Heavenly Tyrant
Ratings24
Average rating3.7
I loved the turn from the first book's themes of fighting for liberation against oppression, becoming an oppressive liberator yourself, juggling the truths you must hide to protect your power and the pace. Fighting the guilt of a knowingly committing genocide. Us an audience knowing what the gods truly are already. The deep dive into the realities of leftist revolution and how even that doesn't mean liberation from patriarchy and totalitarianism if not done by the people and for the people, but then also showing how volatile the masses can be. The refusal to tow the line and stop at just the immediate oppressor above you, but ALL of them, no matter the consequences. The realistic and unexpected fallacies from the characters. The phoenix revival, the space battle, the super cool space station that reminded me of Sea of Stars. There's so much to love here that puts this among my favorites. 6/5 read
I really enjoyed the story. It went places I wasn't expecting. Characters acted out of character and then we would learn why. Good story.
Then there's the politics, which are surprisingly relevant to (2025) current events. The story doesn't shy away from the consequences of the theories and policies in a way that I think is admirable and worthy of consideration. Good story.
I am very disappointed with what happened to the characters.
They were all scrub up and remade. This isn't the Zetian or Yizhi I knew.
The communism was shoved down my throat as the best idea ever. I do not like books telling me what to think.
After suffering devastating loss and making drastic decisions, Zetian finds herself at the seat of power in Huaxia. But she has also learned that her world is not as it seems, and revelations about an enemy more daunting than Zetian imagined forces her to share power with a dangerous man she cannot simply depose. Despite having vastly different ideas about how they must deconstruct the corrupt and misogynist system that plagues their country, Zetian must join this man in a dance of truth and lies and perform their roles to perfection in order to take down their common enemy, who seeks to control them as puppets while dangling one of Zetian’s loved ones as a hostage.
