A fast-paced and intricate Hamlet retelling with a near-future science fiction setting. Enjoyed the exploration of consciousness, AI, and mortality.

ARC provided in exchange for an honest review.

I’m a little backlogged with my ARC’s so my apologies for not getting this read sooner. I really liked the concept of this book! Set in the future and told from the past tense, this book really got me thinking! Especially when it comes to AI and consciousness which has made huge strides lately. Really makes you wonder if a day will come when someone will actually be able to “live forever”. I would definitely recommend to anyone who likes science fiction and dystopian!

The Death I Gave Him by Em X. Liu caught my eye when it was described as a "A lyrical, queer sci-fi retelling of Shakespeare's Hamlet as a locked-room thriller". I mean, come ON?!

The year is 2047, and something is rotten in Elsinore Labs. Hayden Lichfield has walked into his father's laboratory and found him dead. There are several hours of camera footage missing from Horatio, the lab's AI operating system.

As the building quickly goes into lockdown, shutting the five remaining living people inside, Hayden tries to figure out what exactly happened his father. More importantly, he needs to protect the research that he and his father were working on - The Sisyphus Project could be the secret to eternal life. If someone would kill for it, then everyone there is in danger. He's relying on Horatio (his constant companion throughout the project) and the questionable loyalty of an ex in order to protect his work and avenge his father's death - but does he have enough time?

As the story progresses, we have extracts from interviews given after the event, and a book written by Felicia, the aforementioned ex. This makes for an engaging, yet tense reading experience as we go back and forth between waiting for the characters to catch up with us, and us to catch up with the characters.

The queer element of the story comes from the (frankly adorable) operating system, Horatio. He was such a fantastic character, and I got really emotionally attached to him (I cried 😌)

It's definitely full of action and deception, but it's also full of emotion. If you're familiar with the plot of Hamlet, you'll likely know what's happening from the off - if you're not, I would not look it up. Just go with it and enjoy this for what it is - an unusual, clever sci-fi adventure with a lot of heart.

I did get an advance copy of the book from Netgalley, but I had pre-ordered it the second I heard about it in 2023.

Nonetheless, I sincerely thank @solarisbooks for granting me eARC approval! I read this a couple of weeks ago and it's one I keep thinking about. I really liked it.
#sharonreadthis24 #TheDeathIGaveHim

I absolutely LOVED this book. The structure, prose, and tension had me HOOKED. I wasn’t sure how the sci fi aspect would go but it was great.

This is a true to form retelling of Shakespeare's Hamlet but with a Sci-Fi twist. There is no denying this book was beautifully written. There is an art to writing sci-fi, using the specific lingo to describe the intricate workings of the human body, that I think Liu captures. But I found the plot to be a little meandering for what we are building to over the course of the novel. The way in which the story unfolds also is at turns unique and at others really hard to follow. The book takes place over the course of a single night combined with interviews and recordings and footnotes that fill in information along the way.

I also found the queer relationship to be interesting, I don't know that we were given enough build up to it but hat off to Liu for going there with it.

Thank you to unfortunately and the publisher for granting me free access to the arc of this book. DNF unfortunately and no one is more upset about that than me.

This unique crime thriller is a futuristic retelling of Hamlet and a superb immersive read. As a locked room mystery I thought I'd work out the plot, but this smart and pacey narrative wove expertly around relationships and setting and had me hooked right to the brilliant end. Edgy, but with soul, the book takes the reader through emotional highs and lows, with innovative tech and heartfelt romance, this is a very clever inventive book. Highly recommended, and no prior knowledge of Hamlet is really required, but readers may recognise the parallels.

Full Disclosure: This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on September 12, 2023 in exchange for a potential review. I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.

The Death I Gave Him is a Science Fiction adaptation/retelling of Hamlet, with a bit of a Queer twist. It's not a long novel and it's also one that is, while updating the setting and details, kind of faithful in many ways to the original play: certain acts Hayden (our version of Hamlet) does and certain tricks he tries to pull as he seeks to discover the truth behind his father's death and to get revenge come kind of right out of the play. At the same time, the novel combines certain characters and its change of setting - from historical revenge drama to a drama over future biotechnology that could lead to breakthroughs in both healing and perhaps in reversing death itself - work really really well, especially as told from several points of view through pseudo archival materials.

