[Review] Tiger Slayer: The Extraordinary Story of Nur Jahan, Empress of India by Ruby Lal

This is a DNF review at 30%. Regrettably, while positioned as a biography, Tiger Slayer reads more like a general history textbook. The narrative is so bogged down with unnecessary background information and tangential fluff that the actual subject of the biography is completely lost.

This lack of focus is compounded by writing that is frequently clunky and awkward. The book often resorts to disorganized information dumps, with some paragraphs that read like a haphazard collection of non-sequitur facts.

After forcing myself through a third of the book without learning anything significant about the person it was meant to profile, I couldn't justify continuing. The book does contain some lovely art, but that isn't enough to save a text that feels dry, uninspired, and unfocused.

Note: I received this book as an ARC. It is scheduled to be released August 5, 2025.

2 stars