As a reminder, my Into the Riverlands review contains links to affiliate sites. Clicking and purchasing at these links helps fund A Modest Hiccup.
Goodreads Synopsis:
Nghi Vo’s Locus and Igynte Award Finalist, and Crawford and Hugo Award-Winning Series, The Singing Hills Cycle, continues…
“A remarkable accomplishment of storytelling.”—NPR on The Empress of Salt and Fortune
Wandering cleric Chih of the Singing Hills travels to the riverlands to record tales of the notorious near-immortal martial artists who haunt the region. On the road to Betony Docks, they fall in with a pair of young women far from home, and an older couple who are more than they seem. As Chih runs headlong into an ancient feud, they find themself far more entangled in the history of the riverlands than they ever expected to be.
Accompanied by Almost Brilliant, a talking bird with an indelible memory, Chih confronts old legends and new dangers alike as they learn that every story—beautiful, ugly, kind, or cruel—bears more than one face.
The Singing Hills Cycle
The Empress of Salt and Fortune
When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain
Into the Riverlands
The novellas of The Singing Hills Cycle are linked by the cleric Chih, but may be read in any order, with each story serving as an entry point.
⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ My Into the Riverlands Review:
I’m perfectly comfortable here, living in my little corner of the world where I get to be an unabashed fangirl of Nghi Vo.
This was absolutely delightful. The Singing Hills Cycle novellas feature the lyrical prose that makes Vo’s work so enchanting. I love that this installment saw Chih and Almost Brilliant drawn deeper into the story than before – I love seeing that dynamic duo go from audience to participant and back. I liked getting to learn more about the people within the world of Singing Hills in this story – I look forward to re-reading the first two now with fresh eyes! Chih is kind, full of wonder, and truly devoted to their task at hand, and that devotion creates a moving central thread within all the side characters and stories within each novella. This novella is perfect for those looking for a little more depth into the world Chih is trying to gather stories in and who want to dip their toes into a beautifully spun story.
Thank you to Net Galley and the incomparable Tor Books for the digital ARC in exchange for my honest review.
Order Your Copy of Into the Riverlands:
Meet Author Nghi VO:
Nghi Vo is the author of the novels Siren Queen and The Chosen and the Beautiful, as well as the acclaimed novellas When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain and The Empress of Salt and Fortune, a Locus and Ignyte Award finalist and the winner of the Crawford Award and the Hugo Award. Born in Illinois, she now lives on the shores of Lake Michigan. She believes in the ritual of lipstick, the power of stories, and the right to change your mind.