This one wasn't for me. "Cyberpunk" is totally my jam, but this didn't scratch that itch. The first session of the game "fat victory" went on too long and was too brutal for my taste. Made the main character unlikable and unsympathetic.

'Sometimes battles may be lost. These are vital learning experiences. And to live—to live is never truly a defeat. If you are alive, your opponent has made an error. All that matters is to defeat every enemy.' — 36 Streets, T.R. Napper.

36 Streets is a cyberpunk novel that follows the life of Lin, a Vietnamese gangster who was raised in Australia for twelve years by her adoptive mother, Kylie, with her twin sister, Phuong. When she comes back to Vietnam after being expulsed by the Australian government, she is progressively brought to enter the Bình Xuyên, a Vietnamese gang that lives in the thirty-six streets, and she starts to obey the orders of Bao Nguyen, the most popular and dangerous boss in Hanoï. There, she is trained to become a lethal weapon whose goal in life is only to survive and protect the people she loves. But when an Englishman contacts her to investigate a mysterious case involving Fat Victory, an immersive RPG that seems more real than reality, things become complicated and more dangerous.

I was really curious to read this novel at first. The way it was pitched really caught my attention: inspired by Altered Carbon, you say? I was totally in. And, now that I read the novel, I can say that it was perfectly pitched. I really found the 'Altered Carbon' and 'Apocalypse Now' vibes in it, which I was very happy about—a cyberpunk novel, especially in the YA strand, is not common these days. Also, seeing that the ratings were not especially living up to my expectations, I was even more curious to read it and see by myself what I thought about it.

Well, my thoughts are mixed concerning this book. If you like cyberpunk as I do, you will totally get the vibes the author has tried (and succeeded) to develop for the plot. It is violent, very visual, and all the characters are cruel to the point you think it is impossible to be like this. I mostly connected to the secondary characters, like Phuong and Mosquito Brother because I really like their interactions and the dynamics they had with Lin. As for her, I understood the character (I think), but to me, she was lacking the charisma I love to see in the main character. Her development is good, and I think that T.R. Napper really created a protagonist that fitted the genre he is writing, but she was lacking this little je-ne-sais-quoi that made me love her.

About the plot, I think it was interesting. I didn't love it, but I definitely liked it. We are directly immersed in the story with, sometimes, too much violence—I think the violence of this book was the main drawback for me. I remember watching Altered Carbon and already thinking it was violent (though it was okay), but this book put the scale of violence even higher, and I thought it wasn't especially necessary sometimes. Nevertheless, I really appreciated all the reflection around this idea of belonging, with Lin who didn't feel she had roots in Vietnam nor Australia, and also the reflection around racism, which seemed pretty much present in the second half of the book, when Lin's memories of living in Australia are brought up.

Another point that I found interesting was T.R. Napper's choice of introducing the different languages (transcribed in English) in brackets. It was a nice way to avoid mistakes made in another language (people tend to dislike when an author messes up the targeted language), but to still insert it and depict another nationality in the story.

I also liked the little references made here and there, especially the one about Les Misérables.

So, on the whole, I will say that 36 Streets is an enjoyable read for people who are already familiar with the genre and who like it. I definitely would not recommend it to everybody because, as I have mentioned above and as I am sure it will be mentioned by my fellow reviewers, the violence is omnipresent in the story and adds a visual dimension which, perhaps, would need a trigger warning (i.e., gore, sexual assault, violence, vulgarity, death...etc.).

Thank you so much Netgalley and Titan Books for the opportunity to read 36 Streets!

[This review will be posted on Goodreads, Amazon, Waterstones, and Instagram in January 2022, per request from Titan Books.]

