Scan barcode
xdroot's review
4.0
A story that enquires into what makes someone human. Throw in some politics, assassination, android love, and plenty of fight scenes and it turns into a fun read.
cornermac's review
Got about half way. Got bored, lots of political stuff that seemed pretty conservative-positive. Character wasn't consistent. Seemed like the Wells Murderbot series did it better.
regulardragon's review
2.0
tl;dr it was okay. But if you’re thinking about giving this one a shot I’d say softly but with a lot of feeling don’t. Also this book is like a sedative for me I swear, I slept on top of my kindle no less than five times while trying to read it, make of that what you will.
For as much as this book is technological and futuristic, their societies apparently haven't left a lot of tired shit behind. Sexism and misogyny seem prevalent, as well as racism and a fear of what is "other". A common theme in this new world we're being presented is how they reverence history and culture, Callay is made of what seems to be a mixture of different earth cultures, the author throws the words indian, arabic and asian around a lot, both in architectural references and in how he describes people, though never going further than that. After a while it started getting to me, especially when a lot of his characters would make racist generalizations. I think my main problem is that we’re a billion years ahead of where we are today, but cultures/people that are stigmatized and stereotyped by us in the western part of the world are still being treated just like that. It becomes glaringly obvious that while the author is trying to have us believe that these cultures are very prominent in that world and the citizens of Callay are by all accounts direct descendants and very much trying to keep them alive, he himself can’t get past shallow descriptions rendering the book’s world poor and superficial.
It escalates to the point where you feel like the author is definitely going out of his way trying to make us aware of the irony of the poor development of his own world, of his character looking "european" (white) and being called out on that, like we're all in on the same joke. Nope, dude, you're not being inclusive or clever, you're just being racist, be better than that.
As for Cassandra, she’s an interesting character, because she's an android all the philosophical questions about her not being biologically human are there, which makes for a compelling storyline, definitely. Especially when we learn that her creators, the League, for all they're advanced, treat her and other androids as less, and the federation, for all they're behind, have a problem with androids exactly because they don't.
However, it was her relationship with other GIs (that’s how they call them) that intrigued me the most. Because they’re not built like her, she seems to patronize them as much as humans do her before she proves them wrong. Other GIs don’t have as much critical thinking as she does, don’t experience emotions as she does, and thus she doesn’t believe them capable of much. She isn’t angry at the people who created her for not giving them more, nor seems interested in helping them. She just seems to pity their existences, or get angry at the GIs themselves.
Later it’s proved that one of the GIs Cassandra sort of contempted was capable of much more personal growth than Cassandra thought possible, which was definitely an interesting place for the story to go, but little is explored about that.
I think I’d have liked this book a lot more if it were about a GI rebellion against the people who would create them complete beings made of “different stuff” only to treat them as if they’re less because of it. Maybe that's where the story will go, maybe Cassandra will eventually step up as the leader of a rebellion, but right now it's hard to tell.
Especially because we never have a clear picture of what the conflict between the League and the Federation, the one Cassandra fled in search of a "normal" life, even is about. What can be gathered is that the Federation is conservative and focused on old earth traditions (even if they're willing to use League technology), and the League broke from that to become what you'd expect a futuristic society to be (inclusive, without the old stupid shit, incredible tech etc etc). But the League is apparently losing the war, and reverting back to what they were trying to escape from, and so in their quest to be better they became the same, if not worse. Their fight seems to be ideological, but when it started, how it really is going, among other relevant questions, we are never really told. Everyone in this book is mostly like “politics go right over my head” and yeah, there’s a lot of political talk but it doesn’t explain much, it’s boring and both sides seem terrible.
AND FINALLY my biggest problem with this book: sex and sexuality. From moment one Cassandra is described as a sexual being, she enjoys sex and lots of it, as she reminds you every 5 fucking minutes. Which is fine, I'd never shame a character for being sexual, but it does become a problem when every other sentence in the book reverts back to it. Cassandra wants to get “nailed”, she fucked a lot of guys, she’s so straight and likes so much sex, she wants to fuck every guy she sees. This book is built on the male gaze, and doesn’t stray far from it. Maybe there’s a point to it, I don’t know, Cassandra seems to think she has a healthy relationship with sex, but some passages prove that she’s pretty far from it, I mean look at this for example:
"You’re way off target, Sevi." Blandly, and utterly unhelpful. Ghano had sat on the couch beside her. Brushed affectionately at her hair, smoothing her brow. "Tell me what’s the matter, Sandy." His hand rested upon her cheek, smooth and warm. "You’ll feel better if you tell me, I promise. I want to help you, I hate seeing you this upset." And he’d leaned down to kiss her on the cheek. "Blatant manipulation," she’d murmured. Ghano had grinned at her, leaning close. "Of course." Another kiss, this time upon the lips. Rarely one to refuse an invitation, Sandy had responded. They’d made love, first on the couch and then moving to Ghano’s bunk, as they had numerous times before. It was hardly a regular patient/psychologist relationship, Sandy knew. And she further knew that with Ghano it was mostly because he and the entire psych department dedicated to her study knew that she — and most GIs, come to that — had precious little compunction about whom she screwed, never having been socialised in the art of being picky. Nor taught a common-sense reason to say no. And GIs were nothing if not logical… and in that sense, she was just like the others. Which was not to say that Ghano didn’t like her — he did. And obviously he enjoyed having sex with her … everyone else did, and she had a reputation to uphold. But mostly, he did it because it was the best way to get information from her. She knew this, and in those comfortable, lingering moments she usually didn’t disappoint him."
