Reviews tagging 'Pandemic/Epidemic'

Babel, or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution by R.F. Kuang

59 reviews

cherryfreckle's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Torture, Suicide, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Colonisation, Xenophobia, Toxic friendship, Confinement, Hate crime, Classism, Death, War, Racial slurs, Misogyny, Grief, Emotional abuse, Deportation, Domestic abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Slavery, Physical abuse, Murder, Sexism, and Racism

Moderate: Gun violence, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Death of parent

Minor: Drug use, Injury/Injury detail, Drug abuse, and Alcohol

broken_biscuits's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative tense medium-paced

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

3.5

As a political thought piece, great. As an actual story, a little rough. While the magic system was *so* cool, I was a little disappointed in the character writing. Still felt like a worthy and important read. I feel like it did a lot of telling the reader how to feel about things, which kind of took me out of the experience, even though I agreed with what I was "supposed to feel." I didn't feel hardly any connection to the characters, since they felt like they were created to make a point. Especially the main character. Victoire and Ramy were the most real to me, but they still kinda felt like plot devices. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Police brutality, Colonisation, Islamophobia, Misogyny, Pandemic/Epidemic, Torture, Violence, Racial slurs, Racism, Suicide, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Child abuse, Classism, Physical abuse, Blood, Hate crime, Body horror, Death, Grief, and Murder

libellumartinae's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

I'd like to preface this by saying that I genuinely believe that this book having half the pages that it had would have been a better choice, because the writing was just low key ridiculous at times. Starting in media res would have been far more exciting and intriguing and although I do realize the author's reasoning between drilling us with the purpose of this book, it still felt at times empty and without meaning. As did the characters. I genuinely think I have a problem with R. F. Kuang's characters, because I find them so empty and little developed, always going through by stereotypes which I think is a consequences of the author's strong ideologies pushed on them (which I am not against, but for example I felt Victoire utterly useless till the ending and then it was a bit meh; similarly with Robin, who is the mc, there were times when I felt so little interest and development).

I also think that oftentimes there were too many repetitions of some concepts, such as the magic and world building, still I think that on those topics the book is utterly amazing and bring forward a charming and shocking portrayal and a clear critique that should definitely be read by everybody as it also brings forward future and present concerns and I am not going to lie, as a translator and expert of latin and Ancient Greek, this book did feel like a love letter to the act of translating and languages, although at times the linguistic reflections could be a bit boring and useless for the plot.

Overall, I think it's a good book albeit not worth the hype around it and that while in spirit it has good intentions, the actual writing of it could have been worked over so much better.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Xenophobia, Death of parent, Violence, War, Child death, Suicidal thoughts, Sexism, Pandemic/Epidemic, Gore, Misogyny, and Religious bigotry

keltaklo's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad tense 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? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Physical abuse, Slavery, Emotional abuse, Colonisation, Sexism, Death of parent, Grief, Racism, Racial slurs, Classism, Death, and Child abuse

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Religious bigotry, Bullying, Abandonment, Alcoholism, Alcohol, Pandemic/Epidemic, Drug use, Drug abuse, and War

Minor: Torture, Sexual harassment, Suicidal thoughts, and Deportation

leonkaspar's review against another edition

dark emotional funny informative inspiring mysterious reflective tense 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? It's complicated

5.0

The way Kuang manages to use symbols and fantasy to recreate the structural issues of our world is mesmerising. 
I love the way the footnotes are embedded into the story and how they highlight the necessary passages with a poignant and scarcastic undertone.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Genocide, Racism, Injury/Injury detail, Death of parent, Violence, Drug abuse, Gun violence, Pandemic/Epidemic, Abandonment, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Cultural appropriation, Slavery, Classism, Colonisation, Death, Suicidal thoughts, and Grief

bree_h_reads's review against another edition

dark emotional informative reflective sad 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

5.0

I wasn’t sure what to expect from Babel, but suffice it to say I wasn’t disappointed.

While it was a bit slow and some sections were written in a confusing way, it didn’t overshadow the story being told. Every character felt so vivid and alive, like they had a weight and complexity to them. And this bled into every character dynamic and relationship.

I felt like the themes and messages of the book were well conveyed. Overall it really made me think and reevaluate things I had been taught to just accept and gave a new perspective on history.

It was also written in a very potent way, to the point it felt easy to fall into the story and understand it and the characters. Overall it’s a great book and I highly recommend checking it out.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Violence, Child abuse, Sexual harassment, Suicide, Pandemic/Epidemic, Physical abuse, Death of parent, Racism, Sexism, Colonisation, Death, Gun violence, Misogyny, Alcohol, Blood, Emotional abuse, Racial slurs, and Xenophobia

Moderate: Drug abuse, Slavery, Sexual violence, Injury/Injury detail, War, and Addiction

lipka's review against another edition

emotional sad tense 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? It's complicated

5.0

It is "a thematic response to The Secret History, and a tonal retort to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell." 

