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osprey_archerA few months ago, skygiants reviewed Peasprout Chen: Future Legend of Skate and Sword. “This sounds UNHINGED,” I crowed, delighted and appalled and fascinated all at the same time. “Don’t have time to read it, though.”
Of course I ended up reading it.
Even if you have no desire to read a book about a girl who is Determined to Become the Ice-Skating Martial Arts Champion, it’s worthwhile to experience it vicariously throughskygiants’ hilarious and on-point review. Also, the comments have some fascinating info about the probable influences on this book.
Even without this background info, however, I think it’s obvious from reading this book that Kevin Lien has watched a LOT of anime in his life. Moreover, he clearly adheres to the C. S. Lewis school of fantasy worldbuilding, where you throw in everything you love and who cares if anyone else thinks “talking animals and Greek mythology and Jesus don’t go together,” except Lien’s things are “sports anime and ice-skating martial arts battles and intense early teen lesbian drama and the geopolitical situation between China and Taiwan, but in a sometimes-goofy way where the Great Leap is literally millions of people jumping all at the same time to create an earthquake.”
Also amazing food descriptions, and a very distinctive voice for Peasprout, who is the very best martial arts ice skater in Shin and has been crowned Peony Brightstar by the Dowager Empress and is now in Pearl as a goodwill ambassador at their elite martial arts ice-skating academy, where everyone keeps telling her that the ending flourishes on her skating moves are SO out of fashion, but WHATEVER, the manual said that they’re the latest thing so Peasprout will continue her ending flourishes!
This tragic inability to learn anything except ice-skating martial arts unless it is explicitly spelled out for her (and often not even then) makes Peasprout a divisive character. Possibly because I went into the book forewarned, I loved Peasprout. She’s an amazing example of a certain type of person, who is superlatively good at one socially rewarded trait (in this case ice-skating martial arts, but you see this also with people who are good at football, math, music, etc.) and therefore doesn’t see the point of learning anything else. Music? Architecture? Social skills? She’s the Peony Level Brightstar! Why should she bother?
If she were thirty-four this would probably make me grind my teeth. But a lot of people are like this at fourteen – heck, I was like this at fourteen! Although less so than Peasprout because I was not the Peony Level Brightstar. And most of us learn some life lessons and move past it by the time we are twenty-two or so.
In fact, my only criticism is that at the end of the book, Peasprout suddenly starts learning these life lessons faster than seemed to me quite plausible. However, I have high hopes that in book two she will have backslid here and there. (Although hopefully not the one about My Little Brother Has a Different Life Path from Mine and That’s Okay. She’s trying so hard to be a good big sister in this book and she’s so bad at it and I really would like to see her level up there.)
Because yes! Not only am I reading book two (Peasprout Chen: Battle of Champions), but I’ve inducedskygiants to read it too. If you hear high tinny shrieking on the breeze, it’s probably the sound of the two of us screaming about Peasprout’s latest disaster choices.
skygiants reviewed Peasprout Chen: Future Legend of Skate and Sword. “This sounds UNHINGED,” I crowed, delighted and appalled and fascinated all at the same time. “Don’t have time to read it, though.” Of course I ended up reading it.
Even if you have no desire to read a book about a girl who is Determined to Become the Ice-Skating Martial Arts Champion, it’s worthwhile to experience it vicariously through
skygiants’ hilarious and on-point review. Also, the comments have some fascinating info about the probable influences on this book. Even without this background info, however, I think it’s obvious from reading this book that Kevin Lien has watched a LOT of anime in his life. Moreover, he clearly adheres to the C. S. Lewis school of fantasy worldbuilding, where you throw in everything you love and who cares if anyone else thinks “talking animals and Greek mythology and Jesus don’t go together,” except Lien’s things are “sports anime and ice-skating martial arts battles and intense early teen lesbian drama and the geopolitical situation between China and Taiwan, but in a sometimes-goofy way where the Great Leap is literally millions of people jumping all at the same time to create an earthquake.”
