The Poet Empress
It’s a bold novel that opens with the funeral of a newborn. Our heroine, Yin Wei, is born in a poor, famine-stricken village in a historical, Chinese-inspired kingdom where princes write magical poems to both bless and curse. Yet a chance comes to bring hope to the village: Prince Terren, heir to the throne, needs a harem, and a court lady would surely be able to help. So, Yin Wei inveigles her way into the harem. But with the Emperor dying, the court is locked in a deadly power struggle between Prince Terren and his elder brother Prince Maro for the succession. So long and all-consuming is this struggle that everyone at court is bent out of shape with their lusting for power.
No-one is trustworthy. No-one loves. Within the harem, all backstabbing is fair in the quest for a night with Prince Terren, who wields his martial powers and magical poems with no moral compass and lives only to torture, maim and destroy. Tao’s writing is excellent in evoking this amoral world where there is no justice: Prince Terren has complete impunity as no one is powerful enough to withstand his magic. So, in this fatal kingdom where it’s everyone for themselves; how will Yin Wei survive, let alone help her starving villagers? Might she break taboos about “correct female behaviour” and learn not only to read but to cast magical poems? How morally compromised will she be by the end of it? Twists abound towards the novel’s conclusion. Does the book end on a sliver of hope? Possibly, maybe; I’ll leave that for you to decide.
