The Tiger's Daughter (Ascendant, 1)

I loved reading this book. It's moody and sweet and exciting in turns, full of lush imagery with gentle swells of story that build to evocative and thrilling storms. Rivera's talent really shines in her descriptive language - you can practically smell the flowers of a royal garden or feel the cold wind off the steppes as you read. The protagonists, Shefali (the narrator) and Shizuka (to whom the novel addressed) are the daughters of two royal families, with neighboring lands and vastly different cultures. Shefali is the painfully shy heir of a line of nomadic warriors, raised to ride in the hard northern steppes. Shizuka is the spoiled niece to an ineffective emperor, taught the refined noble arts of calligraphy and swordsmanship in a sheltered, luxurious court. Though their countries are historical enemies, their mothers fought together against the demon army that encroached on their lands a generation ago, thus fating their daughters to meet. As many forces work to bring Shefali and Shizuka together as to drive them apart, as the demons gather to invade again and the two girls prepare themselves to defend their homes. I grew to love these two, particularly Shefali, who tells the story with such self deprecation and such hopeless devotion to her lover that sometimes you just want to give her a hug. There were some truly chilling moments throughout, too - the demons are a sufficiently horrifying nemesis to counterpoint the endearing love story.Three main points which I think anyone looking to read this book ought to know:1) The romance is the central story here. The fantasy and action elements are the scene and tone in which these two women meet each other and fall in love. The primary plot is about how they lose and find (and lose and find and lose etc.) each other throughout this mythic course of events. While there is plenty of excitement in the supernatural fight scenes and political intrigues, it's not the focus of the story and the arc of the novel deviates sharply from your standard genre fare. The comparison to anime and manga that people have noted here and on Goodreads is apt in this regard - this was definitely not inspired by the story formulae that Western fantasy usually uses. I saw more of modern Japanese genre fiction in the action scenes (decidedly dark), the fantasy (mostly horror), and the romance (tones of desperate tragedy even during its triumphs). I suspect the next books will return to a more typical Hero's Journey, with a more defined Big Bad and the inevitable face-off between the two protagonists and the demonic menace that threatens their homelands.1.5) The Tiger's Daughter is unapologetically feminist and LGBT. Though characters throughout the story raise eyebrows at the female warriors and lesbian romance that drive the plot, the author never gives any kind of apology to the reader. It is taken on face value that women can fight and lead and fall in love, no matter the culture or circumstances. I know I'm probably going to use the word refreshing a lot in this review, but this whole book is like a cool drink of water in the desert. Just to be clear, there are a few very explicit romance scenes in this book, should that matter to a potential reader or for anyone buying this for a younger reader.2) This isn't a faithful representation of Japan, Mongolia, or China. I would put it this way: Westeros is to Medieval Western Europe as The Tiger's Daughter's countries are to Medieval East Asia. They are informed and inspired by the mythology, cultures, and histories, but they don't bear any strict resemblance, anymore than the Battle of the Blackwater portrayed accurate historical warfare. That said, I found it refreshing to read a fantasy novel that didn't feel like a clever retelling of someone's D&D campaign. It's nice to take a break from bards, elves, plate armor, and magic spells.3) This is an epistolary novel, with all the occasionally improbable storytelling that implies. It mostly felt clear and comfortable, but yes, there are some parts where the narrator is describing a scene to someone who was there to see it. It's a hazard of the form, for sure, but I didn't mind. The letter format felt intimate and confessional and gave insight into the characters and relationships. It also lends a kind of antique tone to the story on its own, just because it's not used much in modern fiction, especially the long form epistolary, where the bulk of the manuscript is just one character's single letter to another. It was refreshing to have a different frame than you usually see in genre fiction.I'd recommend this book to anyone looking for female-centric, emotionally-driven fantasy with a strong descriptive voice and fresh approach to genre fiction. I'm looking forward to the next books in the series!(Disclaimer: I was given an advance copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. I have since purchased a copy of the novel to support the wonderful work Rivera is doing.)