WHAT THE FUCK, RIGHT. There are a lot of parts where she mentions she usually had a literal line by her bunk, because that was how her peers knew how to show her their admiration, even if they didn’t get the same thing out of it as she did. So maybe eventually all the sex talk will have a point, but so far it just seems to be there so the author has an excuse to talk about Cassandra’s body and describe lots of dismissable sex scenes. Also, for someone who enjoys orgasms so much, Cassandra talks very little if at all about sex toys and masturbation, which just goes to show a man wrote this book. To say this is problematic is an understatement.
That’s not to mention all the queerbating, like this couldn’t get any worse. Up until a certain point of the book, a lot of Cassadra’s statements about sex had me thinking she was queer, and the text did leave this up to interpretation, alas this dream shattered pretty quick, and I made me peace with it, she’s straight, it’s fine. But then, of course, the lady who eventually becomes Cassadra’s friend is revealed to be bi, and this is where it gets fucking stupid. There is a whole scene where Cassandra is topless while Vanessa (the friend) is giving her a massage, and then Cassandra decides to tease her and gets all over Vanessa’s personal space and is like “i wonder what it would be like…” and it’s all downhill from there. They flirt a lot, but reminders that Cassandra is straight and Vanessa has a husband appear at every moment, or Vanessa stops in her tracks when she’s daydreaming about Cassandra, because Cassandra only likes men, you get the picture. By the end of the story they kiss and are mistaken for a couple a few times.
Listen, it's okay to have a character question their sexuality, but the thing is, in this book at no point Cassandra doubts her preferences openly, making the scenes where Cassandra and Vanessa are together troublesome, to say the least. Their relationship could develop organically, it's clear they like each other, but the author's tendency of using them to act out little fantasies and then adding an unspoken NO HOMO after every single one of them ruined anything that could come out of there for me. It was queerbaiting of the worst kind and it's unforgivable.
I won’t extend myself here because I’m already tired and it’s late, but if you’re wondering how Callay and the league treat queer people SO AM I, nothing much is mentioned about it, and what is didn’t give me much hope. Also people who are trans, ace, agender or identify as any other type of gender/sexuality are apparently non existent.
This book has interesting characters that I cared about, but as my wall of text proves it was not an enjoyable read and Crossover just didnd’t work for me. The writing style is less than ideal too, with choppy sentences that instead of making the book flow just distract you with how WEIRD they are. I'd give this one a miss if I were you, there are probably better books about this theme out there.
For as much as this book is technological and futuristic, their societies apparently haven't left a lot of tired shit behind. Sexism and misogyny seem prevalent, as well as racism and a fear of what is "other". A common theme in this new world we're being presented is how they reverence history and culture, Callay is made of what seems to be a mixture of different earth cultures, the author throws the words indian, arabic and asian around a lot, both in architectural references and in how he describes people, though never going further than that. After a while it started getting to me, especially when a lot of his characters would make racist generalizations. I think my main problem is that we’re a billion years ahead of where we are today, but cultures/people that are stigmatized and stereotyped by us in the western part of the world are still being treated just like that. It becomes glaringly obvious that while the author is trying to have us believe that these cultures are very prominent in that world and the citizens of Callay are by all accounts direct descendants and very much trying to keep them alive, he himself can’t get past shallow descriptions rendering the book’s world poor and superficial.
It escalates to the point where you feel like the author is definitely going out of his way trying to make us aware of the irony of the poor development of his own world, of his character looking "european" (white) and being called out on that, like we're all in on the same joke. Nope, dude, you're not being inclusive or clever, you're just being racist, be better than that.
As for Cassandra, she’s an interesting character, because she's an android all the philosophical questions about her not being biologically human are there, which makes for a compelling storyline, definitely. Especially when we learn that her creators, the League, for all they're advanced, treat her and other androids as less, and the federation, for all they're behind, have a problem with androids exactly because they don't.
