Reviews - Katabasis | The StoryGraph

595 reviews for:

Katabasis

R.F. Kuang

4.01 AVERAGE

loleia's review against another edition

5.0

meet you in hell (romantically)

bookaroundandfindout's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny informative mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

This is probably the most unhinged yet oddly relatable book I’ve read in a long time. For context, two PhD students go to Hell TJ get their advisor so they can have a future career. What starts out as a simple mission slowly unravels as we come to understand that these two characters are way more than meets the eye and they both think the worst of themselves and the best of each other. There’s a lot of weird growth in this book, lots of humor, and just UNHINGED satire to a point where I’m sitting here wondering WTF did I just read? But did I tear through the book? Yes I did. I think this is a great book if you have a type A personality, ever went to grad school or school in general and love exploring the themes of hell and the what if it brings when you wonder about the unknown. I really loved it and can’t wait to re-read it.

smallsnoot's review against another edition

4.75

adventurous dark emotional hopeful medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

kaniiks's review against another edition

3.25

adventurous challenging medium-paced

sasha_karamyshev's review against another edition

3.5

At times it was a pretty engrossing story. It definitely felt closer to hearing R F Kuang’s personal voice than Babel did. Much more a story about grad school than one about hell (imo) — which is not a bad thing, just not exactly what I expected. The stories from inside vs outside hell felt disjointed in the first half of the book. It felt like they may have been better as separate books. Hell seemed at times like more of a setting than driving force (idk if that makes sense). But it felt more clear once everything was mainly just in hell. Some aspects probably went over my head because I don’t know/haven’t read many of the philosophers / accounts of hell she references. But it’s not too overly worried about mechanics which I liked. I didn’t always love the prose and dialogue but that’s just personal preference.

Overall I would recommend people who are interested read it, but I probably won’t reread 🫶

brons_books's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous emotional funny 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: Yes

namla's review against another edition

1.0

slow-paced

If the shit that comes out during severe constipation, was to turn into a book , it would be named katabasis
It lacks a lot of things to be considered a healthy shit