rydra_wong | The Saint of Bright Doors

sabotabby has just read Vajra Chandrasekera's The Saint of Bright Doors, for anyone who would like to join her and me in screaming about it in the comments (warning for spoilers):

Reading Wednesday

Can highly rec it to anyone who hasn't read it. The pitch I have given to a few people:

The protagonist is grappling with issues like "what if the guy you're dating forwards you the crowdfunder to invite to the city the revered religious figure who (little does he know) is the father you've never met and who you were raised to assassinate, and it's awkward because you don't know if he's forwarding it ironically or not", and despite everything you might infer from this, it's not a broad comedy world

Just SO MUCH LOVE for putting e-mail and dating apps and immigration paperwork and support groups in a full, serious secondary-world fantasy novel and proving that you can, and for the plague which is so overt in its Covid resonances and so keenly observed, and all of these things which I've never seen put into a fantasy novel before.

And it has a lot to say about Chosen One narratives, state violence, family mythologies, and the dynamics of social control.

Also I suspect a healthy dose of Planescape Torment in its DNA.

Anyway you should meet Fetter, he's great.

Here are the first two sentences of the book:

The moment Fetter is born, Mother-of-Glory pins his shadow to the earth with a large brass nail and tears it from him. This is his first memory, the seed of many hours of therapy to come.