Title: Steel Crow Saga
Author: Paul Krueger
Publication Date: September 24, 2019
Publisher: Del Rey Books
Format: NetGalley eARC

I WANNA BE THE VERY BEST …

If you immediately finished that sentence with, “Like no one ever was …” CONGRATS! This book is officially for you.

Steel Crow Saga is a high fantasy with a world that is novel enough, but which will feel familiar for those who grew up with anime. It’s full of action, battles, and characters with as much heart as they have sarcasm.

I went in hoping to love this, and while the beginning was a little rocky, I totally fell in love with this world and these characters, to different degrees. There’s a little bit of something for everyone, depending on what your character preference is. Ultimately, I devoured this book and all its twists and turns and just can’t wait for the sequel. *grabby hands*

❧ This book is comped as “Pokemon x Avatar: The Last Airbender,” and the author has described it as “Fullmetal Pokemist,” and y’all … both of those are so accurate.

Okay, so take the lush world of Avatar with the conflicting nations and their unique cultures and combine that with the Pokemon-ish feel of people having partner creatures that fight with them. Or, if you prefer, another option is to combine the beliefs of the people who shadepact with animals and choose a partner versus the metalpacters.

What I’m saying is if you enjoy any of these fandoms, this book is probably for you.

The inspiration is obvious enough, where it elicits just enough nostalgia to make the fangirl/fanboy in you geek out without being an obvious rip-off of those series. Not to give too much away, but there’s even a particular Pokemon battle line that you’ll come across towards the end if you pay attention. 

❧ These characters are absolutely delightful, and there’s the typical variety that you would expect from any anime-inspired work, so there’s a little bit of something for everyone.

I feel like it should come as absolutely no surprise that my favorite character was the highly sarcastic thief. If you didn’t know that by now … hi. I think we probably haven’t met yet. I’m Sammie and I love all sorts of sarcasm and deviance. But wait, there’s more!

✦ Lee: Professional sarcasmer. Less professional criminal, given that she got caught. Less a victim of racism and more totally owning it. Understands that being called a dog is less of an insult than people think because dogs are freaking awesome.

✦ Xiulan: Technically a princess, but not very good at it. Slightly better at being a detective. Much better at playing the political game. Really bad at talking and acting like a normal person, but she tries.

✦ Jimuro: Totally lovable and hopelessly naive prince who is starting to realize what the real world is actually like and, phew, is that terrifying. Super frustrating optimist that you can’t really hate because he’s probably a better person than you are, even if he makes dumb decisions. *rolls eyes*

✦ Tala: Knows all too well the realities of the world. Has more secrets than all the other characters combined. Really good at kicking ass, less so at taking names.

I actually went in thinking I definitely wasn’t going to like Xiulan and figured Jimuro would get on my nerves, but honestly, I fell in love with all of them. How, I don’t know. I’m not used to this happening.

❧ Okay, sure, metalpacting is cool and all that, but let’s talk about the coolest aspect of this world: shadepacting with animals!

Basically, you can connect your soul to an animal’s soul. Any animal. I mean, assuming you’re near it and it accepts you. Because in order to do this, you have to fulfill some sort of ask they’ll demand of you in order to bind, and in some ways, it seems to be a reflection of your soul. Mine would probably be, like, a wolf that demands bacon every morning for breakfast, and I am all for this. (Although, if I’m honest, I’m totally feeling the rooster in this quote, too, and I’d also be up for that).

Some of my favorite scenes in this book revolve around the idea of shadepacting, whether it’s meeting all the different shades or watching poor Lee attempt to find her own (and cackling with glee at her struggle, but hey, I’m only human).

I thought it was so neat that when an animal shadepacts with a human, they become changed. Usually, they grow in size, and their appearance changes to become … well, altered. Very Pokemon-ish, but I loved all the unique animals and the way they interacted with the humans they were connected to.

❧ There’s all sorts of diversity, but Krueger isn’t in your face about it. These characters happen to be different ethnicites, LGBTQ, etc., but it feels natural, like that’s just who they are, rather than diversity for diversity’s sake.

It’s also pretty easy to see where a lot of the real-world East Asian inspiration comes into play during the book. This can be both good and bad because, you know, the area in reality is known for some not-nice things sometimes (and what area isn’t), and similar things come into play in the book.

Like, for example, the racism towards Lee and her people that seems pretty universal. Even though I didn’t feel like I got a good feel for Lee’s culture, it was quite clear that everyone considered her ethnic group to be less than everyone else, which raised some other interesting narratives. The author had the perfect response to some people raising complaints about this racism, so I felt like I’d just include it here.

my mom showed me a review for STEEL CROW SAGA where someone notes there’s an ethnicity of people in the book that folks are racist to “for no reason”

and man oh man, do i have some news for that person about how racism works

— Paul Krueger ON HIATUS, YELL AT ME IF YOU SEE ME (@NotLikeFreddy) September 30, 2019

Just like the real world, the differences between these characters matter and have implications for their arcs, personalities, and the overall plot. You know, like well-rounded characters do.

It allows for some major important themes like prejudice and racism and classism and wars between belief systems and colonialism to all be brought up within the context of the story. Speaking of which …

❧ This book broaches some really important, heavy subjects in a meaningful way, and it made the world feel that much more vivid.

There are so many different concepts that are important, but I’ll just list a small portion of them here:

✿ Classism
✿ Racism
✿ Colonialism
✿ Trusting other people
✿ Contradictory belief systems
✿ War and the price of it
✿ Vengeance
✿ The game of politics
✿ Right vs. wrong
✿ Who’s the real villain here?!

None of these were particularly preachy, but rather facets of the world (just like they are real life), and I enjoyed how they played out.

❧ This book walks a really fine line between light and dark, balancing the two rather nicely.

Because this book is dark, make no mistake about it. There’s levity, of course, and quite a few times I laughed out loud or giggled like crazy. But this is war. Well, technically, it’s post-war, but war’s not pretty, and neither is the aftermath. Even the characters themselves aren’t black and white; they’re all wonderfully gray. They’re both villains and heroes. They make good decisions and poor decisions and questionable decisions. There were times I rooted for them, and times I yelled at them for being stupid. It was a journey.

❧ The beginning feels a lot like throwing a reader in the deep end and hoping they can swim.

So blow up those floaties, lovelies, or pray someone sends you a lifeline. I panicked at first, because I wanted to love this book so much, and this beginning just wasn’t it. I was so freaking confused and had no idea what was going on with the characters and the world and … yikes.

The book opens with a prologue, and while the prologue plays an important role in the overall story, it wasn’t the smooth transition into the world I was hoping for, and the jump from the prologue to the first chapter was jarring.

Ultimately, it didn’t take me too long to get my bearings. By about 8%, I was invested and starting to get a better grasp of the world. So if you can hang in, the payoff is soooo worth it. I’m glad I didn’t let the rocky beginning turn me away, because phew, this book was worth it.

❧ The world-building felt a little limited. Following the history of the world was a bit difficult, and I felt like I only really knew what was going on with two cultures.

The story is told in four perspectives, so it felt like I should have a chance to know all the different nations fairly well, but I had a really hard time remembering them and who they were fighting with and their history and keeping it all straight. I can’t pinpoint exactly why, but I did. The only thing that made it a little easier was that the real-world influences between the cultures seemed obvious enough to help keep them a bit separate in my mind.

If you could shadepact and have a shade, what animal would you choose? Or would you prefer metal-pacting?