I think my favorite was the fluttering. ᜋᜌ᜔ ᜉᜃ᜔ᜉᜃ᜔ ᜀᜅ᜔ ᜊᜎᜒᜆ. It ends only as it ever could. The audiobook narration is beautiful. The protagonist's voice ages and breaks. Please send birds.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Xenophobia, Classism, Colonisation, and Sexism

Moderate: Death, Death of parent, Gun violence, Racial slurs, Slavery, Murder, Suicide, Violence, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, War, Child abuse, and Police brutality

Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic, Drug use, Alcohol, Deportation, Religious bigotry, Confinement, Drug abuse, and Sexual harassment

In the second half of the book, sinophobic slurs are weaponized against characters, several times.

elysianemily's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-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? Yes

4.0

*I will attempt keep this as spoiler-free as possible but proceed cautiously!

Summary: This book is objectively a solid 3.5/5 star read, but I have promoted it to 4 stars due to my personal bias toward the subject material. I am a person who is enamored with etymology and translation while being drawn to the dark academia genre. I found this to be an interesting spin on the genre and thus have given Ms. Kuang the benefit of the doubt throughout my long journey of reading this book. Below I will lay out what I liked about this and what I thought could have been better. 

Pros: 
- This is a book for linguistic nerds! And it delivered! I found myself genuinely fascinated by R.F. Kuang's footnotes providing etymological and historical context.
- Along the same note as the above bullet point, I did enjoy how the footnotes provided a sense of dramatic irony (yes, I am pulling out some dormant AP Lit terminology here). Much like plays and musicals add 'asides' to the audience, I overall thought this element was executed effectively. 
- I love the characters! I found myself crying and laughing and thinking along with them. I also liked how from the very first chapter, it was clear that our protagonist, Robin, is not supposed to be perfect; and, to me, this characterization remained constant until the end. Victoire was the wisest among them and I am satisfied with her ending (sequel coming?). Ramy added comic relief that every book should have, of course. And Letty—well, I won't spoil anything—I have mixed feelings about (which I assume was the point). I would do a deep dive into every facet of each character but I am simply too lazy to put it here. That will have to stay in my head. 

Cons:
- Upon perusing other reviews here, I can agree with the consensus that many parts could have been cut out for the sake of being too repetitive. It did feel like the same point was being drilled into the reader too many times, that by the end, it felt tedious. I also don't feel the thesis of the book is particularly saying anything new...just perhaps a different way of telling it. 
- The "magic" system (so to speak) in this book did add an air of complication that would have not existed if this were pure historical fiction. I agree with other reviews here on that front. 
- I am a sucker for drama, but somehow I felt the theatrics of the final 1/3 of the book happened too quickly and almost out of nothing. At some point, I was thinking to myself: "Ok, this is a bit corny" (I was reminded to my amusement of that infamous "Watcha Say" skit from SNL, if you know what I mean).

Anyway, this is a long book, so here is a long review. Cheers!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Death of parent, Xenophobia, Racism, and Murder

Moderate: Classism, Grief, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, and Child abuse

Minor: Violence, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual harassment, Pandemic/Epidemic, and War

bobaduckie's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Gun violence, Violence, Grief, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, War, Sexism, Death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Murder, Xenophobia, Torture, Colonisation, Hate crime, Gore, and Racial slurs

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Child abuse, Pandemic/Epidemic, Sexual assault, Physical abuse, Blood, Sexual harassment, Abandonment, Toxic friendship, and Slavery

Minor: Police brutality, Religious bigotry, Islamophobia, and Cultural appropriation

Spoilers ahead: Betrayal because

Letty shoots Ramy and turns Hermes in

toniboi's review against another edition

challenging emotional inspiring reflective 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? No

5.0

Instant favorite.  R.F. Kuang's writing style is captivating and deeply impressive.  Her use of footnotes cleverly reflects the scholarly setting while enhancing the reading experience.  The characters are full, varied, and mercilessly realistic.  It may be historical fiction, but every page is relevant to today.  Babel unapologetically depicts the truth that resistance is never palatable to the oppressor, no matter what form it takes.  Even if you don't typically read fantasy or dark academia, read, read, READ this book!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gaslighting, Xenophobia, Colonisation, and Racism

Moderate: Classism, Suicide, Child abuse, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic