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sleepycaboose's review
adventurous
dark
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Cannibalism, Injury/Injury detail, and Body horror
readingsofaslinky's review
funny
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.75
Holy bodily hell!! This book is not in fact like squid games unless you are imaging a giant gender less squid playing games with humanity. Yeah, that’s not what you thought, huh? I’d say this gave me more Jamaica Kincaid’s Girl meets Dostoyevsky’s Notes from the Underground meets Kang and Kodos from the Simpsons. Weird, queer, explicit, and thought provoking; I’m glad I was recommended to read this!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Dysphoria, Murder, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Body shaming, Excrement, and Sexual content
Minor: Fatphobia
readingwithcoffee's review against another edition
dark
funny
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
The ideas are vastly better then the execution especially prose wise but it’s honestly a lot of fun and very refreshing read it also very crude and explicit in both what it’s using a thin veil of scifi to talk about while being pretty explicit about gender and gender and sexuality as performance.
I felt like there was a conversation about lookism in South Korea that’s incredibly intense but really hard to get if you’re a foreigner (even if you’re familiar with desirability politics) that never fully felt really used well but that and the conversation about cameras and unseen cameras taking photos that was definitely a references to spy camera sexual violence in South Korea and Japan felt kinda refreshing to be the core point of the book or just sat and explained versus a part of the life the alien was going through.
I felt like there was a conversation about lookism in South Korea that’s incredibly intense but really hard to get if you’re a foreigner (even if you’re familiar with desirability politics) that never fully felt really used well but that and the conversation about cameras and unseen cameras taking photos that was definitely a references to spy camera sexual violence in South Korea and Japan felt kinda refreshing to be the core point of the book or just sat and explained versus a part of the life the alien was going through.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder, Stalking, Excrement, Body shaming, Gore, Vomit, Body horror, Cannibalism, Violence, and Abandonment
foolishyetdangerousbooks's review
challenging
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Sexual content, Violence, Cannibalism, Body horror, Hate crime, Murder, Blood, Death, and Excrement
scifi_rat's review
emotional
funny
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Sexual content, Violence, and Body horror
Moderate: Excrement, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Death, and Cursing
Minor: Blood and Cannibalism
quirkykayleetam's review
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
This is not a book for most people.
It is violent and sexual and strange, inviting you to listen to a people-eating alien tell you their most intimate thoughts and actions while hiding and surviving on planet earth.
The experience should be alienating--and sometimes it is. Sometimes you have to reckon with the fact that you're talking to someone with 3 legs and almost 30 genitals who is unapologetic about who they are. But I also found myself connecting so closely with the narrator. They embodied so much of my fear and anger as an invisibly disabled person trying to live in a world where my physical body will always hold me down.
The end of this novella is sudden. It made me think and think and rethink.
This book shows you the monstrous in yourself and how you have been a monster to others. If you can handle the content, this is one I highly recommend.
It is violent and sexual and strange, inviting you to listen to a people-eating alien tell you their most intimate thoughts and actions while hiding and surviving on planet earth.
The experience should be alienating--and sometimes it is. Sometimes you have to reckon with the fact that you're talking to someone with 3 legs and almost 30 genitals who is unapologetic about who they are. But I also found myself connecting so closely with the narrator. They embodied so much of my fear and anger as an invisibly disabled person trying to live in a world where my physical body will always hold me down.
The end of this novella is sudden. It made me think and think and rethink.
This book shows you the monstrous in yourself and how you have been a monster to others. If you can handle the content, this is one I highly recommend.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Gore, Murder, Dysphoria, Violence, Body horror, and Sexual content
Moderate: Blood, Stalking, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: War
ra22ouille's review
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Wowow what a visceral exploration of queerness, ability, sex, gender, and monstrosity. Dolki Min crafted a horrific, disgusting alien that is also tender, beautiful, sexy, emotional, and made me feel such empathy and kindness towards the character. I really loved the limited first person POV and the depth of emotion that the text was able to probe with that perspective. The character was so complex and being in it's head was profound. It not only showed me how they were alienated in our world, but it also alienated me from the society I am home to. The kinship I felt with the alien forced me further outside of humanity and I pondered questions of homogeneity, queer and disabled assimilation, and solopsism in a world where you not only feel alone but are truly alone. Or, at least when you believe that you can only possibly be alone, until perhaps you aren't. How does that challenge your solitude, the solipsistic beliefs that propel your choices and your interior lofe? Truly, truly spectacular.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Excrement, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Vomit, Blood, Sexual content, Body horror, and Violence
shannanigans's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
funny
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual content, Body horror, Violence, and Gore
Minor: Excrement
kaiyakaiyo's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
buying this in print both because it was lovely and because my ereader did not do the art justice!
