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mimetown's review
adventurous
dark
funny
mysterious
fast-paced
4.5
Content Warnings
Minor: Xenophobia, Racism, and Homophobia
abathur's review
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.5
Pros:
- the first third of the book kept me wanting to read it
- the lions
Cons:
- the author is a middle-aged guy who is a leg man, and I had to walk away from this book knowing that
- Father (aka Ancient Pedo) rapes, tortures, and murders the kids because they "need" it. the book tells you so, and he is rewarded for it
- Father/Ancient Pedo only ever pits the kids against each other and isolates them from the outside world. what does this with the point above tell you?
- the black character is the main rapist. the asian girl character smells like shit. the plot conveniently has reasons for this, but take this as you will given that the author paints a textbook child abuser as a good guy
- Carolyn is a flat Mary Sue. there is no tension in this book as a result
- random inconsistencies (eg. the kids under Ancient Pedo's care can't dress themselves, but they dress dead people normally without issue)
- nebulous concepts that are never really established (eg. death is banishing someone to the shadow realm, but it's irrelevant because people get resurrected all the time -- except that one time with the lion because reasons). creativity is cool until it just becomes random bullshit
- random bullshit (eg. when Carolyn calls the president. not sure if that was supposed to be funny or something)
- some of the colour book powers or whatever are redundant and some of them are completely useless
- bad plot armour and nonsensical decisions (eg. why did David let Carolyn touch his dong? he's supposed to be the best fighter in the world, and she's his biggest enemy)
- the first third of the book kept me wanting to read it
- the lions
Cons:
- the author is a middle-aged guy who is a leg man, and I had to walk away from this book knowing that
- Father (aka Ancient Pedo) rapes, tortures, and murders the kids because they "need" it. the book tells you so, and he is rewarded for it
- Father/Ancient Pedo only ever pits the kids against each other and isolates them from the outside world. what does this with the point above tell you?
- the black character is the main rapist. the asian girl character smells like shit. the plot conveniently has reasons for this, but take this as you will given that the author paints a textbook child abuser as a good guy
- Carolyn is a flat Mary Sue. there is no tension in this book as a result
- random inconsistencies (eg. the kids under Ancient Pedo's care can't dress themselves, but they dress dead people normally without issue)
- nebulous concepts that are never really established (eg. death is banishing someone to the shadow realm, but it's irrelevant because people get resurrected all the time -- except that one time with the lion because reasons). creativity is cool until it just becomes random bullshit
- random bullshit (eg. when Carolyn calls the president. not sure if that was supposed to be funny or something)
- some of the colour book powers or whatever are redundant and some of them are completely useless
- bad plot armour and nonsensical decisions (eg. why did David let Carolyn touch his dong? he's supposed to be the best fighter in the world, and she's his biggest enemy)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gaslighting, Gore, Toxic relationship, Torture, Emotional abuse, Racism, and Rape
evandaniel's review
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
medium-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
4.25
I don’t really even know how to describe this. Recommend for fans of Stephen King, Neil Gaiman, and Terry Pratchett who aren’t sensitive to violence.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Suicide attempt, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Torture, Body horror, Rape, Violence, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Animal cruelty, and Animal death
Minor: Self harm, Kidnapping, Drug use, Abandonment, Vomit, Suicide, Suicidal thoughts, Forced institutionalization, Murder, Xenophobia, Genocide, Injury/Injury detail, War, Racism, Physical abuse, Misogyny, Gun violence, Emotional abuse, and Mental illness
joe_dmh's review
adventurous
dark
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Physical abuse, Rape, Torture, Violence, Toxic friendship, Suicide attempt, Suicide, Sexual violence, Animal death, Sexual assault, Child abuse, Body horror, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Death of parent, Car accident, Racism, Gore, Incest, Gun violence, and Grief
thebakersbooks's review
challenging
dark
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
So, I should not have read this book. I saw that Lili (USOM) had said it was hard to give comp titles for this, but if she had to choose one, it would be Middlegame by Seanan McGuire. I know lots of folks loved Middlegame and that it was a very well-written book, but it wasn't my cup of tea. The comparison between that book and this one was accurate as far as tone, mood, and (for lack of a better word) pretentiousness; I didn't care for it at all. I'm going to try not to let that influence my review (if I did, this would likely have been a 1-star read for me) and rather evaluate the book on its merits alone.
