The Drowning Eyes

I mostly enjoyed this. It's like a slice-of-life story, except the plot is epic in nature, and there are also some serious themes about people (women) relying on each other.

The story is about three women: Shina, who is a pretty standard type of YA heroine, struggling with her magical powers (control over the weather); Chaqal, a young sailor who is only slightly older than Shina but has a very nurturing personality; and Tazir, a grizzled older sailor who suppresses all of her kinder impulses. I found Tazir to be the most interesting character; we see that she is a much more caring person than anyone would ever guess, but I think she herself doesn't even know that.

The writing style is great, clear and direct without being dull. There's also some genre-savvy humor, which I liked, such as the characters acknowledging that Shina is on a quest.

Overall, this book is very different from anything else I've ever read, mostly in positive ways. But I was expecting a prominent romance plot due to some of the negative reviews (people whining about the existence of queer female characters), and there's nothing like that (well, not really). So, I think I will need to reread this book in the future in order to judge it as it is, without incorrect expectations.

So I was going to write up a little review about how enjoyable this story was but that it tries - as most spec fiction novellas do - to cram too much world building in too few pages. (Which is true, but not the point of this review now.) Then I reached the final chapter and the wheels fell off. The rest of the book has its ups and downs, but as a whole, I liked it. It was looking at a four star rating (and now I think three is too generous.) For me, that final chapter wasn't fun. We skip five years, relationships - which were kind of my favorite thing about this story - fell apart, we were left in the head of a very bitter, old woman that was most likely addicted to opium and quite possibly an alcoholic. Sure, people might say that the ending was ‘happy' but I was much happier at the end of the previous chapter and would have been happier if the author had ended it there. (And that chapter ended on what was apparently a death. But at least I liked the people and felt something for their friendships.) You know what, I'm changing my rating down to two stars because, thanks to that ending, I'll never want to reread this book and I don't even really need it on my shelf. (Which is sad because I was so excited for this book.)