BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS

THE POPPY WAR by R. F. Kuang

The Poppy War is the first book of the "Poppy War" trilogy. Rin, a war orphan, is forced by her foster parent to marry an old man. To avoid it she studies hard for Keju, a national test, which takes the best minds of the country and trains them to become generals and win the war that takes place over a century, between her country and the Mugen Federation. To her suprise, she is accepted in the academy of Sinegard where she studies hard so she can be the best student. But life in the academy is hard for her because she is from a small unknown village and has to compete with people that are trained their whole life for this academy. She is overlooked by her teachers and bullied by her classmates especially Nezha, the son of warlord, who totally hates her. But with time, she starts to adjust to her new life and even makes a friend, Kitay. At the end of the first year, she discovers her talent for shamanism. But having to deal with gods to gain power is very dangerous. One day Sinegard is under attack and the students of the academy have to fight for their lives. In this battle, she loses control and burns almost the entire city with her friends and enemies to the ground. Becouse of that, she cant serve the real army but she is attached to Cike, a bunch of imperial asassins. But war is not over and having seen the terrible things her enemies do to innocent people something inside her cracks and she makes a huge mistake. Now she has to deal with the concequenses and the rage of the gods.