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batesbarb's review against another edition
I don’t think I’ve hated a book more than this in a LONG time. Our exclusive point of view character is a racist, misogynistic, homophobic asshole who fancies himself a great philosopher. I don’t like Jordan Peterson in real life, and I sure as hell don’t want to spend my fictional time with his 25th century version either. The world building in this story reads like a collection of Fox News scare stories strung together into a novel. They’ll outlaw religion! They’ll outlaw being cisgender (or even using gendered pronouns)! Globalization has hit a point where nations are basically irrelevant and everyone sorts into philosophical/identity affinity groups (which all just happen to be named in English except one that’s named in Japanese, and is a brand/family name, rather than having any philosophical identity). The world is completely intertwined, except that characters all have racial backgrounds that are perfectly apparent to our narrator in some of the most disgustingly racist and fetishistic descriptions I’ve read in years. Sections of the society are heavily invested in philosophy, yet somehow no philosophical or religious traditions other than “Western Civilization” exist in any relevant way (other than one off handed mention of reincarnation).
It’s such a profoundly shallow and colonialist concept of what the future of earth would look like, I just couldn’t take any more and noped out at 23%.
It’s such a profoundly shallow and colonialist concept of what the future of earth would look like, I just couldn’t take any more and noped out at 23%.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexism, Transphobia, Homophobia, Racism, Lesbophobia, and Misogyny
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