Reviews

Assembly by Natasha Brown

imjjules's review against another edition

challenging reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

annegrmn's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

enaberry's review against another edition

challenging informative inspiring reflective tense slow-paced

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

4.5

smal_practice's review against another edition

challenging funny reflective slow-paced

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

2.5

julietlub's review against another edition

challenging dark sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

hicklit's review

4.0

Wrestling with a fate it seems she knew she might or would have, the narrator of this book, who seems to remain unnamed to my knowledge - maybe to tell a thousand stories in one vaguely specific one, weaves a poetic essay of long flitted prose and staccato beats to best describe another hyphenated tale on colonizers land.

Eloquently and bluntly spoken she details encounters of generational and individual past present and future of what it means to be black in a place that will only ever see you as citizen adjacent. Displaced human number …. So many of us of color born or moved, in spaces with solely white tropes face macro and micro aggressions throughout our days that leave us breathless, numb, and enraged. I found myself relating to her plight in so many ways yet frustrated that she never took off that last layer of clothed perception or muted politeness to diss the people who continued to beat her down. Scream. The narrator was passed fighting, passed proving a point, and passed plotting the future. For the first time she was in it and just deciding to float.

At times I would have brief moments of not knowing what was going on, mainly at the first few pages of the book and once or twice in the middle but I think the weaving in out of time as if she was already so distanced from society and the constructs of time, seemed purposeful. You know her MO but never enough to actually pin her down. The only way she seemed to think she could be free.

lydia_woolf's review against another edition

hopeful reflective fast-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

4.5

laurenscholle's review

3.0

3.5. we love some good old depersonalization.

matildabates's review against another edition

wish this was a bit more developed

ashbandicoot90's review against another edition

adventurous dark informative reflective sad medium-paced

3.0

Skims the surface of what it is to be here but also not really here - which was probably part of the point of the prose too tbf. Left wanting a lot more craft though, and less scrapbooking of the world.