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tani's review against another edition
3.0
I liked the book, but it kind of made me sad too. Not because of the post-apocalyptic future where everything has fallen to dust. That was interesting. To be honest, my favorite parts were on the island with just the everyday minutiae of life and how it goes on, even in the darkest of times.
What I didn't care for were the scenes from the city. I didn't care for young Sandy. She was so clueless and naive... I can forgive a little, but having watched her parents lose everything, you'd think she wouldn't be quite so bad as she is. Plus, I never liked Marvin, so I didn't get her attraction to him.
Still, I felt like it was a good debut. The language was really pretty at points, and I did find parts of the story very intriguing. You could certainly find worse out there without even looking hard. 3 stars.
What I didn't care for were the scenes from the city. I didn't care for young Sandy. She was so clueless and naive... I can forgive a little, but having watched her parents lose everything, you'd think she wouldn't be quite so bad as she is. Plus, I never liked Marvin, so I didn't get her attraction to him.
Still, I felt like it was a good debut. The language was really pretty at points, and I did find parts of the story very intriguing. You could certainly find worse out there without even looking hard. 3 stars.
moirastone's review against another edition
2.0
Clean and affecting prose in the service of a group of characters about whom I found I couldn't really care.
firstiteration's review
3.0
'Swarm' was really middle of the road for me. This is a genre I love, and I especially love realistic takes on how food production and survival would work after a societal collapse. And I love beekeeping! So I wanted to love Swarm, but I didn't.
Lauren Carter is a good writer - a lot of her prose sections were really great. Unfortunately, I think her biggest weakness is characters. There were several I liked, primarily Pheonix and Thomson, but most of them didn't grip me at all, and I think when you're dealing with a story like this, character is crucial. A lot of them felt real, more or less, but it was hard to care about them.
I was frustrated with Sandy for being so weak-willed and flimsy a lot of the time. I was frustrated with Marvin for just being annoying and with the writing for giving me no reason to care about him, and with his relationship with Sandy also being so... empty.
Pheonix was the most compelling character in the book, and it almost seemed like Carter realized this towards the end of the book, but didn't have time to go rewrite it all to give her a stronger presence. While I appreciated the connection between Sandy and Pheonix in the last section of the book, it was too little too late. And honestly, have two female characters start something romantic/sexual and immediately having one die is a tired and homophobic cliche.
A rewrite where Pheonix was alive and with Sandy would have made a much more interesting book, honestly.
Lauren Carter is a good writer - a lot of her prose sections were really great. Unfortunately, I think her biggest weakness is characters. There were several I liked, primarily Pheonix and Thomson, but most of them didn't grip me at all, and I think when you're dealing with a story like this, character is crucial. A lot of them felt real, more or less, but it was hard to care about them.
I was frustrated with Sandy for being so weak-willed and flimsy a lot of the time. I was frustrated with Marvin for just being annoying and with the writing for giving me no reason to care about him, and with his relationship with Sandy also being so... empty.
Pheonix was the most compelling character in the book, and it almost seemed like Carter realized this towards the end of the book, but didn't have time to go rewrite it all to give her a stronger presence. While I appreciated the connection between Sandy and Pheonix in the last section of the book, it was too little too late. And honestly, have two female characters start something romantic/sexual and immediately having one die is a tired and homophobic cliche.
A rewrite where Pheonix was alive and with Sandy would have made a much more interesting book, honestly.
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