Is cosy dystopia a genre because that is how I would categorise Down in the Sea of Angels. Khan Wong explores three time periods all located in San Francisco, all three timelines explore social injustices but the overwhelming feeling is of hope rather than doom. I enjoyed this book and was intrigued and engaged from the beginning.
However the pacing did feel slightly off, whether it was narratively intentional for the two past characters to feel more vibrant and engaging than the future personally it detracted slightly from the immersiveness.
Thank you Netgalley and Angry Robot for the Earc

Three individuals linked through time. The only thing they had in common, their existence, was to save the world.

This book is the perfect combo of Sci-Fi and Dystopia. In the first part of the chapters, I got confused because the story had three POV with three different timelines and three different circumstances and atmospheres. But it makes sense in the end. The three characters' personalities plus the different situations and circumstances in each character’s timeline really strongly pop up in the story. I’m glad I didn’t DNF the book, otherwise I will misunderstand this story completely

Also, including eco-green-saving planet vibes as one of the main purposes in the story? It is really cool! This story could be added to an eco-green campaign book. The use of technologies and materials for combat that are used to save the universe from the apocalypse of the world and humanity. It is inspiring!

The world building is very unexpected. The author really did a great job. It is really hard to make a story with three POV, three different timelines and make a unique big world building like this. This book is one of “The books that you should at least read once“ by me. Let’s be heroes of the planet guys!

History, action, coming of age, time travel, sci-fi:

Wong weaves us through three time periods leading up to and past an apocalyptic environmental catastrophe that demolishes half of the world’s population and civilization, all tied together by a magic jade tea cup.

Sadly, the cup doesn’t live up to its promise. The novel reads like three disparate novellas (with completely different genres) glued together with a weak catalyst. Furthermore, it has a generous application of deus ex machina, retconning, and expository dump that really pushed my tolerance for BS.

Other than Li Nuan, Nathan and Maida are flat, lack self awareness, and read like poorly written YA protagonists overly reliant on internal monologue. Supporting characters are textbook tropes, especially the villains. By the end of the book I can barely recall any visual details because so little was given. The relationships are also completely unrealistic, or over the top.

Nathan’s story reads like an overindulgent glorification of Burning Man turned guilt trip fest. His thoughts on his burgeoning awareness of environmental and human exploitation border on proselytizing and paranoid. It’s also a super weak plot point that his transformation hinges on him discovering his family’s bitter roots via magic tea cup images.

Maida is unremarkable and not believable as a heroine. She’s also incredibly ignorant of psionic abilities considering she attended a specialized institution but knows next to nothing about other psionic types. Her journey from new hire to critical member of an underground special ops group defies belief especially as they defeat the big bad with no struggle. The Linking, as another review pointed out, were plain wack and needs way more backstory.

Li Nuan had the most complex characterization and character ark. However compared to the juvenile YA tones of Nathan and Maida, the explicit sexual abuse references were jarring. The symbolism of the jade cup felt too forced—like the author was trying too hard to tie it with the other timelines.

Personal beef: she is from a Cantonese-dominant area immigrating to a Cantonese-dominant destination, why on earth is her name spelled in Mandarin pinyin (which wasn’t even invented yet)! As a Cantonese speaker, the implied Cantonese dialogue is at times culturally awkward and unrealistic.

I wanted to like this story, but it pulled me in too many directions. I really think the ideas are worth exploring, but maybe as separate novels in the same universe.

Down In The Sea Of Angels follows three linked narratives across two hundred years. From human trafficking in 1906 San Francisco Chinatown, through to the Sillicon valley tech boom of 2006, and then into a post-ecological crisis, post-human political thriller in 2106 - the canvas is geographically tight but broad with regards to its cast. It also runs the gamut of genre, the 1906 is a proper historical thriller, the 2016 a sci-fi adventure with psychics. 2006 is the oddest here as it has the lowest stakes as a story, and is probably the one of the three that couldn't stand-alone, though with the two companion pieces it gives the reader some respite and also has the most applicable morals (in the 2006 tale our protagonist becomes to realise that the app he works for is involved in exploitation of child labour and decides to drop out to do something to help). All the tales are linked by a Jade cup, first encountered by Li Nuan, a Chinese girl who had been sold by her parents to end up forced to work in a brothel. When Li Nuah touches the cup she gets flashes of her near future (the great earthquake of 1906), and also flashes of 2006 and 2106. Nathan in 2006 also gets these flashes when his mother passes on the cup to him, and when Maida is handed it in 2016 - her psychic power is to read the history of objects.

