Author: Vaishnavi Patel
Publisher: Redhook
Published Date: April 26, 2022
Genre: Historical Fantasy (Mythology)
Rating: ★★★★☆
REVIEW
I choose this book for my April Book of the Month. The vibrant cover immediately caught my eye, and as I am actively trying to read more books based in mythology, I decided to pick it up. I've had mixed outcomes when it does come to this style of book, but I think I am beginning to like historical fantasy more. I like them more when I haven't heard of the source material that inspires them because then I can discover a whole new story.
SUMMARY
Kaikeyi follows the title character as she grows from a child to an adult. She is the only daughter, and royal, who is raised without a mother since she had been banished by her father, who is also distant. Kaikeyi loves stories of the gods and soon finds that she has the power to enter the Binding Plane, where she can see, and sometimes influence, peoples connections to herself and others. She is married off to the ruler of another Kingdom, where we follow her personal journey as she seeks to create a better world for women while also struggling to control those who she believes seek to damage that. It is a heartbreaking and wonderfully beautiful story.
MY THOUGHTS
I was pleasantly surprised by this book. After attempting Circe and The Song of Achilles, I hate to say that I didn't have the highest of expectations for Kaikeyi. I initially picked this because whenever BotM has a fantasy on their list I buy it. I decided to read it this month for the 2022 Asian Readathon hosted by withcindy. I am so glad that I did because this book had so much that I loved.
The narrative style is very descriptive, which allowed me to immerse myself in the world. I think Patel did an amazing job with building a full world that felt lived in and real. There was much more than surface level worldbuilding here. We followed Kaikeyi on her travels as she visits multiple kingdoms so there was a lot of landscape and surrounding descriptions. Patel is very good at showing what her surroundings looked and felt like, making it easy to picture the forest and the river and the buildings. I just wish that there was a map at the beginning so I could follow along and see where places were.
Another thing that goes along with worldbuilding, is that the cultures created in this book were very well done. Society in one kingdom was very different than the next, and you could feel how Kaikeyi reacted to her new surroundings. It created such good growth potential as she seeks to create space for herself. I liked to see how women were viewed when she was first married to how they were at the end of the book. Kaikeyi was able to use her position to create change for the better. I found myself physically smiling at the end when her maidservant took her to look at the village and how girls were now learning alongside the boys, and women were running their own stalls in the market. It goes to show that while you may not feel like you've accomplished much overtime, if you compare to where you started, change is easy to see.
While I did find the pacing of this book rather telling of the debut status, I still was able to remain gripped by the overall plot. Sure, there were portions that felt like they didn't need to be there, or long streams of thoughts that felt repetitive, but they didn't seem to take away from the story being told. The ending felt a tad bit rushed compared to the rest of the book though. We spend a lot of time in Kaikeyi's childhood and quite a bit of time in her young adulthood. The time jumps didn't feel completely natural, with one paragraph jumping months or years ahead sometimes. Then the ending was over very quickly as well.
Overall, though, I thoroughly enjoyed my reading experience and am excited to see what Patel writes next. She was able to create a beautiful story that makes me want to read more books centered around Indian culture and history. I think an author is successful when they make the reader curious and this book definitely expanded the types of books I am looking forward to reading.
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