And the result is pretty damn interesting honestly, even as its most prominent character Hayden is probably the least changed in tone. But the story's atmosphere and writing is excellent and its secondary POV characters Felicia (this book's version of Ophelia, who has bits of Ophelia's brother Laertes mixed in) and Horatio (who keeps his name from the play but is now an AI who gets hooked into Hayden's being) are fascinating in their actions, emotions, and changes. All in all, an adaptation well worthy of your time.


Plot Summary:
Hayden Lichfield enters his father's lab one day to find a shocking sight: his father murdered and the camera logs erased. Hayden believes there's only one likely reason for his father's murder: Hayden and his father's research on the Sisyphus Formula, which can regenerate human flesh so well it might even be able to reverse death itself. And so he steals the research, hooks up the lab's Artificial Intelligence Horatio (the only person Hayden trusts) to his very body, such that his thoughts and feelings can be shared between them, and begins a plan to unravel who could've killed his father.

But it soon becomes apparent that the only possible killers are those still locked in the lab with them: his Uncle Charles, lab tech Gabriel, research intern Felicia (Hayden's ex), and Felicia's father Paul (the lab's security chief)...and evidence suggests his Uncle was responsible. And so Hayden embarks on a desperate plan to prove his uncle's complicity and to revenge his father...a plan that could easily go awry, and could kill and destroy what little Hayden still cares about in life....

The Death I Gave Him is told as if it is a research project from a researcher in the far future, who has cobbled together the story from various sources. The result of this is that the story is told from multiple perspectives as if it is made up of different texts (with a few segments the fictional narrator claims he or she made up), so you have Hayden and Horatio's segments based off of the records of their shared link and Hayden's eventual testimony at trial, and you have Felicia's large segments coming in part from an interview she gave after the fact and in part from a book she wrote about the events of the story. This presentation sort of keeps the work kind of in the frame you see it read today by people from our time reading an ancient play - one step removed and needing context from footnotes to understand some of what's going on and the language used.

And this works in allowing Liu to tell a really excellently written story with some excellent characters, even as she doesn't change much other than the context from some of the events of the play. First and foremost is Hayden, who is kind of the least interesting - like his inspiration Hamlet, he's an utter mess, spiraling into more and more bad decisions and finding little left to live for by the end other than his revenge...or so he thinks. But this Hayden is a lab researcher who was trying to prove himself so desperately with the formula and who was so grateful to his dad for the chance that he has basically left himself with little else to his core, so the killing of his dad throwing him off feels very natural in how it throws him so dangerously off balance.

More prominently interesting are Felicia and Horatio. Felicia's inspiration in the play (Ophelia) is generally considered a character without much agency - she loves Hamlet, sees the result of his machinations result in the death of her father, and then goes mad and dies. Here, Felicia may have once loved Hayden, and certainly still cares for him, but she broke it off with him when he was too devoted to his work to find anything else and she got into the lab because she wanted to prove her OWN self. And so, even as Felicia sees similar tragedies befall her as her inspiration, she responds in a much more active way to try to take matters into her own hands and to make sure she comes out as okay as feasibly possible. Hayden may be a mess she wants to help with, but she will not let him - or his uncle - take her out with him. Horatio meanwhile may be an AI, but Liu writes the AI as someone who has admired Hayden from afar, and now connected to his nerves essentially falls in love with Hayden (and vice versa) in a kind of queer human/AI relationship (complete with a simulacrum of sex). It's a fascinating relationship that gives both characters more to them as it gives them both something to lose they didn't in the original play.

And so, even as The Death I Gave Him keeps some of the plot beats from Hamlet, recontextualized to its sci-fi setting, it manages to breath new life into the characters and combine it with excellent prose. And so it results in a new work well worth reading.

SUCH an interesting premise, and I felt like it paid off, for the most part! Parts of the book dragged, but the central mystery was good enough to keep me going.

Thank you publisher for the advance copy!

Quite interesting. Though I am not familiar with Shakespeare's Hamlet, it is a good take and twisting it into a queer story.

Thank you to netgalley and the publisher/author for this review copy in exchange for an honest review.

This book was such a unique take on the retelling of Hamlet—and I haven’t read many but I would definitely count it as my favourite.

The tension build and the exploration of the relationships between characters is so interesting. I was constantly wondering what would happen next and, for a good chunk of the book, I was on the edge of my seat.

