Katabasis by R. F. Kuang (2025): A Review
Author: R. F. Kuang
Publication Year: 2025
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐💫
Pages: 559
Source: audiobook @storytel.tr
Genre: Fantasy, Dark Academia
Opening Sentence: Cambridge, Michaelmas Term, October. The wind bit, the sun hid, and on the first day of class, when she ought to have been lecturing undergraduates about the dangers of using the Cartesian severance spell to revise without pee breaks, Alice Law set out to rescue her advisor’s soul from the Eight Courts of Hell.
I’ll admit, I might be swimming against the current here, but as a card-carrying member of academia, Katabasis felt like an all-too-familiar fever dream. The opening chapters had me nodding in recognition—finally, someone capturing the glorious chaos (and, let’s be honest, the exquisite toxicity) of academic life. The setting might be fantasy, but the depiction of conference-room purgatory and departmental intrigue was so spot-on I almost checked for citations. The blend of sharp humor with a dark, brooding atmosphere was like finding an unexpected meme in a stack of grant proposals—pure delight. Alas, just as I was settling in for a cathartic exposé, the narrative seemed to lose its nerve and wrap up in a blink, leaving me blinking back at a heap of unfulfilled promise.
This book had five-star potential and could have soared with a little more focus (and, dare I say, some judicious editing). At first, I appreciated the wealth of detail—academics do love a good digression—but eventually, the narrative began to resemble one of those faculty meetings that could have been an email. It was almost as if Kuang wanted to settle the age-old scholarly debate: Should you tuck your fascinating asides into footnotes, endnotes, or just sprinkle them liberally throughout the text? Here, every side note made the guest list. As a university instructor, I confess—I am guilty of skimming block quotes and skipping over labyrinthine explanations, mentally substituting them with a chorus of "blah blah blah." I found myself doing the same here, which did sap some of the joy from reading what was supposed to be fiction. And the ending—well, full disclosure, I’m allergic to happy endings, especially the syrupy romantic kind. But that’s a personal failing, I suppose!
As for my rating dilemma—well, I’ve already set a rather infamous precedent by awarding three stars to McFadden’s The Housemaid, which has since become my personal baseline for literary mediocrity. It hardly seems fair to place Katabasis in the same category, given its academic flair (and, frankly, fewer plot holes).
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