The Girl in the Clockwork Collar by Kady Cross

[deleriumd]

Since I'm a glutton for punishment, I actually read the vapid sequel to the equally vapid 'Girl in a Steel Corset'. The sequel is titled 'Girl in the Clockwork Collar' and the biggest hint that this was going to be bad was the model on the cover was East Asian. The reason I felt my stomach sink was because this is a steampunk novel and East Asians

Comments

[ljlee]

I've never liked the Plucky Girl trope because too often it's set up to create artificial divisions between the plucky and the non-plucky, and it tends to degenerate into an overly simplistic and cringe-inducing "solution" to sexism as in: if only all women were as awesome as Plucky Girl, sexism wouldn't be a problem anymore! Or worse: Plucky Girl is too awesome to be discriminated against, it's not like she's these other run-of-the-mill girls

[deleriumd]

I speak a little bit of Mandarin and Cantonese, I can't read or write though. Mei Xing's name is very pretty but the racism of "she's EXOTIC" "PEKING" "martial arts" and "china doll" just left me pissed off.

I would have left the book alone if the author had explored her 'accent' by throwing in the nasty 'r and l' accent joke.

My partner is biracial, Mainland Chinese and white and raised in Singapore and when I mentioned how much this bothered me, he zeroed on in the racism and cultural appropriation... but now he has the WORST craving for Peking duck.

[deleriumd]

It's not quite a qípáo, it's basically described as silk, embroidered with dragons but the form of the clothing is a bastardized cross between a qípáo and a kimono.

I tried using my imagination to create a solid picture in my brain and it's the qípáo in the neck and body only, but has kimono sleeves and the waist and below portion of the dress. So sort of a qípáomono...

[polarisdib]

"Emily: It's pretty much beaten into your head that Emily is:
- Irish
- Has an Irish accent
- Says the word "thanks" funny"

...Dare I guess.... 'Tanks'?

--PolarisDiB

[deleriumd]

...yes. Apparently the letter 'h' does not exist in Ireland. And she has ropes for hair.

[a_lovesuicide]

I contemplated buying these books because they looked interesting. I am so very glad that I decided against it.

[lady_fellshot]

I am very glad that I refused to touch those books based on the main character's extremely not-victorian name.

Women wearing trousers would have been decently common in places like the American West (which ignored a lot of social mores in the name of practicality), but the US East Coast? Not a chance.

You might want to try the Leviathan series by Scott Westerfeld to cleanse your brain. It has it's problems but has better plot devices than "No one likes the Plucky Girl."