve the lives of his people. He doesn't actually look into the root of the problem and try to change the system; try to abolish hierarchies and class. He isn't an emperor yet, but he possesses enough power and good standing to attempt to make a difference. He's all talk and no backbone. I think he's just bored. He is immortal, after all (every character is immortal to some extent, making it even harder to care about any of them when there's no real threat to their lives, but that's neither here nor there).
The celestial prince (AND OF COURSE HE'S IMPOSSIBLY HANDSOME TOO!) is a god, like every royal and aristocrat on the celestial plane, and is the perfect, ineffectual Gary Stu, changing his personality and mood quite literally on the whim of the writing.
It is 2022.
I admit to skimming 'Daughter of the Moon Goddess' after 134 pages, out of boredom and eye-rolling at the forced and unconvincing romance that takes over the daughter-saving-her-mother plot. There are also a few instances of potentially cool events happening that are told in quick passing, like the heroine's lessons at the prince's palace, plus there're misplaced time skips that make readers miss years of important parts in the characters' development and lives. I think I'd done enough skimming to know that I would not have enjoyed the book even if I had kept going normally (and, okay, fairly). After 134 pages I thought to myself, "Yeah, I don't want to read 400 more pages of this, I've got better ways of spending my time."
'Daughter of the Moon Goddess' contains almost every cliché in fiction that I hate - those that YA fantasy literature is particularly partial to - if not for the clichés themselves then by how sickeningly, head-smashingly overused they are, or have become in recent times. It's like an epidemic.
These trite tropes include *drumroll*:
The love triangle; girl-on-girl hate, with its cattiness and pettiness; girl-on-girl rivalry over the favours of a powerful man; the smarter and more understanding (and more attractive) male cast; women in positions of power portrayed as OTT heartless, monstrous and unhinged; a female villain who is evil because a man chose another woman over her and broke her heart; any female friends that the heroine has are mostly absent, and are in the sidelines and criminally underused; the main character lies about something inconsequential and when eventually they are found out it poisons everything, making a big deal out of virtually nothing (like, who cares?!!!); evil plots involving mind control; easily infiltrated "good guy" kingdoms; ostracised countries and kingdoms and peoples portrayed as the villains (actually called Demons here, from the Demon Realm); senior/authority figures keeping secrets from the heroine for no good reason; lovers' misunderstanding, quarrel and temporary breakup; and worldbuilding, magical powers and other elements that are so similar to those in 'Avatar: The Last Airbender' that it could very well be that originality had died after that cartoon aired.
Every. Single. Fucking. YA. Fantasy.
Every single fucking YA (and high) fantasy contains these clichés, in one form or another. No subversion, nothing exceptional and enlightening to offer. They're all the same! They thrive outside of the literature market, as well.
It is 2022. This is a 2022 story.
Is originality really and truly dead, at last?
And people wonder why I don't like reading anymore.
Like 'Six Crimson Cranes', too, 'Daughter of the Moon Goddess' has no LBGTQA representation in sight (I could be wrong in my skimming, but either way it's the heterosexual love triangle that's the dominant focus, and fuck that).
I am honestly saddened that my first review of 2022 is a mostly negative one. But there are things in the initially lovely book that I did like: the mother-and-daughter relationship is touching and multilayered, once the narrative takes time off the romance angle to remind readers that it exists; the book largely doesn't meander all over the place, away from the plot and action, or at least it tries not to with its fast forward pace (though the aforementioned time skips that go over years are significantly troublesome, as we miss genuine character development because of it); and it is not as juvenile and annoying as 'Six Crimson Cranes'. Credit where it is due.
It's still weirdly boring and hackneyed, in my opinion.
Unfortunately I could not connect fully to this "modern" fairy tale retelling. Sorry, but I have to speak my mind, in how I read something that I ultimately decided was not worth my time.
I'll end on a positive and fair note: the only new novel in the YA market of this type I can think of that I would call "original" and "exciting", is 'Iron Widow'. That love triangle turns out to be an LBGTQ polygamous relationship! And there's no fantastical and sci-fi mind control! Because there's no need for it!
Final Score: 2/5
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