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3.57 AVERAGE
3.57 AVERAGE
4 stars flat. Weird. Powerful ending. (not a romance :( )
Really different. Felt like some of the background was missing, but a unique and interesting read.
loved the plot structure (you'll see it quick enough) and the mastery of casual-scientific prose
The book ‘Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach’ by Kelly Robson is very good, except that it felt incomplete to me, like it was missing the last chapter. Of course, in real life, all of us currently alive are right now missing the final chapter of our actual future, aren’t we? We aren’t capable of traveling into the future like Doctor Who and his Tardis. In this sense, our personal stories are incomplete, although most of us are able to extrapolate what is likely to happen. Ok, ok, I am getting carried away. ‘Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach’ did that to me. I think the novel is an extreme mind game of literary playfulness. Of course, maybe I am reading too much into it.
Until the last page, I was completely immersed in this science fiction story. It manages in only a few hundred pages to present a future which is both hopeful and dystopian. The Earth is a ruined and poisoned mess caused by Mankind, but some people have climbed out of the underground cities they built to survive and are scientifically attempting to fix the ecological damage on the surface of the planet. Technology is very very advanced. People can opt for body modifications for improved mobility and functionality. However, not everyone agrees with moving forward in fixing the present state (actually, our future state, in two meanings of the word, literally and figuratively, fictionally, haha) of Earth that way because time travel has been invented. Banks, with the power of financing scientific projects if they so choose to do so, hold all of the cards of what the future will look like, and also the past…my head is starting to hurt, gentler reader…
I have copied the book blurb:
”Discover a shifting history of adventure as humanity clashes over whether to repair their ruined planet or luxuriate in a less tainted past.
In 2267, Earth has just begun to recover from worldwide ecological disasters. Minh is part of the generation that first moved back up to the surface of the Earth from the underground hells, to reclaim humanity's ancestral habitat. She's spent her entire life restoring river ecosystems, but lately the kind of long-term restoration projects Minh works on have been stalled due to the invention of time travel. When she gets the opportunity take a team to 2000 BC to survey the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, she jumps at the chance to uncover the secrets of the shadowy think tank that controls time travel technology.”
The writing is concise with no unnecessary verbiage, with two parallel narratives happening in our present timeline at the same time, at least in my uncollapsed timeline of reading the novel now, but actually being a future and past story being told concurrently. Readers will need to pay close attention as every word matters to understanding what is going on. The author does give readers everything they need to know until the ending, where she leaves readers suspended in Time, lost, not knowing what happens in the future or in the new past. I felt like I was in a weird language arts class studying a huge past perfect simple tense joke used to drive the plot forward (and back) in a science fiction story after finishing (?). Discuss.
Until the last page, I was completely immersed in this science fiction story. It manages in only a few hundred pages to present a future which is both hopeful and dystopian. The Earth is a ruined and poisoned mess caused by Mankind, but some people have climbed out of the underground cities they built to survive and are scientifically attempting to fix the ecological damage on the surface of the planet. Technology is very very advanced. People can opt for body modifications for improved mobility and functionality. However, not everyone agrees with moving forward in fixing the present state (actually, our future state, in two meanings of the word, literally and figuratively, fictionally, haha) of Earth that way because time travel has been invented. Banks, with the power of financing scientific projects if they so choose to do so, hold all of the cards of what the future will look like, and also the past…my head is starting to hurt, gentler reader…
I have copied the book blurb:
”Discover a shifting history of adventure as humanity clashes over whether to repair their ruined planet or luxuriate in a less tainted past.
In 2267, Earth has just begun to recover from worldwide ecological disasters. Minh is part of the generation that first moved back up to the surface of the Earth from the underground hells, to reclaim humanity's ancestral habitat. She's spent her entire life restoring river ecosystems, but lately the kind of long-term restoration projects Minh works on have been stalled due to the invention of time travel. When she gets the opportunity take a team to 2000 BC to survey the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, she jumps at the chance to uncover the secrets of the shadowy think tank that controls time travel technology.”
The writing is concise with no unnecessary verbiage, with two parallel narratives happening in our present timeline at the same time, at least in my uncollapsed timeline of reading the novel now, but actually being a future and past story being told concurrently. Readers will need to pay close attention as every word matters to understanding what is going on. The author does give readers everything they need to know until the ending, where she leaves readers suspended in Time, lost, not knowing what happens in the future or in the new past. I felt like I was in a weird language arts class studying a huge past perfect simple tense joke used to drive the plot forward (and back) in a science fiction story after finishing (?). Discuss.
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A
Fun post-apocalypse terra-forming time-travelling sci-fi. Somehow manages to be about project management in an impossibly far-distant future. Sweet characters, fun ideas and a decent story arc. Ends in a rush, sadly, but makes me want to look at the author’s other work
Fun Read
Really like the ending. The action sequences are well written and there are many thought provoking concepts in this novel.
Really like the ending. The action sequences are well written and there are many thought provoking concepts in this novel.
I wanted to like this novella more than I actually did. There are a lot of story elements that appeal to me such as time travel and dystopian futures, but in the length of the story everything felt too busy and there wasn’t enough world building to keep me engaged
Ancient Mesopotamia, time travel, ecological surveys, tentacle-like mechanical limbs: This novella combines a lot of different elements for unique worldbuilding. I've never read a world quite like this one, and I would have happily read more pages that followed Minh, Kiki, and Hamid on their adventures. I enjoyed seeing how Robson takes consulting, banking, grant-writing, etc. and imagines it through a futuristic lens, though other readers might get bogged down in the bureaucracy as Minh & Co. try to win the contract. It's a lot to take in at once, and I felt like sometimes the various elements never cohered together as well as I would have liked. Things do smooth out around the halfway point, when the team finally makes the time travel and arrives on the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates. However, I couldn't help but feel that the book ended right as the real story was beginning, and the conclusion is quite fast and even abrupt. I think Robson may be working on a sequel, which I'll happily check out if/when it becomes available.