Like many books that have multiple narratives, they leave and die by the weakest, which here is Nathan, whose story largely revolves around going to Burning Man with his friends and slowly gaining a greater conscience. However, as that story builds a sense of soulfulness, the other two build their much more dramatic arcs, and so it ends up being quite a useful respite. Not least when the 2016 sci-fi tale goes completely X-Men on a politician trying to subjugate and control the psychics for his own political whim. The 1906 tale, on the other hand, is quite well balanced as the story of one girl's escape from sex slavery, into helping others escape.

I enjoyed Down In The City Of Angels a lot, though oddly for a book with so much going on it did eventually feel like less of the sum of its parts, and at least two of the narratives I think I might have liked with a little more flesh on them. At the heart of it is also a fourth story, about the fall of the global environment, that it hints at and leaves tantalising worldbuilding questions (that and the development of psychics). It is a solid page turner, though, and full of great ideas that even setting a large portion at Burning Man couldn't dissuade me from.

An intriguing promise, but a lack of execution for me. I found it to be too disorienting and quite confusing in places so much so that I ended up DNFing at 20% as it just wasn't clicking with me.

Gorgeously told contemporary fantasy, spanning three centuries of interconnected narratives, each equally compelling in plot and characters. Wong pulls off the rare feat of writing grounded fantasy which feels both real and yet still pushes the edges of our understanding of the shared human experience. Each time period is stunningly rendered, with particular care for the era nearest our own, reflecting lived experiences and evoking a depth of feeling that brings the scenes to life. Highly recommend.

In Down In the Sea of Angels, we follow three timelines: 1906, 2006, and 2106. I adore this concept, especially seeing how much changes in a century, right? So the main-main character I suppose is Maida in 2106, who has the gift of psychometry, which allows her to see the history of objects. One such object is an old jade tea cup, which connects the stories. Nathan in 2006 and Li Nuan in 1906 both were owners of the cup, and we follow their stories as well.

I will tell you the thing I liked the least first to get that out of the way: while I enjoyed Maida's story and learning about what becomes of the Bay Area, the "gifts" part was my least favorite element. Not because it wasn't done well, but because that is just my personal preference. I think that while I liked Maida a lot as a character, I felt a little more connected to Nathan and Li Nuan's stories. It's funny, because Maida's story is told in first while the others were in third, but I still felt more connected. Strange, that. I also thought that the "bad guy" in Maida's time was a little over the top, but then I look at our own timeline's villain, and I guess I can't fault it, can I?

I loved how different all three stories were, yet how they still connected a lot of the same themes and elements to make the story feel seamless. Found family was big throughout, as was standing up for what we think is right even if it isn't always easy. There is so much relevance to our current issues, both on a political level at home, and a more global scale when thinking about the environmental implications. The characters all had to handle some pretty huge morality dilemmas, and I am always a huge fan of those.

The stories definitely pulled at my heartstrings, and I loved the relationships featured throughout the book. Like I said, lots of found families, and some biological families too, but every type of relationship under the sun was explored in the stories.

Bottom Line: An introspective look at how much (and how little) can change in the course of a few generations, and the threads that connect us all.

This was a book I loved from its opening. In 2106 we meet Maida Sun, a woman is psychmetric: this is the ability to see the history of an object when she touches it (think Quinlan Vos for you “Clone Wars” watchers).

Many years earlier, after a series of climate disasters, some people began to get psionic abilities (telekinesis, psychometry, etc.), and though not a large part of the population, they are mostly accepted in this period.

When Maida Sun starts her new job in San Francisco, where she must determine the history of various objects so they can properly understood, she finds herself drawn to a jade teacup. When she touches it, she is shown the life of Li Nuan in 1906. Li Nuan was sold by her father to a crime boss in the US, and she arrived, first as a servant, then forced into prostitution within a filthy brothel, with several other young women.

