The Black Tides of Heaven by Neon Yang
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

“Let the black tides of heaven direct our lives,” he murmured. He turned to look at his partner. “I choose to swim.”

“People make mistakes. They can’t be mistakes.”

Real Score : 2.5/5.0
I wanted to give 2 stars during reading the book. But once I finished it, the story quite lingered in my mind and made me want to read the 2nd book. Although….not immediately.

I’m a character based reader. I love books with strong character. Unfortunately, the only strong characters here are the twins, Akeha and Mokoya. I could feel the strong bond between them, it’s even too strong that I thought Akeha would be an incest. But unfortunately, I couldn’t feel their bond with other characters, even with their significant other. Okay, I could see how Mokoya had a crush with Thennjay, but it seemed that everything is in rush I couldn’t feel their love. Even when Akeha said “I love you” to his partner, Yeongchow, it didn’t give me some sparks.

This undetailed information also happened in the story line. As this is a fantasy book, I think we need more explanation about something only occurs in this story. Some events are left told in such a hurry that it feels like I only know half of it. Is it because it’s only half part of the twin novella? maybe this is what makes me want to read the twin novel. Except the fact that I’m personally interested in Akeha himself.

I ended up reading this book because I wanted to read books with LGBTQ+ topic. This book somehow always made on the top 10 of it. After reading it, I can see clearly why. It’s a fantasy where every child born as a non-binary and will choose their gender in anytime they want and no one would judge or disallow. It is indeed a beautiful fantasy. I like it when Akeha told Yeongchow that he didn’t care if Yeongchow hadn’t undergo some physically process to confirm his gender. Because, what matters is what we decide about ourselves in our own mind and heart, right?

PS : I’m also a southeast asian just like JY Yang. So, I can understand some terms they used in this book. My fav one is when they chose “Cheebye” as a cursing word ;P