Length: 400 Pages
Genres: YA Fantasy and Sci-Fi
Rating: 3 out of 3 Stars
A special thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Teen for an ARC of this book!
Trigger Warnings in this book for Violence, Alcohol Abuse, Torture, Murder and Physical Abuse
"He should be the Iron King, and I should be the Iron Queen. Yet Iron Demon and Iron Widow is all they'll let us be."
I was really excited for Sci-Fi take on the infamous Wu Zetian, who was the de facto ruler of the Tang dynasty and the only female Emperor of China, so much so that I specifically asked to get an ARC of it. Iron Widow relies heavily on Guillermo del Toro's Pacific Rim (which I thoroughly enjoyed, even if I was in the minority), so I thought I would really enjoy this! Unfortunately, I was more than a little let down.
Wu Zetian has been raised for one thing: to become a concubine for a pilot so that he can power the towering Chrysalises, made of precious spirit metal to combat the Hunduns. They are bug-like aliens who have taken over the planet and wiped out a whole city hundreds of years ago, driving the remaining humans back behind the Great Wall. It is a fate few survive, for the pilot's spirit pressure, or qi, obliterates the minds of the concubines. Zetian has already lost her Big Sister, but instead of a valiant death in the midst of a battle, she is murdered by a cruel pilot, one Zetian will do anything to get close to. When she is matched up with him something incredible happens -- it isn't Zetian who is killed but him. Her spirit pressure is enormous, so she can only match up with one pilot, Li Shimin, a convicted murderer who killed his family is still a prisoner despite his powerful qi.
Zetian is tired of being used and will stop at nothing to eradicate a system that views girls as nothing but kindling to fuel the boys' fire. With help of her friend Yizhi, and the eventual acceptance of Shimin, she strives to become the most powerful woman in all of Huaxia.
My main issue with this book was the writing. It was, for lack of a better word, amateur, bordering even on fanfic-y. Everything Zetian said was cool and witty and a perfect retort that left mouths hanging open and people cowering in fear. It was trying to be edgy and coming across as more cringe than anything else. I was very interested in the relationships between Shimin, Yizhi and Zetian, and the fact that they were in a polyamorous arrangement. I really liked that aspect and it was a breath of fresh air from the usual love triangle. Iron Widow takes a while to get going and ends on a massive, unsatisfying cliffhanger. I don't think I'll be picking up the sequel to this one, much to my disappointment!
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