Title: The Burning God (The Poppy War #3)
Author: R.F. Kuang
Genre: Fantasy
Publisher: Harper Collins
Publication Date: 2020
Format: Paperback
Length: 636 pages

Rating:

I first began The Poppy War trilogy after reading (and loving) Babel. R.F. Kuang is an absolute master of fantasy, using her extensive historical knowledge to weave beautiful universes with ties to things like ancient Chinese mythology and history. It was far more violent and brutal than I expected it to be, but I quickly settled into the books, thoroughly enjoying how dark and twisted the characters, and the setting, would come to be.

The Burning God was absolute perfection. I could not have asked for a better, or more appropriate end to a trilogy, with Kuang delivering in every possible way. The plot was well-paced with a decent amount of action, the power dynamics and politics that had driven so much of the plot continued to evolve nicely until reaching a final crescendo, and the underlying themes of racism, discrimination, and imperialism were stark and beautifully explored. Perhaps most important though was the character development (or at times lack thereof) of the main cast. Rin, so tragically flawed and desperately violent, is like witnessing a car crash in human form and I simply could not look away.

I loved everything about this book, from the military fantasy setting to the violent end. I’d read anything that Kuang wrote just based on this series alone, and I can’t recommend this trilogy enough to those looking for an incredibly solid fantasy series.

The Book: The Burning God by R.F. Kuang

The Burning God picks up where The Dragon Republic left us: with Rin fighting for a new southern coalition as she fights back against Vaisra’s republic and the Hesperians they’re allied with. She’s been thoroughly betrayed several times over at this point, and even though she’s now fighting for what she views as her people, the people of the South, the betrayal only continues to roll in. At the end of the day, everyone views Rin simply as a weapon; something to wield, to hammer enemies with, but never someone to lead or to rule. She learns this lesson the hard way once again as the southern leaders rebel against her and she’s forced to seek refuge with her former sworn enemy: Daji, the Empress.

Daji convinces Rin that the only way that the South can be saved is by reuniting the Trifecta, effectively raising a small contingent of the world’s most powerful-ever shamans. Rin sees the wisdom in this, imagining how invincible she and the Southern forces would be with more shamans on hand. While she’s been betrayed by the Southern leadership, she knows that a show of power would return the people of the South to her side. She teams up with Daji and together, they rescue Jiang, the Gatekeeper, from his crypt in the Chuluu Korikh, and they march back to where the southern army has been cornered by the Republic. In a massive show of shamanic power, Jiang almost single-handedly brings down the Republican and Hesperian army, allowing the southern coalition time to escape into the mountains, where Rin, Jiang, and the Empress will go to reunite with the final member of the Trifecta. From there, Rin will encounter more betrayal and loss before she finally finds the allies and strength that she needs to march on to her final battle with Nehza and the Republic as a whole.

As Rin attempts to consolidate her power and rebuild the world around her, the weight of the decisions that she’s made and the devastation that her army has wrecked will prove to be as challenging as any military foe. Despite all that she’s worked for, all that she’s sacrificed, Rin faces more and more hardship, and she slowly begins to spin completely out of control as her paranoia combines with the weight of carrying a starving country. Rin has fought her way out of every problem that she’s ever faced, wreaking devastation and destruction on anyone who has stood in her way, but in the end, she’ll finally be faced with the fact that perhaps, you can’t fight your way out of everything.

The Review

Upon looking back at all that happened in The Burning God, it feels like several books instead of just one. So much happens with so many core characters that it feels impossible that it’s all been a part of one story, but Kuang has created such a compelling world that it didn’t feel like a long read.

Plot-wise, it was just as violent and brutal as its predecessors, but at the same time, the weight of that brutality feels heavier. In The Burning God, we see much more of the long-term devastation that war and civil war wreak on a population. The stark depictions of famine and plague that permeate through the battles faced in this installment are heavy and difficult to process. The battles in this series have always been gory, but as Rin and Kitay are forced to spend significant time dealing with the ramifications of battle in this book, the long-term consequences of the violence that’s permeated through Nikan become a clear and ugly focus. You also see how countries like Hesperia manage to exploit countries like Nikan (or how Western countries managed to exploit the developing world) through issues of civil strife and outright war. A country divided makes for an easy target when you’re looking to gain access to natural and other resources, and the Republic is so desperate for their help that they swallow all the racism and discrimination that comes along with it. It’s a difficult dynamic to navigate and I thought Kuang did a fantastic job of demonstrating not just what this Western country brought, but just as importantly, what they took away in interactions like this. While they may have brought

technology, advancements, and new ideas, they took away the culture, pride, and humanity of those around them. They categorized them as sub-human and then treated them accordingly, and you’re left completely outraged and feeling a little hopeless as it unfolds.

As all these heavy consequences of war and occupation are unfolding, we also see Rin spin further and further out of control. She’s been moulded into a killing machine, a weapon and a tool used in mass destruction, and while she aspires to be more than that, to also play a role in leading the future of her nation, she struggles to ever really achieve any real degree of diplomatic or political sense. She mostly relies on intimidation and violence to keep people in line and when that fails, she very quickly finds herself in over her head. As with the other two books in this series, I found myself constantly wanting Rin to go to the light, to see reason and redeem herself, but it’s not in her nature. Her nature is in burning things down and every time she feels even remotely uncomfortable or slighted, she reverts to that. It’s kind of heartbreaking as you see her ruin every spark of goodness in her life until there’s nothing left but her rage and ruin.

I won’t give away the specifics of the ending, but it was both gut-wrenching and perfect. Again, while I found myself constantly seeking redemption on Rin’s behalf, she was simply too far gone. She would have needed a personality transplant to be anything other than what she was, and the way she burned right down to the end made so much more sense. Your heart is breaking while you’re also like “Yes. This was entirely necessary.” I cried my way through the entire last chapter and loved it.

The Poppy War is probably one of my favourite trilogies I’ve ever read. It was wildly entertaining, gut-wrenching, thought-provoking, and unique. I’m sad that it’s over, but grateful that R.F. Kuang is a publishing machine. She’s an auto-buy author for me at this point and I can’t wait to see what she does next.