Absolutely incredible, definitely worth the read. It’s a painful one to be sure but unbelievably well written. It pulls you in and doesn’t let you go and you definitely won’t want it to.

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jnehilla's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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nick13's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.5

I have never read any of Octavia Butler's work before but now I need to check some more out because this read was astounding, emotional, but astounding. Every single character in this was incredibly well written and well thought out, making every one of them believable, even if some are VERY unlikable.

All I wish more for in this story was for the time the characters spent in their present to be more fleshed out along with Edana and Kevin's relationship to be a bit more expounded upon instead of just presumed throughout the book.

But really, if all I'm wishing for in a story is more of it, it clearly did something very well.

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blackcatkai's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious tense 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? It's complicated

4.5

CW: violence, death (animal & human), self-harm, suicide, slavery, racism, ableism (casual & use of the r-slur), blood, sexual assault

this was an absolute ride of a book. amazing, upsetting, and just all around fascinating. the characters were well fleshed out, and you feel just about every emotion under the sun for all of them in some capacity. it mostly doesn't even read like a book written in the 70s outside of a couple uses of the r-slur as a reminder. there's a reason Octavia E Butler was an absolute icon of an author and I can't wait to read her other work.

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savvylit's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.5

Kindred is a riveting story that's equal parts fantasy and historical fiction. The unpredictability of Dana's time travel and the juxtaposition between 1976 & 1819 makes for page-turning fascination. Unlike anything else I have read, the cruel reality of chattel slavery is thrown into hideous stark relief in Kindred. Right alongside Dana, readers must reckon with the utter powerlessness and terror of daily life as a slave in antebellum America.

The biggest strength of this novel is Butler's skillful and evocative characterization. Each character is both memorable and well-developed. Dana is compassionate, intelligent, and a super resourceful protagonist. Rufus is just smart enough to be even more awful and selfish than he already is by nature. He's truly a Grade A piece of shit. Alice, a free black woman who Rufus is completely obsessed with, is a devastating character. (I'd love to say more about Alice and how upsetting her arc is but I'll keep this spoiler-free.) Secondary characters Carrie, Nigel, & Sarah are loveable and complex.

Overall, it's easy to see why this novel remains one of Octavia E. Butler's most well-known works. Kindred is such a complete and engaging story that it's impossible to forget.

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kmccann98's review against another edition

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challenging emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.25

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mcchristofoletti's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective sad 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

3.5

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/5361633531

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gizzylove's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

This book was amazing. Heavy read, but an important read. Octavia Butler used science fiction, this genius use of time travel to explore it through the lens of a black woman. And it pays off, giving incredible, yet heartbreaking and hard to stomach insights into slavery and the ante bellum south. Throughout it we see these relationships of kindred spirits, the difficulty to accept our ancestors within the context of their time period, and to accept we carry more of them within ourselves than we'd like to admit. We see it with her ancestors, her chosen family in the 1800s, and her husband Kevin, who shows the lack of awareness that white people can have, how time travel in the hypothetical and real is a much different experience, one that Kevin at first saw as not so bad. I truly appreciated the relationships and how they developed which in turn served to display a theme. Butler wrote this in such a way where there is endless commentary, and so much to learn from.

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