Maida also is shown the life of Nathan, a tech-designer in 2006, who lives to party and enjoy unusual experiences. Both Li Nuan and Nathan have used the jade teacup, and how the tea cup has moved through time to be held by these three individuals is slowly revealed.

Maida also learns, inadvertently, that a political leader, despite his public beliefs, actually plans to reverse public sentiment about psions to such an extent that they will be kept imprisoned, then used exclusively and secretly for his benefit.

I loved the fully realized timelines. Li Nuan's time and experiences are hard to endure, considering the incredible abuse and sex trafficking of very young women. Li Nuan turns out to be tough, and though very limited in her experiences, still manages to find a way through her difficulties.

Nathan is untroubled by the quickly changing climate, until it's made personal to him, and then he's forced to think about how his actions, and those of others, are negatively affecting the environment.

Both Li Nuan's and Nathan's transformations are compelling, and lay the groundwork for Maida Sun's own awakening to resistance and clandestine action to save herself and other psions from harm. She's reluctant at first, but becomes emboldened and effective, and a valued member of the team trying to prevent a terrible injustice.

I went back and forth between the prose and the audio, and liked Eunice Wong's narration. Her Li Nuan is a particular favourite, though I think she captured Nathan's easy, comfortable approach to life well. Wong's Maida had a tension to her voice, which I liked.

I greatly enjoyed this thought provoking story. It's an interesting use of time travel, while also providing commentary on a number of things, such as unbridled consumption, climate change, abuse, and equality through the lives of well-drawn characters.

Thank you to Netgalley, Angry Robot and Dreamscape Media for these ARCs in exchange for my review.

This book was a beautifully written dystopian. While covering difficult topics, it showed beautiful moments as well. The interweaving timelines was an interesting approach to this story. This story is intense but thoughtful. We see how closely our pasts and futures are connected. This was a soft dystopian focusing on generations and our ties to each other. Wong hit it out of the park again!

This story connects three individuals in different time periods, alternating chapters and drawing the threads of their stories together. In 2106 Maida is a Psion with the ability to touch any object and know the history and secrets of its owners. Li Nuan is a young girl trafficked into slavery in a 1906 Chinatown brothel. Nathan is a tech-whiz designer in 2006 San Francisco, painfully realizing that he is contributing to exploitation of people and the environment. A jade teacup connects them all, interweaving their compelling stories.

Li Nuan and Nathan experience visions of disasters and societal breakdown; Maida lives after the world has changed drastically. They each are drawn into a fight for a better future.
Parts of this story are brutal, including abuse, slavery, and assault so definitely check trigger warnings if needed. It grapples with climate change, social justice, consumption, equality, but left me feeling strangely hopeful about how much one person’s actions can affect the world in a positive way.
(Also, there are unforgettable scenes with whales that made me so emotional!)

Thank you so much to Angry Robot Books for this gifted copy!

From the premise alone, I was obsessed. I love his idea of object holding memories and the idea of traveling in time introducing a fantastical layer. It just feels like one of those ideas and metaphors we have brought to life. At the same time, Down in the Sea of Angels also examines the prejudices and misconceptions Maida faces. How she can be forced to explain herself, perform like an act. I loved how this theme, and Maida's timeline, progresses to examine discrimination and misinformation.

Down in the Sea of Angels by Khan Wong (book cover is in image) is a dystopian science fiction, that follows three individuals, Li Nuan (sold into slavery in1906), Nathan (a tech designer in 2006), and Madia (historian working on objects from the Precursor Era in 2106). An event called the “Bloom” which enabled psionic capabilities in a small percentage of the population, ties these individuals together through a jade teacup.

Touching on the themes of slavery, exploitation, racism, found family and revolution, this novel provides great insight into how humans react to devastation and fear of the unknown. The narration by Eunice Wong, provides clear distinctive voices to a large cast of both male and female characters that is refreshing and not only keeps the reader engaged, but also makes jumping between the three storylines easy to follow. I strongly recommend this book.

Thank you to Dreamscape Media and Angry Robot for the opportunity to listen to this ALC and read the eARC. All opinions are my own.