It was atmospheric, which I loved, and I really liked the cast of characters. If you’re a fan of Shakespeare retellings or even just interesting queer sci fi I think this will be right up your street.

This book was so damn cool. I love the concept (a Hamlet sci-fi retelling!!!), I love how the author structured the book, compiling camera logs, pieces of Felicia Xia's memoir, with footnotes, their own fictionalized version of events. The story is not exactly a mystery – it's more about how things got to that point. I really enjoyed it. Also can't believe an AI made me cry.

Unfortunately I have decided to DNF this book after two attempts. The premise sounded so intriguing to me, but I think it just didn't end up being what I expected or wanted it to be. At times I find the language to be a little too technical, and I felt like I was thrown into the deep end a bit with how the book first begins and I struggled to find my bearings in terms of the set up. I really enjoyed the addition of footnotes and I loved Horace as a character. I think it was just wrong book at the wrong time for me, which is more a me-thing and not the book's fault. I don't have any legitimate issues with the book itself, I just really struggled to get into it and I didn't find myself wanting to pick it up again. I do think if the premise sounds intriguing to you, definitely pick it up! The locked room mystery aspect was super interesting and if you're a fan of Hamlet, definitely give it a go!

I loved this book way more than I was expecting which was a wonderful surprise. The structure was so engaging and kept me on the edge on my seat. I’m so excited to read more from the author in the future.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for granting me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book.

Dnf. I just wasn’t connecting to the story and I think I’m finding out that Shakespeare retellings aren’t for me. I did enjoy the writing style though and the beginning of the book was very gripping!

I'm afraid I found this book incredibly hard to finish. The world-building was not convincing, the prose indifferent, the premise (human-AI sex isn't really queer?) seemingly inserted because that's topical right now, and the characters either insipid or just plain irritating. But, mostly, it was just the style that rankled. I read M. Darsham Whem's version, Hamlet, Prince of Robots last year, and whilst the prose there was rather simplistic, it was a far better read, and a much better modernisation of the story. I don't think Shakespeare would have been impressed with this version. Not for me, anyway, but going by reviews, it's quite polarising, so others may be entranced.
My thanks to Netgalley for the DRC of this book, all opinions are my own.

A queer sci-fi hamlet retelling!

This book had such an interesting premise, though it wasn't exactly what I was expecting overall I still really enjoyed it

*The death I gave him*

4.5 Stars - Queer Sci-Fi retelling of Hamlet, and it works!

When I read the synopsis for "The death I gave him" by Em X. Liu I was intrigued right away! I mean "queer retelling of Hamlet as a Science Fiction locked room mystery" from a debut author is rather something, isn't it? Combined with the many rave reviews I could not wait to get my hands on this and was very happy to receive an E-ARC from Solaris.

So, if you know Hamlet's story at least in rough strokes your will be fine. Actually, even if you don't you will be just fine, you'll just miss the additional thrill of getting references or knowing what is going to happen. All of the key scenes in Hamlet are indeed there, some of them solved in a rather ingenious way. Like - how do you make Hamlet talk to his father, who is already a ghost?

Of course, also all of the key characters are there, as well as the tragic events that lead to some of the deaths in the story. As in the original Hamlet's mental health is in a tenuous state, but as a pleasant update from the original play, Ophelia's alter ego has significantly more agency in this version.

Em X. Liu employs a pretty great twist by making Horatio an AI-based security system in the lab this is set in, broadening the storytelling scope very effectively. The story is told from a future perspective using changing narrations like oral reports but also security tapes, protocols etc. This is handled deftly and works very well in keeping the tension up and the reader at the edge of their seat.

And the writing really needs a special mention: it is just SO good and sharp! Wow, I was really impressed but how Liu wields words so effortlessly - and this is a debut we are speaking of. It also does mean that you have to work a bit harder for the experience. This is not one of those books that practically reads itself, but the payoff is well worth it.

The only thing I struggled a bit with was connecting with the characters. There was an emotional detachment that might have been deliberate, but it made immersion in the story more difficult. Hayden in particular, who is a fidgeting, barely functional mess was a character I stayed really detached from.

Other than that this one comes highly recommended!

I have received an advance review copy via NetGalley from Solaris and voluntarily provide my honest opinion. Thank you very much!

I did not finish this book because as good as the premise sounds, I did not sink into the story at all. I didn't think it was worth pushing through, as it likely would have left me in a position where I did not want to read any more books.