technicat@bookwyrm.social reviewed Katabasis by R.F. Kuang
delightful, wicked adventure through hell and academia
In my review of the author's previous work Babel, I surmised she was best at writing young female characters, which I think is reinforced by this book which has obvious similarities (young Asian-American/British studying magic at Cambridge/Oxford), but now I think she is best when writing satire. In tone, this book really feels more like her previous previous book, Yellowface, which skewered writing (authors, publishers, academia...) with a main character who was an emotional trainwreck. Babel was very serious and informative and took me a year to finish. This book is about hell and academia with a main character who's an emotional trainwreck and I cranked through it in a couple of weeks. Also, there's a cat.