Book Rating: 5 Stars
Audiobook Rating: 5 Stars
Pub Date: Apr 22 2025

Tags:
#DreamscapeMedia
#AngryRobot
#KhanWong
#EuniceWong
#DownitheSeaofAngels
#YarisBookNook
#Horror
#Fantasy
#Magical Realism
#ShortStories
#netgalley

This is a hard book to characterize, and even more difficult to sum up in just a few – or even a few dozen – pithy phrases. But I’m certainly going to try.

A big part of that difficulty is that it isn’t just one story. It’s three stories that are loosely linked – even though that’s not obvious at the beginning – centered around three individuals who do not know what they have to do with each other any more than the reader does.

They’re also not experiencing the same thing – or even the same sort of thing, although the first and third are closer in that particular than either of them would ever imagine.

But there is one thing that they share from the beginning. All of their stories, all of their histories and hopes and dreams, take place in San Francisco, a place that has carried the hopes and dreams of so very many since long before the city boomed during the California Gold Rush.

In 1906, Li Nuan, 16 years old, sold by her parents into slavery, forced into sex work, whose very existence is proof that slavery was not eradicated by the Civil War, is ‘in service’ to one of the Tong bosses who ‘owned’ pre-Earthquake Chinatown. And the earthquake is coming, the end of the world as Li Nuan knows it. But she’s seeing visions of the quake, the fire that follows, and the death and destruction that results. And those visions have told her that she can seize the freedom she yearns for in the chaos – if she’s willing to do whatever it takes to claim it.

Nathan Zhao in 2006, an up-and-coming tech designer, is busy living his very good life without taking too much care for the consequences to the world he lives on. He’s a good man, a good person, he’s got a great job, is in a happy long-term relationship with his boyfriend, they’re free to be openly gay – which he knows is a privilege – and life is, well, good. The vision that he gets, both of Li Nuan’s past and of the environmental destruction to come in his near future, opens his eyes and sets his life on a different course than he’d originally planned.

The reason that both Li Nuan and Nathan are having these life-changing visions is Maida Sun. Maida is a historian and more importantly, is gifted with psychometry in a future where a significant minority of the population has been gifted with psionic powers of one stripe or another. Maida can see the past of any object she touches, and she’s working on a cultural reclamation project in the ruins of what her post-apocalyptic society calls ‘The Precursor Era’. In other words, us.

And that’s where all the links get filled in – and pushed out into the future. Nathan and his friends buried a time capsule in 2006, a capsule that is uncovered as part of the project Maida is working on. In that capsule, along with photos, memorabilia, a few personal items and a bit of outright junk, is a jade tea cup from the mid-19th century. A cup that passed through Li Nuan’s hands, down the generations to her great-grandson Nathan, and into that box only to emerge a century later under the hands – and into the powers – of Nathan’s great-great-niece, Maida.

At a point where Maida’s post-apocalyptic world is on the cusp of descending into the dystopia they initially avoided. But only will continue to do so at this terrible, hopeful juncture if Maida can seize her day and her freedom as decisively as her ancestor Li Nuan did hers.

Escape Rating A-: This is one of those stories that made me think pretty much all the thoughts and feel like it brought up all the readalikes. Which is only fair as it’s not one story but three stories and they aren’t as similar as one might expect in a single book.

At the same time, it did feel as if all the stories revolved around the idea of ‘carpe diem’, even though the days that each person in the change needed to seize were very different. Still, when they each grabbed hold of that day out of hope for the future, they each moved the story forward into the hope that they reached out for.

A virtuous circle rather than the vicious cycle that begins each of their stories.

Li Nuan’s story is the most harrowing – not surprising considering the conditions under which she was brought to California. Nathan is honestly having a lot of fun in his part of the story – at least until he sees that his world is not only due for a great big fall – but a fall that he’s likely to live to see and and can’t continue his own personal revel toward the cliff even if he can’t do much to fix the wider world.

But the story is centered in Maida Sun’s early 21st century post-apocalypse. Initially her world seems filled with hope of a brighter day for everyone – even if most people are still cursing the ‘Precursors’ (meaning US) for leaving such a big damn mess to clean up.

