Fantastic South-Asian-Inspired world setting. The interplay and issues with power dynamics and different religions and the different regions and countries and peoples. Not to mention all of the very realized gender inequalities in this world. There is an underlying simmering rage that feels SO JUSTIFIED. As revolution and struggle is brimming everywhere, from many sources. As women are being burned alive for religious purification. As a strange plant-based plague ravages the land. As intrigue and hidden societies and extremes of poverty and wealth divide people. As a now forbidden religion reveals it still has practitioners. Switching between narrators, unveiling this world and the plot in such careful small details and then in big crashing waves. The writing is superb. The characterizations varied and gorgeous and effective. There are so many fully realized different peoples and places. This is not a happy time or place. But it is a very Important time and place, at the dawning of revolution and great change. It is hard. Things are dire. There is great risk and little hope for reward. So grabbing onto sweetness and hope where one can is even more important. And those who have deadened themselves and tried to be content living safe half-lives for years are asked to awaken, to risk, to feel again. This was gorgeous.
“A fiercely and unapologetically feminist tale of endurance and revolution set against a gorgeous, unique magical world” (S. A. Chakraborty).
"Suri’s writing always brings me to another world; one full of wonders and terrors, where every detail feels intricately and carefully imagined. The Jasmine Throne is gripping and harrowing from the very start." —R. F. Kuang