Reviews

The Sin of America by Catherynne M. Valente

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mgouker's review

5.0

Wow. What a story! It is horrible and it is delicious. 5 stars. Wow.

She is speaking allegorically about American culture and how everyone fails to take responsibility for their part. As long as there is one Ruby to toss into the machine, it's not our turn.

gengelcox's review

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challenging dark medium-paced

2.0

Okay, sure, this is supposed to be allegorical, possibly even surrealistic, in much the way that Ballard et al. challenged norms and mores in the New Wave with stories like “The Assassination of John F. Kennedy Seen as a Downhill Motor Race.” I get that. Which means I need to interpret this story, and my interpretation may not be yours or even what the author intended, because once you move away from realism, stories like these become fairly subjective. I see it as a cross between “The Lottery” and the Jesus myth, crossed with a bit of Native Americana: sin-eating cleanses the world, but at what cost for the eater, and who would ever voluntarily take that upon themself? I liked it up until the ending, where the diner crowd turns on the sineater…for what, I’m not sure. Has she not done her duty? It was all too gross and violent, likely to echo the sins that America is founded on and continues to endure, and yet I just don’t buy it. Every culture, every country, has sins. Don’t fool yourself. While some in America wish to deny this, there’s enough people who do recognize it, such that we are no monoculture. At the end, I just didn’t see what Valente’s story was meant to accomplish.

badgersaurus's review

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2.0

One of Valente’s weakest—a real shame that this was the one nominated for a Hugo. I think as an author she works best writing more whimsical, fantastic stories (The Long Goodbye of Violet Wild, the Fairyland series, even the novella form of The Past is Red) and is weaker with the more serious, grounded ones (the one exception being Fade to White and even then I think that story could be much tighter.) She tends to overextend ideas in a way that is wonderful for out-there settings and ideas but that collapses in on itself in more serious ones.
Here she dares to ask the question, “what if The Lottery but the main character worked at a butterfly-farm (a common job that anyone can relate to!) and also they made you eat a bunch of stuff too??” Chilling. The strength of that story is the vagueness and how quickly it ends, so take those elements and the dryly gothic feel away and you’re not left with much. I liked the diner setting though.

threeseagrass's review

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4.0

4.5 stars.

hwesta's review

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3.0

Interesting, but not my jam

lethanibooks's review

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3.0

3/5

Short Story Hugo Awards 2022 Nominee.

This was a brutal story. Don't think there's a better word to describe it. Not pleasant to read. So the 3 stars are for the impact it made on me and the clever way to depict a social issue that affects not only America but the whole human race. But unfortunately it was a little too metaphorical for my liking.

Please don't come at me but it gave me American Gods vibes. The decadent atmosphere I think it was. And the crudeness.