One of the beautiful and frustrating things about genre writing is that a single magnificent idea can carry an entire work.
For me, such is the case with Jade City (2017) by Fonda Lee. The setting is a pseudo-Asian metropolis, and the idea revolves around the natives’ relationship with jade, which confers super-human powers upon them. Or, most of them–there are some people immune to jade’s effects, others that are overly sensitive to it and must protect themselves from exposure. But for those trained in it, jade, worn in jewelry of all types, embedded in weapons and in skin, and prominently displayed to show status, is the ultimate indicator of power, and enables a set of powers that translate to a level of otherwise unattainable physical prowess.
It’s a great idea–the city is controlled by an uneasy peace between family clans which, of course, breaks down, pitting the jade-enhanced warriors against each other in both political and physical conflicts.
From there, your mileage may vary. I enjoyed Jade City, found the core characters well drawn and the setting intriguing. Lee has a nice eye for action, and the scenes of hand-to-hand combat–which is really hard to write, actually–are very well done. At the same time, other than the notion of jade itself, there is little new here: we have inter-generational conflicts, we have a prodigal daughter, we have a well-executed final gambit to reverse the course of the conflict, and we have a clear setup for following novels.
I enjoyed it, in a page-turning way, and in admiration of how compelling the notion of jade itself is throughout the book.
Intentionally or not, the whole thing is superbly cinematic and would translate very well to screens, big or little.
Jade City is the opening novel of a trilogy that I may finish at some point.