Reviews with content warning for Hate crime - The Kingdom of Copper

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The Kingdom of Copper by S.A. Chakraborty

16 reviews

rinku's review against another edition

dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

I’m gonna be honest: If I didn’t spend 15 € on The Kingdom of Copper, I wouldn’t have finished it. I just didn’t care about anything happening or any of the characters because many of their motivations were so unclear, and the main plot progressed just too slow for my taste.

One big problem I had with the novel is that it was too long, it could’ve been easily 100 or even 200 pages shorter. One of the reasons the book dragged a lot was the five-year time skip. After the disappointment that Locklands was, I’m really sceptical when it comes to long time-skips, and here, it wasn’t well executed. We spend the first hundred pages only with explaining what has happened in this time and how certain relationships have developed which was so boring. Nahri had to marry Muntadhir, the other prince of king Ghassan, and lives now at the court of Daevabad. Ali lives in a random village and now can control some kind of water magic, and Dara is just there and planning something. Even though there’s so much time spent with explaining and characters talking to each other and nothing more, I still didn’t get all the alliances, the different cultures and the reasons for their grievances.

Most of the time, I was just waiting for anything to happen because for at least half of the book, nothing that is happening has any relevance for the overarching plot, and I’m still not sure what this overarching plot is. The focus is on some hospital that should be rebuilt but I don’t know why I should care about this at all, it was just boring. Besides this, there’s barely any action and even less magic which was unfortunate as well. But we know something will happen at one point because in Dara’s POV, he’s planning a war with some people. It took me again such a long time to understand who’s he in an alliance with and what they have against their enemy. The problem I see with his POV is that it takes some of the tension away since we already know what will happen and what the plans of the bad guys(?) are. If we didn’t, the things happening would’ve been way more shocking.

Only like the last hundred pages were quite good and dramatic and the reason that I didn’t give this The Kingdom of Copper only one star. Even though there were some moments I still didn’t understand, like

Spoiler

where the random rebellion against the king came from or why Nahri was arrested, even though she obviously hadn’t to do with it

, or some that were predictable, like

Spoiler

Nahri’s mentor dying

, it was still interesting. The

Spoiler

was so creepy and a true threat and I loved to see how Muntadhir, Zaynab and Nahri worked together towards the end; it would’ve been so great if they did so earlier

Like I’ve said above, the biggest problem I had with the characters were that many of their motivations were not clear which led to me just being irritated because of their behaviour. For example, I thought that Ghassan would hate Ali and wanted him to die when he exiled him, but he’s so worried about him here which confused me so much. This should probably show that he’s a grey character, but this didn’t convince me. Another character I couldn’t understand at all was Nahri herself. Her extreme stubbornness annoyed me so much, just like her resentfulness towards Ali which I couldn’t understand at all – she seemingly forgot that Dara killed him as well. Talking about Dara, I don’t like him at all, and he annoyed me with his self-pitying since I just don’t care for him. I even had problems understanding the motivations of some side characters, like Jamshid. The only characters I kinda liked were Muntadhir and Zaynab, but that’s it.

The Kingdom of Copper wasn’t even a disappointing read for me since I had no expectations for it, it was just boring and confusing. This is so sad, considering that Chakraborty has such a detailed world and obviously cares quite a lot for it. I already bought the third book – I probably didn’t if I’ve read The Kingdom of Copper before – and I’ll find out how the series will end, I suppose.

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brynalexa's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I was consistently shocked through the entire book. The story never goes where you’re expecting it to. Somehow a cast of treacherous characters making terrible decisions works. Brilliant.

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laurenkimoto's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Spoiler

wow I’ve been reading too much contemporary romance that I forgot that high fantasy has themes and/or acts of genocide</>spoiler

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dealingwithdragons's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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lais's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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ok7a's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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claudiamacpherson's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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readwithria's review against another edition

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adventurous tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

Kingdom of Copper improved upon an already interesting world.

I’m not usually a big fan of long time skips, I think they’re often used to forcibly create unknown information, BUT this book did an incredible job of acknowledging that time had passed without the time passage being the conflict. The characters were able to grow off page and return to the story more sure of themselves and their places in the world. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and think that it was a great choice!

This book brings in Dara as a POV character and for me, that was the hardest part of reading the book. I did not enjoy reading his chapters, and I usually would stop reading for the day once I got to a Dara chapter.

Spoiler

the chapters once he has realized how ruthless Manizheh is were even harder to read because he knows that she’s willing to hurt innocent people, he doesn’t like it, but he goes along with it anyway

I think that the pacing of this book worked much better than City of Brass. I also liked the fact that Nahri had grown into herself and had a lot more agency in this book. Her comfort with being the Banu Nahida was apparent, and her relationships with the other members of the palace felt believable given the years she had spent there as the wife to the Emir.

Ali had definitely grown a lot between books one and two, but his motivation felt a little weak to me.

Spoiler

I don’t fully understand where his shift in beliefs about the Daeva tribe came from. He went from hating their religion and their beliefs about the shafit to not seeming to care, and that shift felt like it came out of nowhere

My favorite non-POV characters have to be Jamshid and Zaynab. They both have so much gumption and a strong sense of who they are and where they fit in the world. It’s refreshing to see, especially given how much Nahri and Ali are changing their place in the world. I could talk about them forever, but this review is already getting long so I’m going to wrap it up here. I look forward to seeing how the trilogy concludes in Empire of Gold.

