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

Down in the Sea of Angels had such an intriguing premise — a psychic connection across time through a mysterious object and a richly diverse cast. I was drawn in by the potential for emotional resonance and speculative depth, but unfortunately, the execution didn’t fully land for me.

The structure of the story, jumping between three timelines and characters, felt ambitious but often left me feeling disoriented rather than immersed. While I appreciated the effort to interweave these lives, the pacing was uneven, and some character arcs didn’t feel fully realized. I found myself far more engaged with Maida’s story than the others, and I wish the emotional threads had been more consistently strong across all timelines.

Wong tackles important themes — exploitation, environmental collapse, and the fight for justice — but at times, the messaging overshadowed the narrative. I wanted more show, less tell. The prose is thoughtful, and there are certainly moments of beauty and insight, but overall, the novel struggled to maintain momentum and emotional impact.

This will likely resonate more deeply with readers who enjoy quiet, introspective sci-fi with a strong social conscience. While it wasn’t a perfect fit for me, I respect what the author was trying to do and appreciate the risks taken.

i really, really enjoyed reading this book. as a slow reader, i was surprised that it took me only four days to devour it - somehow, wong manages to merge beautiful prose and captivating descriptions with deep and thought-provoking reflections while making the reader fly through its pages.

☕️as a fantasy and sci-fi lover, i think this is both accessible for beginners because it features some elements from both genres without being too info-dumpy or heavy on the lore/worldbuilding and, simultaneously, it’s engaging and intriguing enough if you’re a more seasoned reader of the genre!

✨what i personally loved the most about this book was that, while fully engaging in reflection and critique of our current state of things regarding capitalism, consumption and environmental exploitation, wong also provides a beacon of light and hope by means of the 2106 timeline up until the end of the novel: as long as there are some of us left, the fight will continue. only through community will we ever achieve anything close to harmony.

🌈the portrayal of friendship and the importance of support networks was gorgeous and i ended up crying when i reached the final chapter (sorry, but you cannot include a whale character named Grandmother and not make me emotional, that’s totally on you).

🫂 in addition, this is also a perfect contender if you’re planning to participate in aapi month in may. i couldn’t recommend this enough 🤎

Three individuals separated by 200 years are linked by their physical connection to a jade teacup in this dystopian sci-fi novel. In 1906, 16-year old Li Nuan is a victim of (sex-)trafficking, fighting for her freedom in the slums of Chinatown. In 2006, a man working at the Burning Man’s festival confronts the societal inequity and climatological collapse of his time, as he’s composing a time-capsule that is to be buried during the festival. In 2106 in a post-climate-collapse future, a woman with the psionic ability to “read” an objects history looks into the past of a jade teacup, whilst being scrutinized by the authorities for her skills.

What I liked:
This book was a mixed bag for me. Although I really liked the themes the novel addresses, and liked parts of the stories individually, I felt like the whole was so much less than the sum of its parts. It’s a novel with strong ideas, which I appreciate. There’s a lot to contemplate after you finish the final page, and the novel is written in such a way that it makes these themes accessible to readers that are relatively new to them. I liked the plot well enough, and enjoyed puzzling along with the characters to unravel how their stories might become connected.
In terms of accessibility: the book is released in e-book, paperback and audio. I can recommend both the audio and the e-book, but the audio in particular has excellent narration that elevated the story for me.

What I didn’t like:
For a novel that’s hinges on the idea of connections through time, the connection between these three storylines felt incredibly flimsy. Switching between timelines often felt more like interruptions in the flow of the story, than adding to it. I also had a strong preference for some of the stories over the others. Maida’s story was probably the most interesting to me, and I’d have preferred it to have taken centerstage, whilst offering the other two stories more so as flashbacks. Li Nuans story has the potential to be incredibly powerful, but does not get enough page-time to delve into the atrocities that it “namedrops”. That made it very hard to read for me personally. We get glimpses at horrific sexual- and racial violence committed against minors, but there’s too little time to explore it with the care and attention it needs. I would’ve loved a full novel on Li Nuan, but as a smaller part of this narrative, I felt the incredibly heavy topics weren’t handled with the care I’d have wanted.
Nathan was just insufferable as a character. He came across as incredibly naïve to me; a grown man, only now realizing that social injustice and climate-impact are a thing…?! I understand the story that was being told here, but it had too strong ‘woke-privileged-teen-in-adult-man’s-body-vibes” to me.
Again, it overall made it into an unbalanced whole that was less than the sum of its parts.

