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3.49 AVERAGE
3.49 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
challenging
funny
lighthearted
reflective
medium-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:
No
Interesting and very unique. I think my version of it (an e-galley) might have suffered in the formatting, since it was often difficult to understand who was talking and when.
Ultimately, it was a unique bit of storytelling that I enjoyed very much.
Ultimately, it was a unique bit of storytelling that I enjoyed very much.
challenging
emotional
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
"It was ok" in the sense that it's got some interesting takes on posthumanity used as a retelling of Frankenstein, but both the narrative style and its erotic-speculative content felt overall chaotic.
I cannot put into words the experience I had reading this. I loved it and yet it terrified me, the similarities in my experience reading this book are so parallel to my reading on Frankenstein that this feels like a twisted sequel. Such an expansion on ideas and uh! It is very good. I really enjoyed it.
I really liked this. Wish I could give 4.5 or 4.75 stars. It's queer and spooky, trans and sexy, funny and very intelligent. I could definitely reread this a few times.
So, this is the last book I finished in 2021, and I can honestly say that I’m disappointed that I ended it on this transphobic piece of shit. I wish I had chosen to not finish it rather than give it the benefit of the doubt, and it’s honestly something that I don’t say often about books. I gave it a shot through the eye rolling lack of quotation marks (it doesn’t make it literary, it just makes it a pain in the ass). I gave it a chance through the excruciating chapters about sex bots and the speculation about “what it meant for women”. I gave it a chance through the painfully one note religious black woman. I even gave it a shot through the bullshit “is it your story coming to life or is this rando just crazy or???” plot line that she threw in halfway through the Mary Shelley parts of the book. But after a certain point a lot of the things people were saying in the modern part of the book started to sound like the bs that a certain type of British TERF throws around, and I finally did a Google search for the author’s name and gender critical, and guess what the fuck I found, her putting out some hand wringing bullshit about “oh what if we’re giving kids hormones too soon”. That put the rampant transphobia and gratuitous sexual assault of a trans person that got thrown at the reader out of nowhere in the rest of the book into context. I’m genuinely angry that I got pitched what seemed like an interesting take on a trans character in the context of the Frankenstein idea, and nah, it’s just some transphobic Frankenstein’s monster bullshit dressed up in the pretension of “being literary”. Winterson even pulls the “I hope I didn’t cause offense, it’s just a story” horseshit in the author’s notes at the end and that’s where I ended up throwing the book. This is going into a little free library with a sticky note that warns for transphobic bs because I would rather whoever comes on this next come into it with the warning of what they’re getting themselves into.
challenging
informative
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
amazing!! book made me go insane!!! jeanette cannot write a bad book!! the circular narratives were so well done, intertwining between the past and the present, because we never seem to learn our lessons. her thoughts on transhumanism were very nuanced and interesting, fiction interwoven with real fact and understanding. so relevant, writing is beautiful, characters are riveting, the mix of politics was just the icing on the cake for me! I cannot recommend this book highly enough. read all of her works, but this one!! this one in particular!!!
led me to consider what makes a person themselves, is there some innate quality that you can find or is it impossible to differentiate the body from the self. who would I be without the constraints of physicality? could I even compare my current self to this unembodied version. what is nature without nurture? can there be a self without a body for context? at present, I don't believe there is an innate self within me - everything i do, love, choose comes with the context of my body and it's position within society. without my body, I would cease to be me.
led me to consider what makes a person themselves, is there some innate quality that you can find or is it impossible to differentiate the body from the self. who would I be without the constraints of physicality? could I even compare my current self to this unembodied version. what is nature without nurture? can there be a self without a body for context? at present, I don't believe there is an innate self within me - everything i do, love, choose comes with the context of my body and it's position within society. without my body, I would cease to be me.