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just_one_more_paige's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

It has been, embarrassingly, years since I read City of Brass. In my defense, this book wasn't published yet, at the time, for me to have continued with the series then (though I do remember wishing it was). Anyways, as with The Poppy War series, I waited wayyyy too long between the first and second books (I had to find more than one summary/review, outside of my own, to read and recap so I remembered enough of the characters and details to feel ready to continue). But, silver lining (in both cases actually), the third and final book has also been published now, so I can jump right to it! And let me tell you, I plan to do just that.

While the novel starts with a short intro that gives some small insight into the immediate aftermath of the events of book one (Nahri's marriage, Dara's death, Ali's banishment), it jumps very quickly to "five years later." Nahri is doing her best to survive her life at court, basically confined to her healing rooms both physically and in action/attention, without any of the allies that made her first days in court bearable, trapped and powerless within the city and palace that are hers by right. Ali managed to survive a brutal introduction to the arid lands of his ancestors, as well as a slew of assassins, and has made a sort of life for himself, leaning into (while keeping very secret) the water-based gifts given to him by the marid. Dara was brought back from the dead (again) by a very unexpected hand, to help train and lead a force (of partially dubious provenance) with the goal of returning Daevabad's riginaly rulers to their rightful place. These three storylines unfold simultaneously, and slowly in convergence, against a complex political/religious/personal backdrop, coming to a head with violent consequences as a once-per-century djinn celebration kicks off.

Well, if I finished the first book thinking that Chakraborty was a star with world-building, I am finishing this second book convinced that very few are as good as she is. The setting is so alive. Daevabad itself remains as vivid and gilded as before, but with 600 more pages of layered history, descriptions, and interactions of the peoples. Plus, we get additional "outside the city" perspectives and growth more here as well, with Ali's time in Am Gezira and his mother's home (Ta Ntry) and tribe (the Ayaanle). As a major part of this spectacular world-building, I must mention the complex and detailed political (and religious, though mostly in overlap) maneuvering/machinations/plotting/scheming. There is so much “trading decency for a throne” …or power in these pages. You can, quite simply, lose yourself in it. But like, in the best way. With this comes some very deep familial cruelty and misguided loyalty that is heartbreaking to read at times. We always hurt the ones we love the most, when threatened. And so many times here, acting to protect someone you love, especially by withholding truth/information, ends up doing more harm than good. Thematically tough, but so real. Overall, just some of the most lush world-building I've ever read.

Character-wise, I have only similar praise to give. Nahri, Ali and Dara all benefit greatly, in terms of depth, throughout this novel. And I remain very into the way they subvert what the normal love triangle looks like. There is additional attention paid to side characters, originals like Muntadhir and Zaynad and Hatset and Jamshid and Kaveh, but also some newly introduced ones like Aqisa, the ifrit, some shafit, and a few others that I won't necessarily name, in order to avoid spoilers. I loved it all. And I have to say, I was least into Nahri's development, honestly. I wanted her to be...more. But I guess I understand her constraints, she did stay consistent with her goal of saving lives (any lives), and she did have a few breakout moments towards the end, so I am hoping that the final book does her arc a little more justice.

As far as the plot is concerned, I almost have to say that, at least for the first like two thirds of the novel, there wasn't one. Now, don't get me wrong, I was deeply invested in the development of place and character, and the build-up of it all, because I knew something was coming. There was a deep feeling of unrest, almost anticipatory uneasiness, both in the story/characters and within myself as a reader. And I loved the way that feeling escalated as we got closer and closer to what I just knew was impending doom. However, outside that feeling, very little actually happened...so I would caution you to be sure that's the type of book you are in the mood for, before picking this one up. However, of note, when the action began, with about a quarter of the book left (ish), things got real. The pacing, with perspectives jumping from Dara to Ali to Nahri with perfect timing, was phenomenal. Edge of one's seat type reading. Worth the wait in the build-up for sure. And with the cliffs that each of our main characters end on (plus, some additional "characters to watch," including both of Ali's siblings, Zaynab and Muntadhir, as well as Jamshid and Aqisa), I am quite ready to pick up the final installation, and watch the ending unfold, as soon as possible.

Chakraborty puts a deep focus on uncovering/unveiling the truth of history and the stories that are now accepted as truth, despite what the reality actually was, for reasons of maintaining power or avoiding guilt. She really demonstrates how only with the correct information can current consequences of violent/unfair history be rectified. Because after generations and centuries of curses and revenges and betrayals and death, how else (better than the endless examples of how those who are oppressed and given no other option/recourse will rise up with violence, without mercy) can people(s) overcome a legacy like that? (Ummmm, sound familiar to present day much? I think big yes.)

With captivating storytelling, intricate political and locational detail, discerning character development, and well-paced (when it arrives) action, Chakraborty transports the reader on a fantastic Middle Eastern history and culture inspired journey. It's a mythical, magical and entirely absorbing adventure. I cannot wait to see how it ends!

“People do not thrive under tyrants, Alizayd; they do not come up with innovations when they're busy trying to stay alive, or offer creative ideas when error is punished…”

“You don’t need to be a weapon to be an asset.”

“I’m tired of everyone in this city feeding on vengeance. I'm tired of teaching our children to hate and fear other children because their parents are our enemies. And I'm sick and tired of acting like the only way to save our people is to cut down all who might oppose us, as if our enemies won't return the favor the instant power shifts.” (Basically, sums up all of Ali/Dara/Nahri's vibes in this book.)

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readandfindout's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional tense medium-paced

Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.5

Style/writing: 4.5 stars
Themes: 4 stars
Characters: 4.5 stars
Plot: 4.5 stars
Worldbuilding: 4.5 stars

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