A review by martinatan
Phoenix Extravagant by Yoon Ha Lee

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced
Here’s my jumble of thoughts upon finishing Phoenix Extravagant: I was really excited about the concept of this book but I hit a point about two thirds of the way through where I started to dread the direction of the story. The ending turned out unsatisfying and for some reason I did not really enjoy where the message and conclusion landed. I felt the magic system was quite shallow even though I really liked the setting and the focus on art. The pacing was also quite shaky and the plot moved a lot faster than I anticipated. At the same time, I often felt some included scenes were unnecessary while other pivotal moments were glossed over in favor of somewhat distracted passages that diverted my attention from a throughline. I was also confused by the main character’s internal monologue and could not get a handle on their convictions and values, or their approach and ideology in their life. There were times they seemed to use humor but this didn’t feel consistent throughout the narration. I feel as if the author could have thought more about the pacing and overall tone of the novel as it came off as scattered and uneven.

Overall I found the non-Western-centric culture and history of Hwaguk and Razan as well as the main characters’ profiles to be interesting and a breath of fresh air in contemporary fantasy. I also appreciated how integrated queer characters and relationships were in the story although, since so much else of the world in the book reflected our current society—namely some conventions that characters held about love, ancestry, and family—I wondered whether it was appropriate to have such a lack of in-universe discrimination towards LGBT characters. I still like the book for the representation it offered but there were too many things that did not sit right with me for me to rave about the reading experience.
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