Lin is a gangster living on the 36 Streets, the only part of Hanoi now controlled by China in the future. She was born in Vietnam and now lives there but spent her childhood and teenage life in Australia. But she feels like an outsider, neither Australian nor Vietnamese.
One day her boss, Bao Nguyen, asks her to take the case of a missing person- the co-creator of the immersive and addiction game Fat Victory. As result, her life and the people she loves are changed forever when she is drawn into a complex conspiracy involving the powerful who will do anything to achieve their goals.
I received a copy of this book for a free, unbiased, honest opinion.
The cover hooked me in as did the promise of cyberpunk themes with thought-provoking questions set in a different setting. I haven’t read anything before set in Vietnam and this book didn’t disappoint. The author’s description of Vietnam in the future and the past are lush and vivid, especially the food Lin has delivered to her flat.
The tech in the book is explained well but not in too much detail to distract from the story. I appreciated how the author highlighted who spoke in English and who spoke in Vietnamese and what was translated.
In my opinion, the secondary characters added depth to the story and made Lin so much more bearable. I would have happily read more chapters from Bau’s point of view and he was intriguing with so many layers remained unpredictable to the end, and definitely my favourite in this book.
The plot races along with plenty of action, reveals and twists that made me want to keep reading.
The book did make me think about belonging and identity, Lin feels like an outsider but it becomes clear as the book progresses that this perhaps might not be the case. Lin is a hard character to like but her actions are understandable given the context.
Content warning
There is a lot of violence and gore in the book. Threats of torture.
Perfect for fans who like fast-paced science fiction with large ideas.

I’ve only read Vietnamese culture inspired fantasy novels before, so I was excited for something more in the sci-fi genre with similar themes. But this was not an easy read for me. I only managed to get to about a quarter of it before I felt I couldn’t continue. I knew it had a gangster backdrop, but the violence was just a bit too much for me. Maybe I will get back to it if I feel I’m in a better headspace, but it’s definitely not what I’m looking for right now.

A cyberpunk sci fi mystery. The story follows Lin Vu, a gangster/private investigator who lies in a Chinese-occupied Hanoi in 26 Streets. She was born in Vietnam, raised in Australia, and an outsider everywhere. She finds a place for herself working for the underworld of Hanoi’s crime boos Bao Nguyen who has brutally trained her to become a fighter. When a strange new addiction takes root known as Fat Victory- a dangerously addictive immersive simulation of the US-Vietnam War, an Englishman comes to solve his friend’s murder and hires Lin to help him. Soon she finds herself in the middle of a bigger conspiracy, filled with difficult choices, Lin has to pick between family, country, or gang. This was definitely an odd read for me, I was drawn in by the premise but the end result was a bit meh for me. The protagonist is a tough character, who drinks and does drugs, has a heart of gold (sort of), and definitely isn’t a “good” person. She was a unique one to follow, but the overall mystery fell flat for me. I just couldn’t find myself invested in the story despite it being a unique one. While this didn’t work out for me, definitely give it a go if you’re a fan of sci-fi or cyberpunk mysteries.

*Thanks Netgalley and Titan Books for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

DNF at 17%

On the surface, 36 Streets sounds like the kind of sci-fi story I should love. A future cyberpunk-driven Vietnam at war with itself and other nations, and a hardbitten heroine at the center of it all. Unfortunately, it's a dime-a-dozen cookie cutter entry that reads like pretty much every other hardboiled sci-fi mystery. You've got the tough heroine fueled by drugs and booze and swear words who's at odds with her family. The prose is dull and uninteresting, completely lacking any sort of spark to keep me reading. Everything here strikes me as generic and pedestrian, especially on the heels of having just read Alastair Reynold's latest novel, Inhibitor Phase, which presents some heavy, extra-large ideas, and the first issue of Scott Snyder's ComiXology Originals, Clear, which features a similar premise of a sci-fi mystery and augmented reality but is far more engaging and layered. 36 Streets isn't showing me any signs of real originality, or even necessity, and instead feels like a cheap copy of any of the hundreds of other better books I've already read in this vein.

Wow, I loved this book, and I usually find Cyberpunk my least favourite genre of science fiction.. The main character , Lin, is in no way the Gangster with the Heart of Gold, but she is most certainly not a good guy. She is just trying to survive and be loyal to her own when she is given a task more than the usual stand over gangster stuff. Her boss asks her to become a Private Investigator, to solve a murder and of course it turns into a case where everyones motives are completely suspect, just like their memories. What elevates the novel from another rehash of a Blade Runner world is the amazing character that is Lin, a Vietnamise born but raised in Australia, but now trying to survive the mean streets of future Vietnam. The author spent several years living in Vietnam, and his love of the place shines in every paragraph.
I get to sell this book to SF loving book readers when it is released early 2022, and boy do I love my job.