What didn’t help:
On multiple occasions, the marketing draws comparisons to the work of Emily St. John Mandel. It’s in the tagline, the press releases and even the title (Sea of Angels/Sea of Tranquility seems almost deliberate). I don’t think that comparison does Down in the Sea of Angels any favours. I have to admit that it was a big part of why I requested an ARC, as Mandel is one of my all-time favourite authors, but that parallel was part of my disappointment in Sea of Angels. It simply lacks the nuance and literary mastery that Mandel has honed over years of writing, and selling it as “for fans of Emily St. John Mandel” might just not get it in the hands of an audience that is going to love it.
Something similar can be said about the cover. The bright and colourful art would be more fitting for a cozy-sci-fi, which is a tonal mismatch to the actual story’s content.

Many thanks to the Angry Robot and Dreamscape Audio for providing me with an (audio-)ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Three separate individuals are inextricably linked by one jade cup. A young girl trafficked from China, a fellow attending Burning Man and a psychic, I mean psionic, lady who’s new job is in jeopardy because of prejudice.

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Plot
Unfortunately, this was a DNF for me, and I’m actually disappointed with myself. This is such a wonderful premise, but I got bored.
Out of the three characters, I feel that Nathan’s could have been removed all together. Despite how well it was written, I couldn’t bring myself to care about his Burning Man adventures or the new relationships he was forming along the way. I liked his connection to the cup and Li Nuan, but other than that I didn’t really understand his part in the story.
I really liked the premise of Maida’s story, especially with the potentially implications of her special abilities, where these came from and the impact of prejudice on her role. But that’s where my enjoyment stopped. Again, I just couldn’t care about her at all. Maida’s era being set in the future would also have benefitted from some world building, which I felt other than glimpses was missing. We know there’s been an apocalypse of some sort and this has changed the world, but I felt that it ended there and I was left wanting to know more.
And lastly Li Nuan. She probably has my favourite of the stories out of the three, and hers is incredibly bleak. I did find her transition from one prison to another interesting, but I wish there had been some light at the end of this tunnel.

Characters
Nathan – I’ve also written about the plot aspects, but his character didn’t really resonate with me either. There was a big anti-capitalism focus throughout his travels, which while an important and serious topic, felt like overkill, even with the link to climate change in Maida’s story. I enjoyed his relationship with his partner, and they were both very sweet, but I didn’t care about anyone else.
Maida – I really liked the idea of her story. However I found Maida very flat and uninteresting herself. I didn’t feel that she had any real personality beyond her skills or any real drive to improve anything for herself or the secret society that she gets embroiled in.
Li Nuan – another interesting story with some insight into her thoughts and feelings throughout, but I wish we’d learnt some more about her life before being trafficked to America.

The Good
The premise is really good. I love the idea of three interconnected people from different times, especially when its linked through an object.

The Bad
I found the characters flat and uninteresting in themselves. While their plots were good, the characters themselves didn’t quite live up to it.

The Ugly
Nothing ugly.

The Wrap Up
This is an excellent idea split egregiously into three separate story lines, all without the world building and character development to make them stick together with any kind of pizazz.

It’s been a while since I’ve picked up a science fiction novel that merges past, present, and future into its narrative constituents. While I do find that sometimes plots of similar ilk can be confusing, Down In the Sea of Angels managed to keep its varying timelines referential to one another without having them blend too heavily, and as a result the distinctive voice of each protagonist remained unique and individual.
Speaking plainly, this novel is definitely for history nuts who also happen to like science fiction. It reminded me a lot of The Chrysalids or Cloud Atlas in that it is definitely futuristic and speculative, but it also has this overlayer of the past influencing the present and future in strangely imaginative and sometimes terrifying ways. Personally, I found a lot of interest in all of the characters’ timelines, but Maida’s was definitely my favourite.
My one gripe is that because it is dealing with three protagonists in three separate timelines, the exposition was exceedingly heavy as each main character was introduced. This made the beginning of the book a little bit of a slog to get through, but I’d still recommend it as an overall story.

Fairly solid novel that shuffles between three different time periods in San Francisco (past, present, and far future) that all revolve around a jade teacup, and how three individuals in each (related in a way you can probably guess but I won't stop you) deal with conflicts in their lives, most of which involve oppression in some major way. Lovely read, and worth your time.

3 individuals centuries apart, psychically linked through a teacup, experiencing different horrors of their time.

The cover of this book absolutely doesn't do it justice of how dark and intricate this book is. We're mostly in San Francisco and this book covers everything from severe climate crisis to moral and ethical obligations of working in industries that are harming the climate, to being enslaved and powerless. If you want both a historical and futuristic sci fi/magical realism, this book is absolutley for you.