First, I'd like to say that while I didn't especially enjoy Middlegame due to the complexity of the plot structure and some of the terminology/jargon that I just didn't understand, I do trust McGuire to largely avoid including ableism, fatphobia, queerphobia, and racism in her books. Scott Hawkins? Not so much. This book was everything that didn't appeal to me about Middlegame with the additions of ableist terminology throughout, completely unnecessary homophobia by some characters, and a fair bit of mild fatphobia and racism as well. There were no openly queer characters in this book, and honestly, thank goodness for that. I don't want this author writing my community.
I'm aware that the content of a book and the things fictional characters do and say don't necessarily represent the views of the author. However, things like describing an Indian man's skin as "caramel colored"; making it so the only fat characters are bit roles, criminals, and/or die immediately; and having (unsympathetic) characters spew graphic homophobia? Those are authorial choices. And those were only a handful of examples; I could give several more in each category.
As I'm writing this, I actually knocked my rating down a star because this was a long book and I forgot, by the time I was through with it, how angry the things mentioned above had made me. I'm also having a hard time coming up with redeeming facts about the story, characters, etc.; I suppose the plot's complexity could interest some readers, as well as the amoral/villain-arc main character who was nevertheless somewhat sympathetic. The atmosphere and worldbuilding left a lot to be desired. I feel like a lot of the "magic" system was handwaved using obscure terminology, but it didn't seem consistent within itself. Basically, this felt like fantasy by an author who dislikes the fantasy genre and who used jargon and elision to avoid developing the setting well.
If you got this far into my review, you've probably guessed that I do not recommend this book. I'd also be reluctant to read anything else by this author based on the range of baked-in bigotries I covered above. Also, do male authors know that having a female character get raped isn't the only way of giving her trauma and a motivation for revenge? Just wondering. Anyway, go read Middlegame if you haven't, but look elsewhere for more of that vibe if you end up enjoying it.
Content notes: gore and violence; rape; child abduction and child abuse; violent homophobia and homophobic slurs; mention of wartime violence against civilians; suicide by hanging, poison, and self-immolation; mild cannibalism; animal death and graphic gore involving a dead dog
First, I'd like to say that while I didn't especially enjoy Middlegame due to the complexity of the plot structure and some of the terminology/jargon that I just didn't understand, I do trust McGuire to largely avoid including ableism, fatphobia, queerphobia, and racism in her books. Scott Hawkins? Not so much. This book was everything that didn't appeal to me about Middlegame with the additions of ableist terminology throughout, completely unnecessary homophobia by some characters, and a fair bit of mild fatphobia and racism as well. There were no openly queer characters in this book, and honestly, thank goodness for that. I don't want this author writing my community.
I'm aware that the content of a book and the things fictional characters do and say don't necessarily represent the views of the author. However, things like describing an Indian man's skin as "caramel colored"; making it so the only fat characters are bit roles, criminals, and/or die immediately; and having (unsympathetic) characters spew graphic homophobia? Those are authorial choices. And those were only a handful of examples; I could give several more in each category.
As I'm writing this, I actually knocked my rating down a star because this was a long book and I forgot, by the time I was through with it, how angry the things mentioned above had made me. I'm also having a hard time coming up with redeeming facts about the story, characters, etc.; I suppose the plot's complexity could interest some readers, as well as the amoral/villain-arc main character who was nevertheless somewhat sympathetic. The atmosphere and worldbuilding left a lot to be desired. I feel like a lot of the "magic" system was handwaved using obscure terminology, but it didn't seem consistent within itself. Basically, this felt like fantasy by an author who dislikes the fantasy genre and who used jargon and elision to avoid developing the setting well.
If you got this far into my review, you've probably guessed that I do not recommend this book. I'd also be reluctant to read anything else by this author based on the range of baked-in bigotries I covered above. Also, do male authors know that having a female character get raped isn't the only way of giving her trauma and a motivation for revenge? Just wondering. Anyway, go read Middlegame if you haven't, but look elsewhere for more of that vibe if you end up enjoying it.
