Lisa Cotton

Four stars.

The first half I found an absolute chore to get through (and half of 1100 pages is a hell of a lot) but then it clicked, and I was engrossed.

I loved Mariko & Blackthorne, of course - and Blackthorne's steady transformation. And Toranaga, what a character! I enjoyed how deep and rich and clever the whole story was, and how vividly the world is painted - historically accurate or not, it's certainly beautiful. So many passages gave me the shivers, especially towards the end.

I did struggle to keep up with the politics though, particularly in the early chapters. But it was really worth persevering. Excellent climax & excellent ending. 

My awareness of African-American history is presumably far beneath that of the target audience for this book - I know enough to recognise a good few of the historical events it's satirising, but I'm sure there were references I simply don't have the background knowledge for. Still, from my position of ignorance, I really enjoyed it.

The plot is outrageous. A lot of reviews of this book use that word, and it's totally apt. The plot is ridiculous, but it carries, it works. There's also a lot of gold in there that's not social commentary. The end of the first chapter genuinely gave me shivers. There's a sentence at the start of chapter three that I smirked at the start of, laughed at the middle of, and then I felt my face fall in horror before the end.

But goodness me, it sure is cutting and funny, too. Christ, that opening line: “This may be hard to believe, coming from a black man, but I've never stolen anything.” Woah! OK so we're addressing those stereotypes full on, then!

All in all: hilarious, and shocking, and humbling.

3.5 stars. The achingly delicious language is what kept me going - I was frustrated throughout most of it. So much cliffhanger-style teasing of “The Terror” without relief until the very end. The ending was magnificent, mind you. Of all the different chronological perspectives to choose from, I admired the point in time where the book ended: the one point where there was any pleasure at all, doomed or not.