I enjoyed this one much more than the previous book. Nghi Vo's writing is once again breath-taking and each time I love the narrator more as well as the morally grey, but passionate, sapphics that exist in their stories.

📖 When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain by Nghi Vo Book Review 📖

2nd book of January 2022 and 2nd of the year:

I loved the first book in this series, so I had to pick this up! Once again, I loved the beautiful, lush, and poetic writing and descriptions, the queerness in it, and the importance put on stories and storytelling. I didn’t enjoy this one quite as much as the first one, but I still really enjoyed it and find myself liking it more the more I think about it, and I recommend picking it up! TW for death, blood and gore, animal attacks, animal cruelty, animal deaths, murder, cannibalism, cheating, confinement, sexual content, and violence🎧🐅🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️

This is great. Clih was the only returning character, and they had a more active role this time, both telling and receiving the story in a high-stakes cultural exchange/hostage scenario as they and they companions try to please three tigers until help can arrive. 

The tigers’ version of events was interjected at moments where it complemented (or occasionally contradicted) the version Clih knew. These moments are well-chosen, and serve to tell much about the tigers conveying them. The actual story is exciting, romantic, and poignant by turns, the pacing works well (even when interrupted by the tigers).

It as much to say about stories, who tells them, and whether telling them imperfectly is a price worth paying to preserve them. Clih begins with a story recorded, but recorded imperfectly, set against the tigers’ corrections and their demand for a perfectly told tale that will be Clih’s last. 

This is technically a sequel but can function as a stand-alone book. The main difference for anyone who reads them in order is that they'd already be familiar with the main character and their vocation, but these details are briefly conveyed early on without needing to reference any other text.