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3.75 AVERAGE
3.75 AVERAGE
adventurous
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
This book feels like reading the magic far away tree. I absolutely loved it.
slow-paced
'The Cautious Traveller's Guide to the Wastelands', by Sarah Brooks. Read for the r/fantasy bingo challenge. Square: Down with the System, a book in which a main plot revolves around disrupting a system. Hard Mode: Not a governmental system? Check - you can have either disrupting the careful anti-contamination measures aboard the train, or disrupting the train company itself.
Combined with Tchaikovsky's Alien Clay, this is the second book I've read for this challenge where the protagonists initially fear a hostile and unduly-sentient landscape with high levels of interconnectivity between its residents and mind-altering effects on human beings, and go to great lengths to avoid contamination by it, but ultimately form a symbiotic relationship with the landscape, establish a new community built around it and set out to transmit the contagion/enlightenment to previously unaffected humans . It's a very specific re-occurrence. And I'm only four books into the challenge! Could this be a new genre? Is it all a metaphor for embracing the effects of climate change? ... Probably not.
The premise is that that a vast swath of land between Moscow and Beijing has been taken over by the mysterious Wastelands, where biology runs riot and humans develop amnesia. The fastest and indeed only route through the Wastelands is aboard the Trans-Siberian Express, a hulking armoured train. The train is now setting out again from Beijing, destination a great international expo in Moscow. The mood is tense, though; the previous run ended in contamination, mass staff and passenger amnesia and disgrace for the train's glassmaker, whose shoddy work allowed a window to break and let in the tainted air. The passengers and staff entrusting their sanity to the train's defenses for this trip include a woman hiding her true identity to investigate the events of the previous crossing; a naturalist trying to gather specimens from the Wastelands in a desperate attempt to save his career; a child of the train, born and orphaned aboard and recruited into its service; a mysterious stowaway; and the two sinister representatives of the train company, the Crows. With these clashing elements aboard, the train rattles into fifteen days of isolation and danger!
It's a great premise. Sadly, the execution fell short for me.
This was partly to do with the three POV characters. Lying Marya is the most solid, because she has a clear objective and good reasons for her actions. Train-baby Weiwei, however, throws over the regulations and precautions that are literally all she's ever known far too quickly and easily; the most plausible explanation is that she's immediately infatuated with stowaway Elena, but that's not dwelt on or seriously discussed. Naturalist Gray is as dull as the name would suggest and, though he's set up as a major concern, the reader knows from Weiwei's POV that firstly, he's no threat to Elena, and secondly, anything he does to risk contamination is a drop in the bucket next to what Weiwei's done and will keep doing.
Another factor, however, was in the dissatisfying ending; I would have preferred more on the collapse of the company , rather than the found family escape back into the wilderness . The established, demonstrated mind-fraying effects of the Wastelands also have to be disregarded in order for it to work - there's no particular suggestion countermeasures have been found, so that all seems to just stop happening for the sake of the plot.
2.5.
adventurous
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I enjoyed the premise and the whimsy. I think a little more explanation would have been helpful.
There is something about this book that will stick with me for a long time. Not the plot or the characters themselves, but the feel of the Wastelands and its persistence. I have felt it all, reading this book, but I wish the world building was a bit grander. There is so much wonder and lore that exists within these pages that will stay with me for a while, and I feel the author has not done them justice with a book so short. I wish the epilogue was a book on its own, and everything that came before that much less rushed; which is why I am docking one star off.
Between China and Russia stretches the wastelands, an odd place where nothing ever stays the same and the air is poison. Crossing the wilderness is the trans Siberian railway with its cast of characters - Weiwei, child the train, and Marya, seeking to investigate her father's death.
The setting is odd and dreamlike and vaguely creepy! The growing lichen and giant moths bring fairy land to mind. This was very interesting but didnt quite come off for me! The characters did not seem distinct and made off choices
The setting is odd and dreamlike and vaguely creepy! The growing lichen and giant moths bring fairy land to mind. This was very interesting but didnt quite come off for me! The characters did not seem distinct and made off choices
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
So there is such a thing as too many plot threads
adventurous
mysterious
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:
No