A sweeping historical fiction, A Song to Drown Rivers emphasizes the power of softness. The knowledge that barbed words, careful favors, and the danger of love are deadly. Fans of books like Kaikeyi should check this one out! Keep reading this book review of A Song to Drown Rivers for my full thoughts.
Summary
Xishi’s beauty is seen as a blessing to the villagers of Yue—convinced that the best fate for a girl is to marry well and support her family. When Xishi draws the attention of the famous young military advisor, Fanli, he presents her with a rare opportunity: to use her beauty as a weapon. One that could topple the rival neighboring kingdom of Wu, improve the lives of her people, and avenge her sister’s murder. All she has to do is infiltrate the enemy palace as a spy, seduce their immoral king, and weaken them from within.
Trained by Fanli in everything from classical instruments to concealing emotion, Xishi hones her beauty into the perfect blade. But she knows Fanli can see through every deception she masters, the attraction between them burning away any falsehoods.
Once inside the enemy palace, Xishi finds herself under the hungry gaze of the king’s advisors while the king himself shows her great affection. Despite his gentleness, a brutality lurks and Xishi knows she can never let her guard down. But the higher Xishi climbs in the Wu court, the farther she and Fanli have to fall—and if she is unmasked as a traitor, she will bring both kingdoms down.
Review
(Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher. This has not impacted my review which is unbiased and honest.)
A Song to Drown Rivers takes a story you might think you know – a beautiful woman sent in as a spy – and portrays a story of love, sacrifice, and war. It’s a story that touches upon, and begins conversations, about the ‘casualties’ of war. The innocent lives, civilians, that hang in the balance that rulers and kings never think about. The dehumanization, and perceived monstrosity, of our enemies which, as shadows, all look the same. A Song to Drown Rivers is also a story about love struggling to remain beating despite all the odds against them.
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Emotionally heart wrenching, A Song to Drown Rivers is about the barbed nature of love. The ways we can use it to manipulate, to whisper, and to maneuver. While circumstances may be cruel to us, that doesn’t necessarily have to result in cruelty. A Song to Drown Rivers is a book I finished days ago and have still been thinking about. I appreciated the ways it takes a story which you may think you know the ending to and introduces these questions, some nuance, and some surprises.
(Additionally, if you’ve been following me for a while, you will know how much I love the narration of Natalie Naudus. And this book is no exception. Naudus does a phenomenal job at infusing the hints of doubt and the fledgling moments of hope into the narrative).
In many ways, it forces us to question, to begin to think about the nature of revenge, the intersection of cruelty and kindness, and understanding and love. Between ambition and power games, where will Xishi lie? Find A Song to Drown Rivers on Goodreads, Storygraph, Amazon, Bookshop.org, Blackwells, & Libro. fm.