Reviews tagging 'Genocide'

Babel by R.F. Kuang

154 reviews

danielledeal's review against another edition

4.0

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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"Translation means doing violence unto the original, means warping and distorting it for foreign unintended eyes" 

I liked this book, but I didn't love it. At times it felt very repetitive; I don't know how many times the author needed to say "colonialism bad" in basically the same way; at a certain point it was no longer advancing the plot or contributing to character development. it felt like the author didn't trust the readers to come to any conclusions on their own - about Robin's morality or about the justification of the British empire,

about the justification of Hermes or Letty's betrayal

. The pacing picked up in a meaningful way toward the ending - which in turn left me feeling downtrodden and heavy. But still there is hope - "History isn't a premade tapestry that we've got to suffer, a closed world with no exit. We can form it. Make it. We just have to choose to make it." 

A note on the formatting -- this book contains a lot of footnotes (which I thought overall served the story well) but I read the Harper Voyager paperback version and because of the font and size I often had trouble seeing the footnote indicator ( * ) which made the reading experience a little choppy. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Genocide, Racial slurs, Racism, Slavery, Violence, Blood, Trafficking, Grief, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Colonisation, War, Classism

Moderate: Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Xenophobia, Islamophobia, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail

ida_reads_77's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous dark emotional reflective tense slow-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Genocide, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Xenophobia, Murder, Gaslighting, Colonisation

Moderate: Slavery, Death of parent, Sexual harassment

gingerabbie's review against another edition

3.75

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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I listened to this as I struggled with the physical copy. The writing feels very complicated/overly intellectual. As in that why use one word when you can use 5. 

The audiobook definitely helped with getting over that. I really liked the mixture of characters, though would have loved to know more about them. I know you can’t build out the secondary characters too much.

One thing that would have been nice to tie in with Letti. It would have been a good tie in if her dead brother was a member of Hermes, and that’s another layer to her disdain, and lacking of understanding to the others. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Genocide, Hate crime, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Slavery, Xenophobia, Police brutality, Death of parent, Gaslighting, War, Classism

sackmann66's review against another edition

4.75

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Racism, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Xenophobia, Murder, Gaslighting

nicoleme1212's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous challenging dark emotional medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Suicide, Xenophobia, Grief, Murder, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Colonisation, Classism

Moderate: Child abuse, Gun violence, Slavery, Death of parent

Minor: Drug use, Genocide, Sexual harassment, War

another_dahlia's review against another edition

3.5

dark reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Death, Genocide, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Slavery, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Xenophobia, Islamophobia, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Toxic friendship, Sexual harassment, Colonisation, War, Classism

Moderate: Drug abuse, Infidelity

njuny's review against another edition

4.25

adventurous challenging informative inspiring medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

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I really liked this book! 

I think it's an important read to start thinking about the power of languages, colonization and racism, and how (some) revolutions happen. For me, especially at the beginning, it was a bit too explicit about how the author wants you to think about a topic (like of course colonization is bad but I much prefer when she "shows" it to me rather than just saying it). However, as the characters develop, is more like each of them has a way of thinking and attached to it are their actions... and the consequences of their actions. No spoilers but I *loved* some of them and hated others soo much... some of them I loved and hated at the same time lol.

Aside from that, I loved the magic system a lot! very very interesting and I had a lot of fun thinking about possible match-pairs using my own native languages. I also deeply enjoyed the mix of this fantasy with real history! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Gun violence, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Colonisation, Classism

nightsparks's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous challenging dark informative inspiring reflective 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: Complicated

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Wow. What a fantastic read. An absolute masterpiece. A masterclass in weaving historical fiction, history, language, colonialism, capitalism, revolution, and academia. A modern Greek tragedy of hubris.
The highest honour I can bestow upon it: I will be purchasing a physical copy of this book.
Ps, the long title is a tier: the Necessity of Violence: an Arcane History of Oxford Translators’ Revolution

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Xenophobia, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Murder, Cultural appropriation, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, Classism

Moderate: Genocide, Torture, Grief, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, War, Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Infidelity, Blood, Trafficking, Abandonment, Deportation

Truly recommend looking these up

kdelhan's review against another edition

4.5

adventurous challenging dark emotional 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

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A masterful critique of colonialism destroying that which feeds it. And

classic white woman tears galore but in a well-done non-SJW elementary way.

It also made me feel inadequate for only speaking English lol. Many plot points were extremely jarring, as I for some reason didn't expect it to get as dark as it did, but that's on me. The character development and watching their perspectives and world-views shift was incredible and thought-provoking as well. However, the messaging was often heavy-handed and repeated a few too many times. Some of the footnotes were too much of a 4th wall break, drawing me out of the immersive experience.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Racism, Self harm, Slavery, Suicide, Violence, Xenophobia, Death of parent, Murder, Colonisation, War

durramonchi's review against another edition

5.0

emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Grief, Murder, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, Colonisation

Moderate: Addiction

Minor: Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide