Reviews with content warning for Gore - Severance

Kind of made me feel scared and sad and shocked at times. It toes the line between dark and satirical, where at times things are so dark you have to choose to laugh. I found both the past and the present well woven, it kept the pace moving. Not too sure what to take away from it. Kind of wild that it was written pre pandemic. And also very meta that candace works at Spectra. Defo made me feel lots of emotions, found it overall unsettling. Loneliness and made me think of Taiwan, some vivid descriptions of missing home, or what home is like, and what having a Chinese parent is like.

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josi1911's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense fast-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

3.5

I normally never read dystopian (if this book can be called that after we all have experienced COVID), but since it was for a book club, I was rather excited. The Beginning until maybe the 17/18 chapter were strong, but then it turned into the typical dystopian story of someone trying to escape their group mixed with cult-esque leadership.
The ending was such a letdown and the themes the book tried to tackle weren't fleshed out enough. How did the Fever transmit? It can't only be fungal, or at least it seemed to have to do with routine, nostalgia and remembering. But I can only say those keywords, because the story lacked fulfillment/tying up the loose ends and like I already said delving deeper into the social criticism it started.

The Author has sometimes beautiful prose with a minimalist but hard hitting tendency and some of the scenes (especially the gruesome ones) felt all too real. So it's sad that that wasn't utilized more to really make strong points regarding the mentioned themes.

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brookebatesratesbooks's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny hopeful reflective sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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j_m_alexander'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

4.25

On the surface this book could be described as a pandemic novel published prior to COVID-19 (2018) or even a zombie book (maybe?), but the heart of this book is about relationships, directionlessness, worth, autonomy, and big questions around purpose... at least that's my quick take on it - what is below is much more interesting than the surface-level.

This book is more focused on building out the main character and relationships than driving plot, not to say there isn't plot, it's just not the most important thing. I wonder if some people reading this book now will get too hung up on the pandemic details to appreciate the subtle relationships and character studies? I hope not. There is a back and forth in timeline and the slow cobbling together of details that I think was executed well. I don't think we are supposed to love our protagonist, Candace, but I can absolutely empathize with her, same with her mother, and ditto to other more minor characters. The writing itself was good, moody, restrained but had real feeling - Ling Ma knows how to build some quiet seething tension. Also, this feels very much a millennial book, I mean this as a compliment, I feel like we're just starting to get more quality books that get to the experiences and feelings of this generation - my generation. Ling Ma has a unique voice and in this book she lends it to feelings of powerfully bleak, barely controlled pointless rage and a questioning searching nature.

For many it may not be the time (or never be the time) to read a pandemic novel, with all the illness and death that goes along with that, but that is not the only trigger warning I feel should be mentioned, I will cut right to it - there are no quotation marks in this book, I repeat NO quotation marks. It is not necessary to use quotation marks in fiction, and in fact unquoting seems to be in fashion, but I know some readers still find this distressing when they come upon it on the page, so be forewarned - this book is devoid of quotation marks. I personally have gotten over this pet peeve, even find it can be make for a more seamless reading experience at times, but that's just me, you do you readers, if you "can't, JUST CAN'T", when it comes to the omission of these little marks well then just move right along, there are plenty of other books in the store/library.

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potatokao's review against another edition

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slow-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? N/A

4.5

the writing was beautiful and illustrative. i underlined in every chapter a sentence i needed to read. the back n forth between past and present was seamless, like a rocking chair. (rating especially writing over plot)

my original expectation was simply “zombie novel,” that’s all i had really heard. because of that, i felt the book was slow paced as i was waiting for adventure to happen.

however, once i realized what the book was about, i wept. her identity, her relationships, her family. i didnt expect to cry but her relationship with her mother was everything to me and i want to know more. i want to hear candace’s active voice on who she is, who she is in relation to her mother

, and who she will become as a mother.

even her tender moments with her father had me in pain.

candace is a passive character stuck on routine but i want nothing more than her to actively participate. if not now, then when.

there were moments where i felt underwhelmed from how passive candace was but i understand this is who she is. i wish she’ll grow more from here, away from our gaze.

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laceyc1's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

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bluejayreads's review

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challenging dark slow-paced

Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

I barely skimmed the back cover before picking this up. I’m trying to read more broadly. I don’t think I’ve ever read a satire, it’s by a Chinese author featuring a Chinese protagonist, and looked to be satirizing the meaninglessness of modern work culture (relatable) and post-apocalyptic fiction (I’ve read a lot, could be interesting).

This was published in 2018, but I had to check. I think it was supposed to be satire of the modern millennial life in NYC or the post-apocalyptic genre or both. In 2018, maybe it was. But in February 2022, nearly two years into a deadly global pandemic that varies only slightly from the “epidemic” of the book, Severance isn’t satire – it’s prophetic.

This book is told out of order, altering back and forth between Before and After. Before and After what isn’t obvious in the book, but it’s clear to me. I can’t pinpoint a particular event or moment, but my life has definitely divided into Before Covid and After Covid. “It seemed to happen gradually, then suddenly,” as Candace says. Candace keeps going into work as everything slowly crumbles, keeps trying to do her job even though there’s less and less job to do, until suddenly it’s After and things are completely different.

I am not going to talk about the After timeline. I am not prepared to touch those emotions right now.

I didn’t think I had much if any of that “collective pandemic trauma” people talk about. Then I read Severance, and it turns out I do. When Candace’s job started requiring N95 masks, I felt a sinking familiarity. When a character first said the phrase “these uncertain times,” it felt like a punch in the gut. This book pulls on the trauma of living through a pandemic and the horror of surviving an apocalypse and combines them into something vividly repulsive and hideously possible. It evokes the visceral terror of being in a place usually full of people and discovering you are alone; the agonizing helpless realization that even if you survive this, there is no future; the despair of knowing that even if the world is ending, the only thing you can do is get up and go to work.

I read this as an audiobook at work, my mind lost in the horror and despair of this barely-fictional world while my hands, nearly independent of the rest of me, did my job. Scan the box. Open the box. Take out the bag. Label the bag. Put the bag in a new box. Label the new box. I repeat the same process over and over again, just like the epidemic victims in the book. I think that’s what Severance is supposed to be satirizing.

If there is an apocalypse, it won’t be like any of my post-apocalyptic novels. If it’s like any work of fiction, it will be like this. And if that’s the case, I don’t think I want to survive. I took several books off my to-read list. I have no more desire to read any post-apocalypses. I am too afraid of surviving the end of the world.

I’ve never legitimately described a book as life-changing before, but Severance is. I feel like I’ve just realized the world is about to end and can’t understand everyone continuing on and worrying about unimportant stuff. I feel like I have to sit down and figure out what actually matters because most of the shit I’m doing now just doesn’t.

Severance feels terrifyingly, painfully, imminently possible. If no one ever recovered from covid, we might be living in the world of Severance right now.

This book is not satire. It’s psychological, existential horror.

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nyssbomb's review against another edition

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dark mysterious reflective sad tense slow-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? No

3.5

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