Still, the human side of Maida’s world is filled with hope. The ‘Collapse’ of the Precursor civilization in the 2050s, the climatic changes, the wars and death and destruction that followed, set humanity up for a more cooperative future – with the help of the great ‘Bloom’ of auroras that surrounded the planet and gave rise to psionic powers among a percentage of the population.

But by Maida’s 2106, the new normal has been normal long enough, and the devastation of the collapse is just far enough back in time and memory, that some people are starting to think that the ‘good old days’ were better than they were – at least for THEIR sort of people. Whatever that might mean. And, because humans are STILL gonna be human, there’s always someone just watching and waiting to take advantage of that impulse. By creating a new scapegoat, giving a new generation someone to hate and fear, and telling as many big lies as they can to weaponize society so that a new authoritarian regime can rise and start the whole terrible cycle all over again.

It’s hard to miss the historical parallels, because the playbook being used is old and familiar and all the more frightening for being followed right this very minute. What gives Down in the Sea of Angels its hopeful ending is that Maida Sun and the psions are finally living in a time when more people seem to want the world to get better for everyone – or alternatively that she and the psion community have the truth on their side and the opportunity to nip the forces of regression, repression and evil in the bud before the tide has turned completely in their favor.

More than a few of all of those thoughts I mentioned at the top before I close. One of the reasons this story worked as well as it did is that San Francisco is a bit of a liminal place and its history as well as its reputation for being a bit ‘out there’ for multiple definitions of that phrase fit the story. (For an entirely different fantasy featuring San Francisco’s liminality take a look at Passing Strange by Ellen Klages.)

Maida’s particular early 22nd century was fascinating because it didn’t follow the usual patterns for post-apocalyptic stories – or at least there was clearly a delay between the apocalypse and the dystopia – or we missed the first wave of dystopia and this is the attempt of a second dystopia to take hold. It’s a very different post-apocalyptic vision from either The Annual Migration of Clouds by Premee Mohamed or The Knight and the Butcherbird by Alix E. Harrow and the contrasts are quite interesting.

As much as the rising tide of authoritarianism in Maida’s time resembles both the rise of Nazi Germany AND the present political situation in the United States, the way that the anti-psion sentiment is created and promoted by the powers-that-be owes more than a bit, in the fictional sense at least, to the anti-mutant sentiment in the X-Men movie series.

I’ll confess that I picked this up because I absolutely adored the author’s debut novel, The Circus Infinite – and I was hoping to get a similar feeling from this book. In the end I did enjoy Down in the Sea of Angels very much, but not quite as much as Circus, and I think that’s because of the split story lines and how long it took them to figure out that they were part of each other. Howsomever, I did absolutely love the audio narration by Eunice Wong, and it was lovely to hear her voice again, telling me a marvelous story.

This was really interesting.
Three and a half stars, not because it was a bad book but because it just wasn't for me. This review comes from a person who is way more into the time travel/history aspect of this book rather than the sci-if dystopian side of it. That being said, I thought this was a good book!

The story line had me right from the beginning and wasn't what I was expecting but engaged me from the start. I loved the historical aspect and the connection between the three MCs throughout this book and seeing each perspective was really eye opening.
A good book but not quite my cup of tea. Worth a read if you love any of the above themes I mentioned!

𝐀𝐑𝐂 𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰
𝐃𝐨𝐰𝐧 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐞𝐚 𝐨𝐟 𝐀𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐥𝐬
𝐛𝐲 𝐊𝐡𝐚𝐧 𝐖𝐨𝐧𝐠
𝐑𝐞𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐞: 𝐀𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐥 𝟐𝟐𝐭𝐡

- - -

Thank you, Netgalley, for the ARC.

I love dystopian books! I was so excited to read this one. Three individuals linked through a jade tea cup. One from the future, one from the past and one from the present. Sounds interesting, right?!

My favorite POV was of the woman from the past. She went through so much and remained so strong.

I just thought it was too detailed sometimes. I don't need 5 pages about the world-building. It could be explained on one page. This book could be shorter.

If you love time traveling, dystopia, politics, then this book is for you.