Content notes: gore and violence; rape; child abduction and child abuse; violent homophobia and homophobic slurs; mention of wartime violence against civilians; suicide by hanging, poison, and self-immolation; mild cannibalism; animal death and graphic gore involving a dead dog
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Blood, Child abuse, and Gore
Moderate: Animal death, Homophobia, Kidnapping, Suicide, and Ableism
Minor: Animal death, Death of parent, Drug use, Fatphobia, Racism, and Rape
dovedozen's review against another edition
slow-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
This book was written by a man whose blog says he's fostered a bunch of dogs, but who I can only infer never learned to trim their nails and also seems to think lions are more interesting, because they're epic or whatever. Also, the racism is WILDLY out of line and VERY OBVIOUSLY comes from the author's entirely unexamined history of personal mass media consumption. The hyperviolent rapist is a man who wears a tutu for most of the book, because haha, get it, he's ~not human~ and doesn't understand which clothes go with which gender, lol? Oh, also, it's dropped halfway through the book in a throwaway line that he's black. Also the tutu came from the childhood bedroom closet of a gay man, I guess? I wish this dude didn't know what gay people were. I also wish he didn't know what dogs were, to be perfectly honest with you.
Listen to me. The pacing is awful. Scenes that don't matter are explained in excruciating detail and the lore is nothing but a series of vague gestures towards the CONCEPT of real-life mythological systems. The main character is bait-and-switched from the Woman Who Might Be Losing Her Humanity the blurb tells you about to the author's epic quipping self-insert everyman, who has the same conversation with rando after rando about how HE KNOWS, RIGHT, what's happening is REALLY weird but he has a gun and will shoot them if they don't help him fail to advance the plot. This is a book written by a middle-aged man who has seen a lot of movies and reads Neil Gaiman sometimes. Whoever edited it didn't do shit, because it barely hangs together as a coherent narrative at all. Instead it reads like the idle dark fantasy of a guy who had some free time to write one book, one time. It's a story that uses sexual assault and graphic descriptions of violence to ask the reader "wouldn't it be fucked up if" and it doesn't even have the decency to do it in a way that's well-written enough to be cathartic. It's not even that weird. It's, like, an intensely boring person's idea of what a weird book is probably like, they think.
Mount Char is nothing. It's a desperately sad waste of my ears and brain cells. It's fodder for my lifelong vendetta against Artists Who Are Just Some Guy. It's "John Dies at the End" for assholes. Whoever wrote the blurb for it is some kind of chaos genius and I hope they were paid accordingly, because if you'd asked me to describe this novel concisely, in a way that might trick people with brains into taking a chance on it, I would have simply said "no, thank you".
Fuck this book.
Listen to me. The pacing is awful. Scenes that don't matter are explained in excruciating detail and the lore is nothing but a series of vague gestures towards the CONCEPT of real-life mythological systems. The main character is bait-and-switched from the Woman Who Might Be Losing Her Humanity the blurb tells you about to the author's epic quipping self-insert everyman, who has the same conversation with rando after rando about how HE KNOWS, RIGHT, what's happening is REALLY weird but he has a gun and will shoot them if they don't help him fail to advance the plot. This is a book written by a middle-aged man who has seen a lot of movies and reads Neil Gaiman sometimes. Whoever edited it didn't do shit, because it barely hangs together as a coherent narrative at all. Instead it reads like the idle dark fantasy of a guy who had some free time to write one book, one time. It's a story that uses sexual assault and graphic descriptions of violence to ask the reader "wouldn't it be fucked up if" and it doesn't even have the decency to do it in a way that's well-written enough to be cathartic. It's not even that weird. It's, like, an intensely boring person's idea of what a weird book is probably like, they think.
Mount Char is nothing. It's a desperately sad waste of my ears and brain cells. It's fodder for my lifelong vendetta against Artists Who Are Just Some Guy. It's "John Dies at the End" for assholes. Whoever wrote the blurb for it is some kind of chaos genius and I hope they were paid accordingly, because if you'd asked me to describe this novel concisely, in a way that might trick people with brains into taking a chance on it, I would have simply said "no, thank you".
Fuck this book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Blood, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Murder, Physical abuse, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Torture, and Violence
Minor: Bullying, Drug use, Fatphobia, and Homophobia
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