However, it was her relationship with other GIs (that’s how they call them) that intrigued me the most. Because they’re not built like her, she seems to patronize them as much as humans do her before she proves them wrong. Other GIs don’t have as much critical thinking as she does, don’t experience emotions as she does, and thus she doesn’t believe them capable of much. She isn’t angry at the people who created her for not giving them more, nor seems interested in helping them. She just seems to pity their existences, or get angry at the GIs themselves.
Later it’s proved that one of the GIs Cassandra sort of contempted was capable of much more personal growth than Cassandra thought possible, which was definitely an interesting place for the story to go, but little is explored about that.
I think I’d have liked this book a lot more if it were about a GI rebellion against the people who would create them complete beings made of “different stuff” only to treat them as if they’re less because of it. Maybe that's where the story will go, maybe Cassandra will eventually step up as the leader of a rebellion, but right now it's hard to tell.
Especially because we never have a clear picture of what the conflict between the League and the Federation, the one Cassandra fled in search of a "normal" life, even is about. What can be gathered is that the Federation is conservative and focused on old earth traditions (even if they're willing to use League technology), and the League broke from that to become what you'd expect a futuristic society to be (inclusive, without the old stupid shit, incredible tech etc etc). But the League is apparently losing the war, and reverting back to what they were trying to escape from, and so in their quest to be better they became the same, if not worse. Their fight seems to be ideological, but when it started, how it really is going, among other relevant questions, we are never really told. Everyone in this book is mostly like “politics go right over my head” and yeah, there’s a lot of political talk but it doesn’t explain much, it’s boring and both sides seem terrible.
AND FINALLY my biggest problem with this book: sex and sexuality. From moment one Cassandra is described as a sexual being, she enjoys sex and lots of it, as she reminds you every 5 fucking minutes. Which is fine, I'd never shame a character for being sexual, but it does become a problem when every other sentence in the book reverts back to it. Cassandra wants to get “nailed”, she fucked a lot of guys, she’s so straight and likes so much sex, she wants to fuck every guy she sees. This book is built on the male gaze, and doesn’t stray far from it. Maybe there’s a point to it, I don’t know, Cassandra seems to think she has a healthy relationship with sex, but some passages prove that she’s pretty far from it, I mean look at this for example:
"You’re way off target, Sevi." Blandly, and utterly unhelpful. Ghano had sat on the couch beside her. Brushed affectionately at her hair, smoothing her brow. "Tell me what’s the matter, Sandy." His hand rested upon her cheek, smooth and warm. "You’ll feel better if you tell me, I promise. I want to help you, I hate seeing you this upset." And he’d leaned down to kiss her on the cheek. "Blatant manipulation," she’d murmured. Ghano had grinned at her, leaning close. "Of course." Another kiss, this time upon the lips. Rarely one to refuse an invitation, Sandy had responded. They’d made love, first on the couch and then moving to Ghano’s bunk, as they had numerous times before. It was hardly a regular patient/psychologist relationship, Sandy knew. And she further knew that with Ghano it was mostly because he and the entire psych department dedicated to her study knew that she — and most GIs, come to that — had precious little compunction about whom she screwed, never having been socialised in the art of being picky. Nor taught a common-sense reason to say no. And GIs were nothing if not logical… and in that sense, she was just like the others. Which was not to say that Ghano didn’t like her — he did. And obviously he enjoyed having sex with her … everyone else did, and she had a reputation to uphold. But mostly, he did it because it was the best way to get information from her. She knew this, and in those comfortable, lingering moments she usually didn’t disappoint him."
WHAT THE FUCK, RIGHT. There are a lot of parts where she mentions she usually had a literal line by her bunk, because that was how her peers knew how to show her their admiration, even if they didn’t get the same thing out of it as she did. So maybe eventually all the sex talk will have a point, but so far it just seems to be there so the author has an excuse to talk about Cassandra’s body and describe lots of dismissable sex scenes. Also, for someone who enjoys orgasms so much, Cassandra talks very little if at all about sex toys and masturbation, which just goes to show a man wrote this book. To say this is problematic is an understatement.
That’s not to mention all the queerbating, like this couldn’t get any worse. Up until a certain point of the book, a lot of Cassadra’s statements about sex had me thinking she was queer, and the text did leave this up to interpretation, alas this dream shattered pretty quick, and I made me peace with it, she’s straight, it’s fine. But then, of course, the lady who eventually becomes Cassadra’s friend is revealed to be bi, and this is where it gets fucking stupid. There is a whole scene where Cassandra is topless while Vanessa (the friend) is giving her a massage, and then Cassandra decides to tease her and gets all over Vanessa’s personal space and is like “i wonder what it would be like…” and it’s all downhill from there. They flirt a lot, but reminders that Cassandra is straight and Vanessa has a husband appear at every moment, or Vanessa stops in her tracks when she’s daydreaming about Cassandra, because Cassandra only likes men, you get the picture. By the end of the story they kiss and are mistaken for a couple a few times.
