An Ember in the Ashes (An Ember in the Ashes, #1) in Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge

Sep 29, 2015 Alya rated it liked it

Shelves: cool-females-in-fantasy, 2015

3.5

I'm not a fan of split perspectives. I find them very hard to be convincing. Aside from really obvious emotional responses to make the voices different, it's hard to actually achieve unique voices, unique vernaculars etc.

And I didn't like the relationships, the constant thrust of relationship potential after relationship potential.

The storyline and world building is great, reflective of historical time periods (HRE) that should make us constantly evaluate how we see and treat people. The sc ...more

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Dec 09, 2015 eb rated it liked it

Shelves: young-adult, print, fiction, male-protagonist, female-protagonist, multiple-viewpoints, female-author, poc-author

I was a Latin / Classics nerd in high school and college, so Sabaa Tahir's Martial Empire, which is modeled on Rome, was super compelling and very vivid for me. I definitely liked the changes she made to the structure of the society-- the fact that women occupy all positions and ranks and wield as much power as men was awesome. No one questions Helene's ability to take their head off with an axe, for instance, or her right to be an Aspirant in a series of brutal trials meant to name a new Empero I was a Latin / Classics nerd in high school and college, so Sabaa Tahir's Martial Empire, which is modeled on Rome, was super compelling and very vivid for me. I definitely liked the changes she made to the structure of the society-- the fact that women occupy all positions and ranks and wield as much power as men was awesome. No one questions Helene's ability to take their head off with an axe, for instance, or her right to be an Aspirant in a series of brutal trials meant to name a new Emperor / Empress.

I will point out a problem that a friend of mine pointed out in a critique of Game of Thrones that applies here: Laia, our main heroine, takes on a dangerous mission spy on the Martial stronghold of Blackcliff, posing as a slave, in order to save her brother. There are many kinds of danger in this scenario, but the one that is the main concern in the book is rape. The Commandant uses Laia as a pawn, assuming she will be raped by a smith the Commandant wants to bribe; Laia is attacked by one of the Aspirants, Marcus, who beats the hell out of her and attempts to rape her; and she is thrown into the barracks that belong to Elias, our hero, as a reward for winning one of the Trials with the assumption that he will use her for his pleasure. Even though we are supposedly occupying a world where men and women are equal, Laia's situation undercuts that presumption. Because she is female, the worst fate is rape. Think about it-- when we see a man, and wonder how he will be punished or tortured in a story, we don't immediately think of rape. Because when we see a man, we don't immediately think sex. But even in a world where supposedly women don't equal sex, Laia = sex. Which means the only punishment or torture that threatens her is rape. It happens with Helene, too-- she is a terrifying figure, hard and brutal and strong, and yet Marcus is able to dismantle her emotional armor by threatening to "order her to do whatever I want" if he wins Emperor and she comes in second and becomes his Blood Shrike, a position that means carrying out orders-- any orders-- without question. The meaning is clear, but so is the unfortunate subtext: Helene is a soldier, capable of becoming Emperor, and yet because she's a woman she still = sex. Sex or rape is still the only thing that threatens her. This is a problem of worldbuilding, but it is a deeper problem of overriding social narratives in America and the world. I'm not saying that Tahir knowingly set this up or that she wanted her female characters to uphold the woman=sex narrative. I'm saying it's a narrative storytellers of all kinds--in books and scripts-- keep falling back on because it's easy. But it's also damaging. If you're writing a world where men and women are equal, where women do not reduce to sex objects, than for each woman there will be a different threat or torture that will resonate with her character. It might be sex. But, as with male characters, it might not be. There's a whole other argument in here about sex as power and men as more physically powerful in general, but if we're dreaming big-- if we're building worlds where supernatural things are real-- we can also build worlds where we turn these narratives inside out or abandon them all together.

Besides this critique, Ember was really engrossing-- fast paced, and alternating between Elias and Laia's narration, it fleshed out the Martial empire, the Scholar Resistance, and the tensions in this society that thrum with ancient secrets. I'm excited for the second installment! ...more

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Nov 16, 2015 alana rated it really liked it

Shelves: audiobook, fantasy, addicted-to-ya-2015

This book didn't grab me at first (partly because I have a hard time with tremulous lady voices), but the story picked up from the middle. I don't really get the Roman-times vibe...should I associate jinn and ifrit with Romans? Maybe I'm just clueless. Oh, emperors! Maybe that's the connection. Anyhow, the intrigue makes it fun to read though the plot isn't incredibly thought-provoking. I'm curious to learn more about the Resistance and the oogy-boogy stuff, so I'll likely check out the next boo ...more

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