I loved this book. Set in 3 time periods including the future it is a wonderful story of human relations, corruption, anguish and survival. Lots of strong female leads and diverse relarionships. Thank you to the author. Thank you to #netgalley and the publisher for an ARC. Highly recommended.

the story is told from three different points of view, all in san francisco: li nuan, a chinese immigrant sold to a local mob boss and prostituted at sixteen years old; nathan, a designer at a tech company in 2006, and maida, a psychic who can sense the stories of objects by touching them. I loved how each character was so unique and how, together, they really told the story of the city from three different perspectives. the interlocking narratives were very well done and helped to drive home the point that the past is never truly gone and informs our lives every day.

on a fundamental level, this book was well-written. the descriptions were so vivid, I really felt like I was at burning man, or turn of the century sf, or the far future. it made the absolute horrors of the brothel, and li nuan's ability to survive through them, hit harder. all of the characters were compelling and I found myself really wanting to keep reading to see the conclusion of all of their stories.

there was a little bit too much info dumping about the future world and I think that ending wrapped up too nicely, but other than that. the story flowed well. I love how unique the story is-- from the focus on different types of psychic powers to the trippy view on all time as occurring in the same moment. I'm so glad that people are still writing books like this and that they're still getting published. angry robot is one of my favorite indie presses out there. thank you to them and netgalley for the ARC!

read for r/fantasy bingo 2025: lgbt protagonist

I love a good dystopian novel and as I loved the author’s previous book, The Circus Infinite, I was really excited to read this new novel.
The premise sounded brilliant, three characters living in San Francisco at different times but all three of them are linked together by a Jade tea cup. The main POV is Maida, a young woman with psychic abilities living in the year 2106. She has a very rare ability to be able to ‘read’ objects and handling the tea cup gives her insights into the cup’s previous owners and their lives. She learns about Li Nuan, a young Chinese girl who has been sold by her father and sent to San Francisco’s Chinatown in 1906 and Nathan, a designer living in 2006 who comes to see that things are very wrong with the way society is treating our world.
The main plot is in the future time of 2106. The world is recovering from a period of climate change leading to wars and famine. The former USA is now split up into separate areas each controlled by their own director. In this new era, a minority of the population have developed psychic gifts and are known as Psions. As you might expect with a group of people who are different, reactions to them differ and the book sees them treated as: useful members of society, feared for the power that they control or seen as a resource to be controlled and used by those in power.
I did enjoy all three of the character’s story lines to a certain and the amount of research carried out by the author really added to the depth of the stories. However, Li Nuan’s was by far the most gripping of the three and she came across as the most real character. Each time the POV changed to one of the other two, I found myself wanting to go back and find out what happened next in 1906.
I think that my main problem with this book is that by giving us three different timelines, I never felt that I really got to know any of the main protagonists. Li Nuan’s story is the most dramatic and the one that I wanted to read the most but neither Nathan or Maida really came alive for me. I can see why the author wanted to include Nathan’s story but I wonder if the characterisation would have been stronger if the book had just focused on Li Nuan and Maida?
I enjoyed the book and the author’s view of what our future might look like but for me, the lack of depth in the characterisation meant that I didn’t enjoy it as much as I had hoped. Still a solid three stars though.
My thanks to Net Galley and the publishers Angry Robot for allowing me to read this ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

A story told in three separate timelines - 1906, 2006, 2106 - with a psychic connection to a jade teacup binding all of them together.

I’ll be honest - this book did not work for me. Personally, I felt like the connection between the three timelines to be…tentative at best, and at no point did it feel like there was an actual reason for all three people to be connected through time. While reading this, I wound up wanting full books on both Maida and Li Nuan’s lives, as opposed to the small glances we were given. By breaking up this book into their three separate lives, instead of one entire story, I felt like I was given the sparknotes of three different ones. I was even explaining the plot of this book to my mom, and with only about 100 pages left could still not come up with a reason for the connection between these people - or how it was necessary to help a single one of them.

Maida has the psychic ability to connect to objects and see their pasts, and by doing so sees a brief glimpse into the lives of both Nathan and Li Nuan. She also discovers a plot to capture and control everyone else like her in their futuristic world. Li Nuan is a trafficked 16 year old girl in the slums of Chinatown, desperate for escape and freedom. And Nathan…is a grown man who somehow just discovered that child exploitation, labor and slavery is a thing in the tech world, and has a crisis of conscience.

Clearly, two of these stories had a stronger connection to me than the third. It was just a bit difficult to read about the real life abuses and dangers suffered by these two women, only to have a chapter where this man complains about the horrors of society. I’m sorry but I just didn’t care about Nathan and found his chapters to be tedious and boring, at best.

Also, much of this book is written with a more YA feel, and - while there were trigger warnings for the sexual abuse Li Nuan would suffer - I felt it was a bit more graphic at times than was entirely necessary, or went into more detail than I felt was needed to understand her story. There is one scene in particular that I felt went into more detail than I needed to understand her sexual abuse, as well as another scene that I didn’t find necessary at all other to have her be abused another time. And with the whiplash of her chapters as opposed to the “party at Burning Man and then suddenly become aware of capitalism” Nathan and “anxious at her new job and then forced to become an agent to save her kind” Maida felt extremely out of place. I strongly believe her chapters could have been toned down to still tell her sexual abuses but to not make them so violent and triggering, while not losing any of the horror of them.