Listen, it's okay to have a character question their sexuality, but the thing is, in this book at no point Cassandra doubts her preferences openly, making the scenes where Cassandra and Vanessa are together troublesome, to say the least. Their relationship could develop organically, it's clear they like each other, but the author's tendency of using them to act out little fantasies and then adding an unspoken NO HOMO after every single one of them ruined anything that could come out of there for me. It was queerbaiting of the worst kind and it's unforgivable.
I won’t extend myself here because I’m already tired and it’s late, but if you’re wondering how Callay and the league treat queer people SO AM I, nothing much is mentioned about it, and what is didn’t give me much hope. Also people who are trans, ace, agender or identify as any other type of gender/sexuality are apparently non existent.
This book has interesting characters that I cared about, but as my wall of text proves it was not an enjoyable read and Crossover just didnd’t work for me. The writing style is less than ideal too, with choppy sentences that instead of making the book flow just distract you with how WEIRD they are. I'd give this one a miss if I were you, there are probably better books about this theme out there.
thaxllssillyia's review
5.0
Excellent read. Great blend of fast paced action, consistent world building and exploration of what makes us human. Everything good science fiction should be.
jambery's review
3.0
Despite sometimes clunky writing, and a rather slow introductory world building section in the beginning, I quite enjoyed this book. It's a story that manages to both be exciting and ask deep questions about what it means to be human.
duchess's review
2.0
Overall, the story of Crossover isn't bad at all. A couple irritating things have justified the 2-star rating for me though:
First, the author has some bizarre fetish for sentence fragments. Why?!?!! I don't know why this writing style is a thing, because it makes everything choppy & weird. I can only imagine that the original drafts for this book were all underlined green in Word.
The fragmented writing style in turn affected the fight and action scenes for me. The action didn't flow easily, and this made complex scenes a swamp of unnecessary periods and unclear tactics.
Secondly, while I do appreciate reading about an android's 'human' characteristics, I'm not sure why the author couldn't give Cassandra more of a personality outside being a nymphomaniac... Every other page has Cassandra decrying her love of fucking, and there's literally no reason for it. It doesn't impact the plot, doesn't improve Cassandra's characterization, and just gets downright weird. When Mahud is introduced, Cassandra seems to finally develop some other interests outside hunting down her next orgasm, but this doesn't happen until the final third of the book. Honestly, I'd forgive people for thinking Cassandra was a sexbot that occasionally handled weaponry.
Another minor irritant was the constant emphasis on a character's Earth-based cultural and/or racial background. I get that the Federation, one of two distinct warring factions of the interstellar human population, is the pro-Earth faction, but this book supposedly takes place many, many years after humanity had gone to the stars so I'm not sure why people would not have moved on from using Earth-based cultural tropes when describing each other?? But okay whatever.
ALL THAT SAID, I did like the conspiracy & moral questions raised. If I didn't have the next 2 books on my iPad already, I likely would put off following-up with this series, but what the hell might as well. Maybe the writing will be better? (unlikely tbh)
First, the author has some bizarre fetish for sentence fragments. Why?!?!! I don't know why this writing style is a thing, because it makes everything choppy & weird. I can only imagine that the original drafts for this book were all underlined green in Word.
The fragmented writing style in turn affected the fight and action scenes for me. The action didn't flow easily, and this made complex scenes a swamp of unnecessary periods and unclear tactics.
Secondly, while I do appreciate reading about an android's 'human' characteristics, I'm not sure why the author couldn't give Cassandra more of a personality outside being a nymphomaniac... Every other page has Cassandra decrying her love of fucking, and there's literally no reason for it. It doesn't impact the plot, doesn't improve Cassandra's characterization, and just gets downright weird. When Mahud is introduced, Cassandra seems to finally develop some other interests outside hunting down her next orgasm, but this doesn't happen until the final third of the book. Honestly, I'd forgive people for thinking Cassandra was a sexbot that occasionally handled weaponry.
Another minor irritant was the constant emphasis on a character's Earth-based cultural and/or racial background. I get that the Federation, one of two distinct warring factions of the interstellar human population, is the pro-Earth faction, but this book supposedly takes place many, many years after humanity had gone to the stars so I'm not sure why people would not have moved on from using Earth-based cultural tropes when describing each other?? But okay whatever.
ALL THAT SAID, I did like the conspiracy & moral questions raised. If I didn't have the next 2 books on my iPad already, I likely would put off following-up with this series, but what the hell might as well. Maybe the writing will be better? (unlikely tbh)
More...