wow! what can i say. such a fresh premise, the narrative voice was so refreshing, i don’t think I’ve ever read a book anything like this. if you have, PLEASE recommend! favorite book this year i think
unapologetically queer and making very interesting points about who this world is designed for both physically and in a more abstract sense. definitely graphic and gory but that takes a surprising backseat to the emotions of the main char. idk this book was just great and a lovely opener for Halloween month.
wow! what can i say. such a fresh premise, the narrative voice was so refreshing, i don’t think I’ve ever read a book anything like this. if you have, PLEASE recommend! favorite book this year i think
unapologetically queer and making very interesting points about who this world is designed for both physically and in a more abstract sense. definitely graphic and gory but that takes a surprising backseat to the emotions of the main char. idk this book was just great and a lovely opener for Halloween month.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder, Cannibalism, Hate crime, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Gore, Body horror, Blood, Violence, Vomit, and Sexual content
Moderate: Body shaming, Chronic illness, Misogyny, Death, Ableism, Cursing, Excrement, Transphobia, Fatphobia, Injury/Injury detail, and Sexism
danielles_reads's review against another edition
dark
funny
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- 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
I wondered how it was even possible to divide something with so many visible variants into just two groups [men and women]. But humans keep bringing up their criteria and judge me by it. In the subway, in the street, in restaurants, in shopping malls, in parks . . . their expressions and words that question my humanity irrespective of where I am made me tear myself apart and rebuild myself piece by piece. I’ve invested close to ten years of my time figuring out what exactly their criteria are. My conclusion is that there are no such criteria.
This book is sooo weird lol. I knew it would be weird going in, but somehow it ended up being even weirder than I thought. There is a huge focus on sex, with explicit sexual content combined with blood and gore in a way that I’m sure will turn off a lot of readers. There are also a few fatphobic descriptions that felt entirely unnecessary to the story.
I’m always a fan of stories about aliens observing humanity from the point of view of an outsider, so I liked this book from that standpoint. It had a lot to say about humanity’s rules and expectations for how people should act, especially in terms of gender roles, and how isolating that can be.
This book doesn’t have much of a plot, and is mostly just the day-to-day life of the main character. It did start feeling a little repetitive in the second half (so many complaints about stairs lol), but then the book ended. The ending was pretty sudden and kind of bittersweet, but I think it worked well for the story.
The real highlight of the book is the character’s extremely sardonic way of speaking directly to the reader. This really differentiates the book from other alien characters, and is strengthened even more by the audiobook narrator, who did a fantastic job bringing this strange character to life. There were also some cool sound effects that enabled the listener to feel as disoriented as the MC does. The ebook also made tons of interesting stylistic choices to convey the alien’s shifting mindset, so I was glad I had a copy of it along with the audio.
There is not much world building in this book, which I think was fine for the story the author wanted to tell. We got a tiny bit of the alien’s backstory, but the story mostly leaned into the weird aspects of the alien’s physical body and lifestyle on Earth. Really this book feels more like horror than science fiction.
Overall, I think Dolki Min wrote a very unique story, and Victoria Caudle’s translation was very effective. I’d definitely be interested in reading more from them.
To tell the truth, having someone not reply and treat me as a nonentity is a teeth-chatteringly frightening experience. There are so many people who ignore someone as naturally as eating. […] Answering human leeches like her is almost like a reflex for me, probably because the violence of going unanswered has cut me to my core.
Honestly, relatable
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Murder, Sexual content, Gore, and Violence
Moderate: Fatphobia