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sunflowerjess's review
challenging
dark
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? No
4.0
This is one of the most fascinating science fiction premises I've ever read.
albernikolauras's review
challenging
dark
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
This is an independently published piece of work that is more a series of interconnected stories following a scientist and his work to help keep black Americans alive by modifying their genetics for the better. It is a wrought series that deals with wealth and healthcare inequality, reparations, environmental racism, and the push back against true inequality as well as family ties.
The stories start of slow and ramp up as the situation throughout the situation. The quality of the stories was mostly consistent, but there were some amazing lines. Definitely reading the next book in the series.
The stories start of slow and ramp up as the situation throughout the situation. The quality of the stories was mostly consistent, but there were some amazing lines. Definitely reading the next book in the series.
errantdreams's review
4.0
Tenea D. Johnson’s R/evolution: A Mosaic Novel (Book One) is something of a cross between a novel and a set of interconnected short stories (I’ve even read one of the “chapters” as a standalone short story in another anthology).
This book takes a deep, painful look at racial and class divides. Rich people can afford to get whatever adaptations they want for their children, widening the gap still more than it was before (class has long dictated health, as it takes money to get good medical care). The middle class disappears. Racial tensions run even higher, resulting in violence and death. A version of the Klan has made a comeback. While it’s clear that the New Dawn (a pro-reparations group) went too far in kidnapping Kristen Burke and the others–they’ve sentenced them to a life of trauma and pain and triggered terrible reprisals–the story itself really opened my eyes. The New Dawn carefully point out all the ways in which the treatment Kristen and the others received was much better than that the slaves received, and that more than anything else conveyed how horribly the slaves were treated.
The one part of this book that felt weird to me was Quincy’s. Quincy is Ezekiel’s step-son, and he is clearly a sociopath. He takes the story on a weird tangent later on where he tries to make himself into a “prophet” of a religion based on “Carter’s Kids” (the children who received Ezekiel’s genetic reparations). It’s bizarre, and seems to lose the focus on the wider themes of the book.
It was interesting to see Ezekiel change from focusing just on race to focusing on class as well–offering his genetic adaptations for superior health to people who couldn’t afford to get adaptations themselves. It’s clear that his work is going to change the world, but I’d like to have seen more of that effect, rather than having it just hinted at in the end.
Original review posted on my blog: http://www.errantdreams.com/2019/09/review-r-evolution-tenea-d-johnson/
This book takes a deep, painful look at racial and class divides. Rich people can afford to get whatever adaptations they want for their children, widening the gap still more than it was before (class has long dictated health, as it takes money to get good medical care). The middle class disappears. Racial tensions run even higher, resulting in violence and death. A version of the Klan has made a comeback. While it’s clear that the New Dawn (a pro-reparations group) went too far in kidnapping Kristen Burke and the others–they’ve sentenced them to a life of trauma and pain and triggered terrible reprisals–the story itself really opened my eyes. The New Dawn carefully point out all the ways in which the treatment Kristen and the others received was much better than that the slaves received, and that more than anything else conveyed how horribly the slaves were treated.
The one part of this book that felt weird to me was Quincy’s. Quincy is Ezekiel’s step-son, and he is clearly a sociopath. He takes the story on a weird tangent later on where he tries to make himself into a “prophet” of a religion based on “Carter’s Kids” (the children who received Ezekiel’s genetic reparations). It’s bizarre, and seems to lose the focus on the wider themes of the book.
It was interesting to see Ezekiel change from focusing just on race to focusing on class as well–offering his genetic adaptations for superior health to people who couldn’t afford to get adaptations themselves. It’s clear that his work is going to change the world, but I’d like to have seen more of that effect, rather than having it just hinted at in the end.
Original review posted on my blog: http://www.errantdreams.com/2019/09/review-r-evolution-tenea-d-johnson/
kevinbeynon's review
challenging
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
kjcharles's review
A novel about a future USA destroyed by brutal anti-Black racism, wealth inequality, lack of healthcare and climate change. So, barely SF at all, really. The basic premise traces Ezekiel, a brilliant geneticist who genetically engineers babies of the poor as reparations, but it spans about fifty years and three generations.
What's weird is, it's novella length but it isn't a novella. It reads somewhere between linked short stories and extracts from a 600pp SF family saga. The reader gets a section of the story, and then the next section is five or ten years on and we have to fill in the missing bits.
I am not sure how I feel about that tbh in that I actually wanted to read the full novel, to get the love story and the character arcs and the betrayals and losses on the page. I didn't engage emotionally in the way I would definitely have done at full length because it was a great, well developed world and the characters were compelling even only getting a fraction of the story. (From my novel-loving perspective, that is: the author obv told the story as she wanted, in these sections.) I'm going to be musing on this one for a while.
What's weird is, it's novella length but it isn't a novella. It reads somewhere between linked short stories and extracts from a 600pp SF family saga. The reader gets a section of the story, and then the next section is five or ten years on and we have to fill in the missing bits.
I am not sure how I feel about that tbh in that I actually wanted to read the full novel, to get the love story and the character arcs and the betrayals and losses on the page. I didn't engage emotionally in the way I would definitely have done at full length because it was a great, well developed world and the characters were compelling even only getting a fraction of the story. (From my novel-loving perspective, that is: the author obv told the story as she wanted, in these sections.) I'm going to be musing on this one for a while.
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