This book has a huge theme on limiting harm and trying for the best, but in many ways it doesn’t work with the rest of the novel. With a societal collapse that happened before the events of this novel started in 2106, despite the theme of “time is circular, not linear” it doesn’t exactly work. The book itself even mentions how Li Nuan can’t really do anything to help prevent the apocalypse and so she just tries to do her best where she’s at, and Nathan can only do so much to try to mitigate his carbon footprint. We know how the story ends because we’re currently in the future!

Also, so much of this novel in the futuristic “utopia” world present in 2106 involved Maida saying disparaging things about those who do not help in some way to “clean up the mess” left by the Precursors (people present before the collapse).

‘Service at these centers was compulsory - a minimum of two days a month for the residents of the Administrative Regions.’
‘...anyone who worked more than their compulsory earned luxury credits.’
‘Those of us who were not giant assholes dedicated some of our time to clean up the mess.’

One thing I kept thinking of while reading that was never mentioned or acknowledged, was how do disabled people fit into this model of “everyone needs to work to get basic necessities”? While the knowledge that in this utopia things like food, basic clothing, and housing are provided - but they are provided by “contributing” which…isn’t much better than how capitalism works currently. It was even mentioned that her living quarters are provided by the job she is doing, which - in my honest opinion - sounded a lot like company towns and like having these benefits are only provided to those who can do the work for them. How does this utopia provide for those who cannot do those jobs, who cannot “dedicate some time to clean up the mess” not because they are “a giant asshole” but because their body doesn’t allow them to do so? Not to mention that the way to gain luxuries was to do even more work than the bare minimum required, so do…disabled people then just not deserve things like nice clothes or alcohol?

This is partially what I mean when I say I’d have liked entire stories about these broken-up pieces of novels. Li Nuan’s story is barely fleshed out, with a strange focus on her sexual abuses while Maida’s doesn’t go into the worldbuilding and instead very quickly exposes the political corruption trying to imprison them. Reading about the issues they’ve been facing felt much more like a SparkNotes version of their story, as opposed to everything that was provided. (And don’t get me started on Nathan’s story focusing way too much on whatever party they were doing in the desert and the fact that I simply. Did not care one iota. About it. Or him.)

Also, this is a spoiler without actually spoiling anything, but the whale thing was too weird and should’ve been taken out.

Thank you to the author, NetGalley, and Angry Robot for providing this copy for review.

Down in the Sea of Angels by Khan Wong is such a good story. I totally recommend everyone to read this book as fast as they can because it's really good and the characters are fantastic. I rated it 5 stars because I couldn't put it down for a second.

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

3.5 stars. I enjoyed this, but as is often the case with multiple timeline books, if one of the timelines is weaker than the others, it can make the whole experience worse. This book has 3 timelines: 1906, 2006, and 2106. The 1906 and 2106 timelines both have real stakes and had me wanting to read more. I learned a lot from the historical timeline and really rooted for Li Nuan. The futuristic timeline was an interesting take on how future generations could perceive us. The political intrigue ramped up too fast, and Maida was hard to connect with because she herself felt disconnected to the world around her, but it was still fun to explore an almost solarpunk version of a society that feels a little more caring than the one we live in.

Unfortunately, the 2006 timeline felt a little out of place and not very interesting. Nathan's ethical dilemma might have been interesting on its own, but when placed next to the actual peril of the other timelines, it just fell flat and often felt extremely on-the-nose when it would just outright voice ethical questions. It also seemed like kind of a missed opportunity to explore psychedelics and how they can make you feel connected to others, much like the psionic abilities of the future could.

this was a good book! It had a whole whirlwind of issues that it talked about, it was a great combination of science fiction and fantasy, and it flowed pretty well! I do think some things were left unresolved which was a bummer, but otherwise it was good!

Thank you to NetGalley, to the author, and to the publisher for this complimentary ARC in exchange for my honest review!!!

This was such an insanely interesting book ! I absolutely fell into it and did not move until I had finished this since it was spring break, I decided to treat myself to a little bit of reading and it truly turned into me not moving for a few hours!

The story follows a few characters who are psychically linked fighting against tyranny, exploitation, enslavement, and more. The story had very engaging characters, and I loved seeing how each of their stories had parallels and differences! The premise of this novel is so interesting and very well done in my opinion!

This novel spans multiple time periods and does an excellent job of jumping from each! If you enjoy spec fiction and interconnected character stories, then this book is for you!


5⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️