Reviews with content warning for Lesbophobia - Interesting Facts About Space

Reviews tagging 'Lesbophobia'

Interesting Facts About Space by Emily Austin

44 reviews

lindseyhall44's review

emotional 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? Yes

5.0

Ever since reading Everyone in this Room Will Soon be Dead, I’ve known that Emily Austin is something special. The characters that she wrote connected with me on such a personal level, and I was expecting the same for this novel. I’m so happy to say that Interesting Facts about Space was even more wonderful than I could have ever predicted. As a socially awkward, anxious, lesbian who often wonders if she is a bad person, this felt tailor made for me. There is so much light in these pages.

Content Warnings

spec_tacles's review

Go to review page

challenging dark funny hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad 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? Yes

4.75

Content Warnings

skywhales's review

Go to review page

dark emotional funny hopeful 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? Yes

5.0

oh my god. like oh my god. emily austin i will swear my loyalty to you forever if you want just say the word

i like characters who are very different from me a lot of the time. there are a lot of ways to enjoy characters. but i don't think i've felt seen the way i felt seen reading this book in my entire adult life. enid is a lesbian with a weird relationship to gender who's probably autistic. she plans out her social interactions and replays them in her head later. she shares fun facts with her mom. she's worried she's a terrible person. she's a different person to everyone in her life. she overthinks and lets her anxiety take over and has weird and bad and maladaptive coping mechanisms and god i loved her. i genuinely felt my breath taken away by how much i related to her at times.

honestly every character in this felt so real and genuine and likable (mostly) with their own quirks and flaws and i found myself finding something to like in all of them. particularly polly. sometimes it's hard for me to see what the narrator sees in a love interest but i adored her. she wasn't perfect but that just made it all the easier to see why she fell for the equally strange and imperfect enid.

and this won't make sense until you're at that bit but "i love weird little bugs, remember?" made me exhale and close the book and hold it to my chest because i had such big feelings.

god. fuck. i think i also really like books that are depressing, and sad, and deal with fucked up shit, but end in a way that reminds us that despite all that, things can be good. and we can be good and we can get better. my problem with a lot of "cozy" fiction is that it feels afraid to deal in dark topics in more than a few brief mentions, or else dark topics come out of nowhere and feel so shocking that they throw you out of the narrative entirely. i Love, however, books that are dark and sad and occasionally get worse before they get better but they do get better. i think it might hit harder when we actually see the protagonist having to fight so hard for that improvement.

also i have a lot of mostly negative feelings about true crime stuff and was wary about that going in but i think it was not only tied very well to the character but the worst elements of it were discussed and touched upon in a way i was worried they wouldn't be.

Content Warnings

lcg527's review against another edition

Go to review page

funny sad tense fast-paced

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

Go to review page

dark emotional funny fast-paced

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

4.5

If I could describe this book in two words, it would be uniquely weird. But in a good way.

With a fresh narrative voice, Interesting Facts About Space is an excellent novel focused on recognizing our pasts and how to let others in. Austin’s writing style helps create Enid to be a relatable character that highlights our doubts as humans as well as living in a world as an autistic person. I also felt that the pacing that Austin utilizes was executed well and keeps you drawn in. However, if you don’t get the narrative voice or the jump-change in scenes, this book might not be for you. This book is also not for you if you don’t like graphic discussions about true crime and true crime podcasts since Enid does talk about it a lot in the book.

If you want a book similar to Gail Honeyman’s Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine or you want something similar to a Sally Rooney novel (but were left down by her work), I would definitely recommend reading Interesting Facts About Space.

Content Warnings

More...