Also amazing food descriptions, and a very distinctive voice for Peasprout, who is the very best martial arts ice skater in Shin and has been crowned Peony Brightstar by the Dowager Empress and is now in Pearl as a goodwill ambassador at their elite martial arts ice-skating academy, where everyone keeps telling her that the ending flourishes on her skating moves are SO out of fashion, but WHATEVER, the manual said that they’re the latest thing so Peasprout will continue her ending flourishes!
This tragic inability to learn anything except ice-skating martial arts unless it is explicitly spelled out for her (and often not even then) makes Peasprout a divisive character. Possibly because I went into the book forewarned, I loved Peasprout. She’s an amazing example of a certain type of person, who is superlatively good at one socially rewarded trait (in this case ice-skating martial arts, but you see this also with people who are good at football, math, music, etc.) and therefore doesn’t see the point of learning anything else. Music? Architecture? Social skills? She’s the Peony Level Brightstar! Why should she bother?
If she were thirty-four this would probably make me grind my teeth. But a lot of people are like this at fourteen – heck, I was like this at fourteen! Although less so than Peasprout because I was not the Peony Level Brightstar. And most of us learn some life lessons and move past it by the time we are twenty-two or so.
In fact, my only criticism is that at the end of the book, Peasprout suddenly starts learning these life lessons faster than seemed to me quite plausible. However, I have high hopes that in book two she will have backslid here and there. (Although hopefully not the one about My Little Brother Has a Different Life Path from Mine and That’s Okay. She’s trying so hard to be a good big sister in this book and she’s so bad at it and I really would like to see her level up there.)
Because yes! Not only am I reading book two (Peasprout Chen: Battle of Champions), but I’ve induced
skygiants to read it too. If you hear high tinny shrieking on the breeze, it’s probably the sound of the two of us screaming about Peasprout’s latest disaster choices.
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Date: 2025-01-16 07:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-16 08:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-16 08:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-16 08:54 pm (UTC)2. You're talking about the New York Public Library, the Brooklyn Public Library, and the Queens Public Library? All three of these libraries already have copies of this book, in both physical and e-audiobook form, as I discovered through a quick online search of their catalogs.
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Date: 2025-01-16 09:22 pm (UTC)Well, it's possible the BPL has it - I have to re-up my card there, and that would mean traveling into Brooklyn.
I can't reliably return books, so I don't take out real books.
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Date: 2025-01-16 09:54 pm (UTC)Frankly, as a former library employee, I'm offended by your assumption that there is something "not nice" about requesting a purchase. It's an insult to everyone who does request a purchase (do you think everyone else is using this feature to heroically request books that they're sure will have high demand?), to my former coworker who requested books he didn't even plan to read because he thought the library would benefit from a wider selection of queer books, and to the librarians who point to purchase requests as one of the metrics that determine how much funding the library will get next year. You are hurting libraries with your supposed thoughtfulness. Get over yourself.
Seriously. There is an incredibly easy solution to your problem. Either use it, or admit to yourself that you don't actually want to read the book enough to actually take any steps to make it accessible to you.
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Date: 2025-01-16 10:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-16 09:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-17 01:25 pm (UTC)as a hostageas a goodwill exchange to study at the Academy of Martial Arts Ice Skating.On the one hand I want everyone to read this, but on the other hand I cannot in good conscience exactly recommend it, because while I enjoyed it very much I am also not exactly sure that it is what you might call "good."
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Date: 2025-01-17 01:47 pm (UTC)I was fascinated to read that he created songs and everything for the series. Wow!
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Date: 2025-01-17 06:21 pm (UTC)The first two volumes came out in 2018 and 2019, and there hasn't been anything since. I don't know if this is a result of publishing shenanigans, or Covid knocked the stuffing out of Lien's inspiration, or what. But if a third one DID at some point appear I would be all over it.
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Date: 2025-01-17 06:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-17 01:27 pm (UTC)Poor Cricket is doing his BEST and also wants so much to be a good little brother but what exactly does being a good little brother MEAN when your older sister is in fact pretty bad at older sistering even though she is trying so hard!
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Date: 2025-01-18 09:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-20 03:28 pm (UTC)