This book is not meant for me. This, I admit openly and readily. This book is meant for readers of modern fantasy (who are legion, it seems: in the week of writing this review in early August, three of the four new entries in the UK best-sellers list are fantasy fiction). It is for those in thrall to “dark academia” on TikTok, and those (also legion in the world of online book appreciation), who enjoy extreme simplicity wrapped up in convoluted explication. It is also a love story – so a home run, marketing-wise.
Katabasis is the story of two grad students, Alice Law and Peter Murdoch, studying magic at Cambridge, who follow their adviser down to hell in an attempt to retrieve him (all for their future job prospects, you understand).
I can imagine that those who’ve been through the mincer of competitive graduate courses might already be chortling knowingly at this description. But for the rest of us ... there is a certain amount of suspended disbelief a reader is willing to give any fantastical set-up, of course, and in true Kuang style, the ridiculousness of the pursuit is implied – the tone is very knowing. And yet, any but the most invested reader may, about halfway through the book’s 541 pages, say “ah here, so what?” Also, in this age of splurted feelings and “healthy” therapy-speak, the Austen-esque technique of having lovers not comprehend the painfully obvious due to an unwillingness to talk openly wears very thin.
Still, if you walk into a bookshop looking for fantasy escapism with a touch of social satire about the closed world of education (with faint hints of feminist theorising), this will excite and delight you. I found it tiresome and, yes, I was obliged to finish it for the purpose of this review, but it also had that familiar effect that so much YA fantasy fiction (not that this is officially marketed as YA) had on me in my spotty teens. That is, although I wish I could’ve skipped chunks in the middle, I was compelled to find out what happened in the end.
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I have no doubt that this will be a huge hit. But if you’re hoping for an interesting follow-up to Yellowface, seek elsewhere.
