Reviews

City of Bones by Martha Wells

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shiyr's review

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adventurous medium-paced

4.0

lauramj's review

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adventurous mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

What a fantastic book. Careful detail and world building that's delivered well/naturally, a really rich and vivid culture and society experienced throughout the main characters' everyday business. And a very compelling story! And characters who are not stereotypes but subtly flawed, not clearcut "good" and "bad" caricatures.
Entirely different style to what I was expecting having only read All Systems Red of her books so far. Time to read the rest of her works...

copiousfreetime's review against another edition

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adventurous fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

teal2wine's review

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adventurous fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.25

esseastri's review

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5.0

Slowly working my way through all of Martha Wells' backlist, with the help of the new Tordotcom editions, and damn, but wasn't this one worth the reprint! I still have so many feelings about Martha Wells' status in the greater SFF community (she deserves MORE, okay, just more), and I am so, so glad that her older books are getting a second life.

While I don't jive with the title of this book (and I'm not sure the book jives with it either), I loved everything else about it. Wells is an absolute master of characters, especially non-human characters that end up being the most human and the best of them. Khat is no exception, and falls in with Murderbot, Moon, and Kai on my favorites list. I love a person who is too deeply good for their own safety. And Wells writes these doofuses perfectly.

It's a slow start and a soft story (surprisingly soft, considering how dark it can be), but if you can give it a little patience and attention, this book--like its main character--will open up to you and reward you greatly for your time.

gipanu's review

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adventurous funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted mysterious reflective relaxing tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

mes0pelagic_fan's review against another edition

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adventurous funny medium-paced

4.0

i picked this up in the library, read the first chapter in one sitting, and then put the audiobook on hold! i loved all the characters and thought the worldbuilding was super compelling!

i had a few qualms, namely the kind of random journey into the bridge world at the end and that whole resolution (that felt very surreal to me and kind of took me out of the story). Elen's little confession to Khat (this came out of pretty much nowhere, they were really giving me wlw/mlm solidarity besties vibes and any 'romance' there felt like a 90s ending-of-the-story perfunctory check list item).

i really liked the multi-family household and the tiers-- the society seemed really fleshed out and the mix of fantasy and apocalyptic/steampunk/magic/tech made for a good backdrop! i thought the tier system made a lot of sense in my mental geography-- the whole story was actually super tight in terms of place up until the ending kind of threw me.

i do wonder about the updated version having some narrative changes from the older version that the audiobook is based on (i think i noticed some even in the first chapter), but i would recommend any edition of this book :)