Wong effortlessly weaves together a tale of dark and light in this story that takes place over three timelines. Whilst this is a story that stares directly at the most difficult and horrible aspects of humanity, throughout it there is a message of hopefulness and a world that could be better through consideration and a sense that it is through the building of community that we will see the change we desire. The future timeline is presented in such a way where it feels like an inevitably but one where our actions in the present can create something that feels collaborative rather than disastrous.

I really enjoyed how well-developed the science fiction aspect of this story was and the three timelines felt equally strong and engaging.

A fantastic story and an enjoyable reading experience.

Down in the Sea of Angels by Khan Wong is a science fiction novel that bridges characters across time, and this is a particular sci-fi trope that really tickles my fancy, and I do want to start this review by saying that it’s a really hard trope to pull off effectively. You run the risk of leaning too heavily on one particular time period and letting the novel suffer as a result.
In Down in the Sea of Angels, I found myself drawn to the story of Li Nuan the most. Her story was compelling and heartbreaking and I wanted to stay with her for almost the whole story. By contrast, I found that the other two characters just didn’t have the same pull. I’m not quite sure whether it’s because of the setting or whether I just personally didn’t find the others compelling.
This had the effect of making Down in the Sea of Angels feel lopsided and not quite well polished. The dialogue often contains a lot of exposition and there is quite a bit of telling in places where more depth could have been added by showing. Good but not great, worth the read if you think it’ll be for you.

A glorious examination of how we interact with history, what makes family, and how humanity reacts to environmental disaster and a worldwide humanity decimating illness 👀
This is beautifully written, really thought provoking and utterly original. Covering three different time zones (one historical, one near future and one future / post-disaster event) it follows a different individual in each time frame, and in all honesty I could have read a book on each of them.
Given the state of <gestures vaguely at everything> right now, this wasn’t always the easiest of reads, but it was the kind of book that I had to write down quotes from, because it was so well written.
Very hard to talk about it without spoiling anything, but it is as time harrowing, and others hopeful. Also it made me want to visit Burning Man, and I hate anything that doesn’t have plumbing and / or mattresses!

review - 3.5
This book follows three people in three different timelines. In the 22nd century, Maida Sun is part of the rare population that was gifted psychic abilities following the 'Bloom' event. In 1906, Li Nuan is sex trafficked and seeks to find freedom. And lastly, in 2006, Nathan is a designer who has a revelation about child exploitation and environment and shows how a capitalistic society contributes to environment degradation. These characters are connected by a green jade cup which is passed through generations.

I was intrigued by the premise and the plot did not disappoint. However, I wish there was more shown of the 22nd century and how the world was after the Collapse. It felt as we were shown only glimpses of it. Out of all the characters, Maida was the most interesting to read about. Her rare ability and personality was quite fun and she was a loveable character. Li Nuan's chapters were disturbing to read and personally, I think at times were too graphic. I would've liked Maida and Li Nuan's chapters to be longer. There was so much more about Li Nuan that could've been explored. Nathan's chapters are the reason I felt the pace was slow at times. His timeline is closest to us and hence talks a lot about the capitalism and the upcoming doom that will come because of climate change. How, an individual can contribute so much to save the environment and yet the environment will be ruined anyway because some people are too selfish to care. However, I wasn't that big of a fan of how he was written. Sure, people in 2006 may have not known everything about child labour and climate change, especially since it was still debated whether climate change was a real thing or not, but Nathan came off a bit childish and even privileged. Therefore, his chapters made it a bit hard for me to remain engaged. One really good thing about this book is how beautiful the writing was. It flowed smoothly and the descriptions were well written. Overall, it was good but had potential to be better.

EArc courtesy of NetGalley, spoilers ahead.

While I did find several of the parallels to today in this book slightly scary, I still enjoyed myself reading this book.
I am slightly obsessed with the concept of psychometry as a psychic power, I think if they were real it would be my new go to choice of power. Particularly because I have always been a fan of looking at bigger issues though the lens of the small stuff, i.e. a jade teacup.
I felt so proud of Li Nuan for taking what she deserved whenever & however she could, and the same of Nathan for leaving behind his tech-bro arc.
Though getting psychic powers during the inevitable climate collapse is a bit far fetched I would go for psychometry as a power. It'd be useful for figuring out what belongs to people, and fun since I am proper nosy.

3.75 stars