The Fisherman King

By: Kathrina Mohd Daud

Narrated by: Johan Munir

Finalist for the 2020 Epigram Books Fiction Prize. Eight years ago, Lisan the fisherman, who has always believed he was descended from royalty, left his wife and the Water Village. Now he's back, and he says he can prove it. Six hundred years ago, a forbidden relationship between the royal children of Brunei set into motion a chain of events that will end with the death of a king...or the death of a god. As the story of Lisan's true intentions – and what he was really doing in those years away – unravels, the story of those doomed royal children also spins to its inevitable conclusion.©2021 Storyside (P)2021 Storyside

hell yeah brunei hell no everything else

this one's tough because it was my first ever audiobook and just don't think that medium is for me. i'm not gatekeeping reading, audiobook away babes, but it's just not for me. i did like the narrator quite a lot! he did wonderfully. but this is apparently extremely difficult to find in physical form in english, and i had an audible trial, and i want to read around the world, so here we are trying to figure out if i was just not into the way i consumed it or if i really did just hate lisan that much.

jk i know it's because lisan is a fuckass bitch. i swear i was about to dnf during the uhhhh.........climactic scene at the rock with the thing because i was just so sick of his antics. and i have no idea why batia the baddie was so obsessed with him. if the book would have been her attempting this feat, a of all it would have worked and b of all i would have loved it. but. lisan sucked and his only punishment was "he felt bad as he died peacefully in his bed of old age" and that's just not really good enough for me.

i do love reading about other cultures, especially their mythology, but i think ultimately i didn't get the purpose of the nabau. like where did it come from and besides ol "wah i'm a royal i shouldn't have to grow up in this backwater i'm too good for it and everyone in it and yes that includes the supposed loml or otherwise i wouldn't have fucking left her when she was pregnant" lisan who wanted to use it to like. ???? i don't even know his goal? it wasn't about the treasure, the sultan said, he saved the kingdom, he said, but like? from what? from who? you were the one who woke the sleeping god so what if you just had never done that?

anyway i loved brunei but the book wasn't my fav 🇧🇳