Books & Boba discussion

For the month of February, we will be reading Zen Cho's historical fantasy Sorcerer to the Crown. Set in alternate 19th century Britain, the story follows Zacharias Wrythe, a freed slave and magician who takes over his adoptive English father's position as head of the Royal Society of Unnatural Philosophers--much to the outrage of racist Society members.

This will be our first time reading a novel featuring a non-Asian protagonist, though the co-lead is a biracial Indian woman. I'm sure Cho's book will spark some interesting discussion topics.

I'll set a separate date for a Google Hangout book club meeting. Keep a look out for updates on that!

I just finished Sorcerer to the Crown, and I enjoyed reading it very much. No surprise there because I love books set in the Regency era. I wrote a pretty lengthy review of the book on Goodreads, but I'll give my two cents here.

While Sorcerer to the Crown did start off slow with the introduction to magical Regency England and expositions, I zipped through the book fairly quickly. I braced myself for really dense magical lore and world building, but there were a lot of scenes that made me laugh--most of them involving Prunella extricating herself from ridiculous situations.

What I found most interesting though was how Cho made corrupt bureaucracy the true monster in the narrative. Dragons are easy to slay, but white supremacists and institutional oppression are much harder to defeat. I found it particularly eerie when I compared the political conflicts and racial microaggressions in the novel to the ones Obama had to face during his presidency.

(view spoiler)[Also, did anyone else flip out when Prunella chucked Nidget to be eaten by Leofric? I was like "WHAT?!" and had to reread that part two more times. (hide spoiler)]