My Review: I finally picked this book up after hearing Sam from Thoughts on Tomes on Youtube mention it as one of her favorite books repeatedly. The cover is stunning and the synopsis was really intriguing, I found the setting (and Mongolian inspiration) to be really intriguing. I buddy read this book with someone from Instagram for the Tome Topple challenge and I am glad I had someone to discuss the book with as I read it! The book is written in a really beautiful almost lyrical way, the words just flow together like music.Admittedly, I had a few concerns when starting the book, first being the various names each characters is called, and this turned out to be a problem as they gain more names as the story continues and some of them are extremely similar (I highly recommend listening to an audio book to hear the pronunciations while reading, at least for a little while). Then next concern I had was that the beautiful writing would be the focus and we would loose the story or possibly even the character connections due to it; that ended up not being a problem, the beautiful writing only added to the story and heightened the intensity of the relationship between Shizuka and Shefali. In fact, the love between these two characters is so strong that it made my heartache and brought me to tears a few times.Even though I was aware that this is a fantasy, I honestly wasn't expecting the magical elements or the demons. While it did add a little to the story and it does become a major plot point, I like that the focus remained on their relationship and own personal character development.While the story is supposedly written as letters and present day moments, in truth it is one long letter to the point of being a book with brief moments of present day reactions of the one reading it. I was honestly expecting more of letters back and forth throughout the story but it is just one letter from one character and the other character reading and reacting. With that said I really think that it word well for this story. It is not often that a second person narration works in books and thankfully Rivera really pulled it off in this one.This book may not be for every reader, and not even for all fantasy fans. It does start off a little slow but it does pick up pace as it goes, but for an over 500 page book it can be daunting. I am beyond excited for the next book and have already pre-ordered it!My Rating: I absolutely fell in love with Shizuka and Shefali and especially their love story. There were a few hiccups but all in all this was a beautiful story that really pulled me in and held me throughout. I give it a rating of Four Paws and a Stump Wag!

Got it for my partner and she likes the book so far. LGBTQ friendly.Big bummer, there's about 33pages of misprint from a completely different book. Pages 224-257 have pages from the book Hush. Wish we would've noticed sooner. 😞 She's hooked on it.

A fun, well built fantasy novel with a great deal of thought put into the culture and history of the setting and the characters. It manages to convey a lot of information without infodumping. The characters are real, visceral, and believable.

Un auteur que j'adore en avait parle en utilisant le terme "épique" donc je me suis ruée dessus.Il s'agit de l'épopée de deux femmes dans un monde fantasy ressemblant a la mongolie-chine-japon : shefali, la future chef d'une nation de cavaliers nomades et shizuka, héritière d'un empire. Depuis leur naissance, elles ont toujours été ensembles jusqu'à un terrible événement. L'histoire commence quand Shizuka, maintenant impératrice, reçoit un journal écrit par Shefali dont elle est sans nouvelles depuis 8 ans. Il s'agit donc d'un recit épistolaire et, bien que déroutant, on se sent happé par le style. Une magnifique histoire d'amour, je recommande !

'The Tiger's Daughter' is stunning. Especially as a debut, but really it would deserve the praise no matter where it came in an author's catalogue of work. It's a slow-burning fantasy love story between two remarkable girls, both of them superb warriors, who develop into young women over the course of the book. The world's East Asian influences are clear from the start, which immediately provides a different backdrop to the vast majority of published fantasy out there, but this is more than just historical fiction with the names changed. Magic and demons are present, and unnatural abilities. I'd class it as heroic fantasy, if a different sort to usual, in that the two main characters are unquestionably more than human in some ways: it reads like the novel that a fairy story or folktale might be distilled out of. It's rich and beautiful, and almost exclusively told in a flashback format that's reminiscent in some ways of Patrick Rothfuss's 'The Name Of The Wind' and 'The Wise Man's Fear'. It's very different in many ways to my usual reading, but I would have no hesitation in recommending it to anyone.

Mir hat das Buch sehr gut gefallen. Es gibt nicht viele Bücher im Fantasy-Genre mit lesbischen Protagonisten.Ich freu mich schon auf die Fortsetzung.

A love story, two amazing characters, a glorious rich fantasy world that ISN'T set in a medieval Europe and this males it so refreshing.With parts of the history of these to loving characters carried in correspondence, opening up the stories like a film sequence putting you in the heart of the story, and this story has a lot of heart.Throughout the tale there were moments of interactions between them which made me cry they were so beautiful. The battles are always small, between few characters but this doesn't lessen the impact.It was in the last third where our lovers were divided, by politics, by family, by the fact one had the blood of monsters coursing through their veins and could become a raging demon, during this I was so afraid that I wouldn't see them reunited I wasn't sure I wanted to keep reading.Did it resolve, were my concerns addressed?Well when I got to the end I had to immediately download the next book The Phoenix Empress.