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4.33k reviews for:

The Mountain in the Sea

Ray Nayler

3.95 AVERAGE


I really loved this book!

I bought it on a whim as part of a buy one get one half off deal at Barnes and Noble. The octopus is my favorite animal and I was immediately drawn to Alex Merto's cover art for the paperback edition (for some reason it's not on Goodreads yet, but google it - it's beautiful). After reading the description I decided to give it a shot despite Sci-Fi not being my favorite genre, and the book being nearly 500 pages.

It took me exactly one month to finish, and I really enjoyed jumping back into the story, but I wouldn't describe this as a page-turner exactly. It definitely had elements of action and adventure, but more than that, it's a deeply thoughtful story. I found myself having to take short breaks to really think about the points Nayler made about mankind, Artificial Intelligence, technology, communication, and more, often using the octopus as a metaphor. It's hart to hit that perfect balance of entertaining and enlightening, but he did it. I can tell this is one of those stories I'll be thinking about for a very long time.

I would highly recommend this to anyone who likes science fiction (it's not too out there for anyone hesitant), and of course anyone who admires octopuses.
mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

A book tailor-made to appeal to several of my primary philosophical interests, from consciousness to animal ethics to interspecies communication. Not every thread resolved satisfyingly and the prose had to grow on me, but these are minor complaints: most importantly it kept me hooked and all of the octopus scenes were extremely cool.

I LOVED THIS. The only thing keeping this from a 5 star is how quickly it wrapped up.   
medium-paced
informative mysterious reflective medium-paced

4,3
emotional tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

This book was so interesting - I did get a little confused on who all the characters were but somehow the storyline just drew me in so well and the themes felt very topical with ai and it was just very interesting to me, octopuses are so cool
adventurous medium-paced
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated