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3.46 AVERAGE
3.46 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
dark
inspiring
lighthearted
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
Couldn't put this one down and read through the night. Hoping for a sequel!
adventurous
emotional
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
The cover is beautiful, the blurb sounds exciting. Don't judge a book by its cover I guess.
I have two big problems with this book.
1) The blurb is misleading to the point of being a false description. The two characters Pendt meets already control the station. It is not an inciting incident and doesn't happen until over a third of the way through. The "scheme" they hatch is not "against all odds". In fact there is no conflict at all, and the "scheme" is resolved within a few pages before the mid-point of the novel. The story is about something else entirely. The blurb made it sound like an exciting adventure or a space heist. It is not any of those things and I strongly recommend against buying if you got that impression.
2) The editing quality is atrocious. I don't mind the typos so much. I do mind the perspective errors, where a chapter in one character's perspective suddenly shifts into another character's for one sentence. I do mind that characters know things they couldn't possibly know, like the family relationships of people they've just met. It speaks to the lack of care that went into the edits, which is surprising from Penguin.
Inside the book, after the dedication, a content warning reads: "This book contains a scene of medical violence. Characters also obsess about food and count calories." I honestly think it needs more detail. It's not just a scene of medical violence, it's a constant fear of sexual medical violence, forced pregnancy and child abuse in various forms.
Forced pregnancy and bodily autonomy are the main themes of the story. It's odd that it doesn't get a mention in the blurb or the warning. It was uncomfortable throughout and not at all what I was expecting.
Does it do a good job of what it was trying to achieve?
I don't think so. The fear of forced pregnancy is the main motivation for Pendt to escape her family onto the space station. Within literal minutes of escaping though, she happily agrees to (ever so slight spoiler)get married and pregnant with a total stranger with a lot of power over her life. The marriage happens within a week, the pregnancy soon after that. I was surprised to say the least.
We're only halfway through now and all the driving conflict has been resolved. The story potters about for a while as the characters talk about who will clean the dishes today (apparently they forgot that they have automatic machines to do that for them - it was a big part of the story earlier), or think about how lovely everything is and how happy everyone is to see them all the time.
The story meanders aimlessly into a romance plot, briefly thinks about some trans issues, something that's meant to be dramatic happens offscreen somewhere, and then I gave up with a quarter of the book left to go.
Conclusion:
This reads like a first draft, almost like the wrong file got sent to print. With a bit of work it could be something good, like a low-stakes, low-conflict, more depressing Becky Chambers novel (assuming the blurb wasn't misleading). Unfortunately it was released before it could ever meet its potential.
I have two big problems with this book.
1) The blurb is misleading to the point of being a false description. The two characters Pendt meets already control the station. It is not an inciting incident and doesn't happen until over a third of the way through. The "scheme" they hatch is not "against all odds". In fact there is no conflict at all, and the "scheme" is resolved within a few pages before the mid-point of the novel. The story is about something else entirely. The blurb made it sound like an exciting adventure or a space heist. It is not any of those things and I strongly recommend against buying if you got that impression.
2) The editing quality is atrocious. I don't mind the typos so much. I do mind the perspective errors, where a chapter in one character's perspective suddenly shifts into another character's for one sentence. I do mind that characters know things they couldn't possibly know, like the family relationships of people they've just met. It speaks to the lack of care that went into the edits, which is surprising from Penguin.
Inside the book, after the dedication, a content warning reads: "This book contains a scene of medical violence. Characters also obsess about food and count calories." I honestly think it needs more detail. It's not just a scene of medical violence, it's a constant fear of sexual medical violence, forced pregnancy and child abuse in various forms.
Forced pregnancy and bodily autonomy are the main themes of the story. It's odd that it doesn't get a mention in the blurb or the warning. It was uncomfortable throughout and not at all what I was expecting.
Does it do a good job of what it was trying to achieve?
I don't think so. The fear of forced pregnancy is the main motivation for Pendt to escape her family onto the space station. Within literal minutes of escaping though, she happily agrees to (ever so slight spoiler)
We're only halfway through now and all the driving conflict has been resolved. The story potters about for a while as the characters talk about who will clean the dishes today (apparently they forgot that they have automatic machines to do that for them - it was a big part of the story earlier), or think about how lovely everything is and how happy everyone is to see them all the time.
The story meanders aimlessly into a romance plot, briefly thinks about some trans issues, something that's meant to be dramatic happens offscreen somewhere, and then I gave up with a quarter of the book left to go.
Conclusion:
This reads like a first draft, almost like the wrong file got sent to print. With a bit of work it could be something good, like a low-stakes, low-conflict, more depressing Becky Chambers novel (assuming the blurb wasn't misleading). Unfortunately it was released before it could ever meet its potential.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Eating disorder, Rape, Sexual violence, Medical content, Pregnancy, Abandonment
Moderate: Sexism, Transphobia
I don't even know what to say about this book. It's only positive aspect is that it was relatively short, otherwise this was probably the most mundane, plotless, underdeveloped story I've ever read. This book reads a lot like AO3 fanfiction. Which is not a bad thing, but in order to write fanfiction, you need to have a body of work to draw elements from, which this book did not provide. The characters had no real personality to speak of. I can't even describe them through stereotypes like "the funny one" or "the annoying one". The characters are literally just their names. Named NPC whose sole purpose is to conveniently further the plot. Personal tragedy is mentioned, but rarely has any effect on literally ANYTHING. Definitely would not recommend this book to anyone.
Edit: Just remembered the various Hozier, P!ATD and Florence + The Machine references, which definitely did not help the feel of the book and made it seem really unpolished.
Edit: Just remembered the various Hozier, P!ATD and Florence + The Machine references, which definitely did not help the feel of the book and made it seem really unpolished.
adventurous
challenging
hopeful
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Loveable characters:
Yes
I accidentally read this in a single day and I want a sequel. This is a wonderful story of hope set in an absolutely fascinating world.
i wanted to like it. i really did. i love sci-fi, i prefer when books are written in third-person and past tense. it was on the shorter side. by all means i should have enjoyed it.
i did not :(
i was bored almost the entire time. the book felt encyclopedic; i kept checking the blurb to make sure i was remembering the right plot as i was reading, since the story described in its own summary doesnt start until around page 80. i kept thinking "wow, this is really passive" and "when is the story going to start?". i understand that the intention was probably to make the reader feel as neglected, distanced, and isolated as the main character was during the first part of her life, told things instead of actually experiencing them, but for that to be the first 80 some-odd pages of a book made it a slog to get through for me, and even after the story i was advertised began, it felt oddly paced
the book was broken up into parts, each part prefaced with a few pages of straight up encyclopedia history of the world, which was then rehashed to us every single time something from that history was mentioned in the novel itself; we have paragraphs and paragraphs explaining the existence of a creature called oglasa that is a nonperishable food source, and then every single time oglasa are mentioned again, we are given that same explanation again, making me wonder why we had bothered with the prologue/intermission pieces at all.
the characters kept flip-flopping between making very young sounding jokes, something i would believe a teenager would actually say, and speaking as if giving speeches... there were a lot of places characters would be talking and not use contractions, making things sound really stilted and over-professional, and then make sex jokes in the next line, so the tone kept jarring back and forth. they also kept explicitly saying how they felt while then being told in the prose that they were playing things close to the chest. classic telling-one-thing-showing-another, and a lot of times, i would read a conversation (something that happens very few times, it felt like) and just... be frustrated
honestly the entire book felt pretty 'tell' to me, and for a space-fantasy, i really wanted to feel a little more immersed in the world, but the way the book was written was like it was purposefully shoving me away to make sure i knew it was an arms-length away. there is a major event that occurs about 3/4ths through the book that just...happens. very suddenly, with no emotional heft, it just kind of falls into your lap and then forty pages later is resolved/undone, and the solution is equally unceremonious. maybe it didn't hit for me because i was kept so distant from the characters the entire book, but when it happened, i just...couldnt care.
idk. it just really didn't do it for me. but i finished it, so, there's that.
i did not :(
i was bored almost the entire time. the book felt encyclopedic; i kept checking the blurb to make sure i was remembering the right plot as i was reading, since the story described in its own summary doesnt start until around page 80. i kept thinking "wow, this is really passive" and "when is the story going to start?". i understand that the intention was probably to make the reader feel as neglected, distanced, and isolated as the main character was during the first part of her life, told things instead of actually experiencing them, but for that to be the first 80 some-odd pages of a book made it a slog to get through for me, and even after the story i was advertised began, it felt oddly paced
the book was broken up into parts, each part prefaced with a few pages of straight up encyclopedia history of the world, which was then rehashed to us every single time something from that history was mentioned in the novel itself; we have paragraphs and paragraphs explaining the existence of a creature called oglasa that is a nonperishable food source, and then every single time oglasa are mentioned again, we are given that same explanation again, making me wonder why we had bothered with the prologue/intermission pieces at all.
the characters kept flip-flopping between making very young sounding jokes, something i would believe a teenager would actually say, and speaking as if giving speeches... there were a lot of places characters would be talking and not use contractions, making things sound really stilted and over-professional, and then make sex jokes in the next line, so the tone kept jarring back and forth. they also kept explicitly saying how they felt while then being told in the prose that they were playing things close to the chest. classic telling-one-thing-showing-another, and a lot of times, i would read a conversation (something that happens very few times, it felt like) and just... be frustrated
honestly the entire book felt pretty 'tell' to me, and for a space-fantasy, i really wanted to feel a little more immersed in the world, but the way the book was written was like it was purposefully shoving me away to make sure i knew it was an arms-length away. there is a major event that occurs about 3/4ths through the book that just...happens. very suddenly, with no emotional heft, it just kind of falls into your lap and then forty pages later is resolved/undone, and the solution is equally unceremonious. maybe it didn't hit for me because i was kept so distant from the characters the entire book, but when it happened, i just...couldnt care.
idk. it just really didn't do it for me. but i finished it, so, there's that.
Content warning for abusive control over food calories and treating women as incubators.
This book was a little hard to read at times. The magic system uses calories and on the space ship food is tightly controlled. Also you have to have a purpose on the ship or you are sold off to slavers. This futuristic dystopian is a cruel world and the main character tries to find joy in it.
This book was a little hard to read at times. The magic system uses calories and on the space ship food is tightly controlled. Also you have to have a purpose on the ship or you are sold off to slavers. This futuristic dystopian is a cruel world and the main character tries to find joy in it.
I listened to this as an audiobook and the utilization of sound effects was fantastic. I'd never experienced that before, but I hope I'll get to again. The found family plotline was great, but I almost wish there had been more world building. The universe Johnston made was interesting and it left me wanting more.
However, I will say that I read this book expecting to find queer representation and thought I was fooled on that front until I read other reviews revealing that Fisher is trans. I feel like if I wasn't able to tell from first reading that a character is trans, the representation isn't good enough. Also another note, I was very surprised when reading this book that it's marketed as a YA novel. So many of the things that happen (forced pregnancy, discussion of calorie counting, general bodily autonomy, people owning other people) seemed far too intense to be included in a book marketed for teens. I'd give this a 3.5 because I did like the space magic and the found family but the book is lacking in some ways.
However, I will say that I read this book expecting to find queer representation and thought I was fooled on that front until I read other reviews revealing that Fisher is trans. I feel like if I wasn't able to tell from first reading that a character is trans, the representation isn't good enough. Also another note, I was very surprised when reading this book that it's marketed as a YA novel. So many of the things that happen (forced pregnancy, discussion of calorie counting, general bodily autonomy, people owning other people) seemed far too intense to be included in a book marketed for teens. I'd give this a 3.5 because I did like the space magic and the found family but the book is lacking in some ways.
adventurous
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No