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scifi_rat's review against another edition
- Loveable characters? No
2.5
Moderate: Animal cruelty, Colonisation, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, War, Xenophobia, Slavery, and Sexual content
yourbookishbff's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
1) The structure. Short, fast-paced chapters within a clearly defined three-part story. This seems trivial, but I honestly felt like this accessible structure made it easy to follow the characters and the action and kept the plot moving. In each of the three parts we have a core cast (with connections between each generation) and an evolving picture of Sask-E, and because each generation has its own corporate obstacles, there is always a clear (and unique) central conflict.
2) The world-building. For as many creatures and constructs of human-level intelligence as there are in this story, it's surprisingly easy to get acclimated. A world in which "The Great Bargain" has determined which creatures can participate as equals in self-governance means a world in which a moose or a cow or an earthworm may be your partner in the field. I loved our wacky cast of characters, and appreciated that the moments of levity are counterbalanced with moments of uncomfortable reflection. Ideas of defining personhood and measuring intelligence reminded me of Martha Wells' Murderbot universe, as did the futuristic corporate-colonizing space-race.
3) The audio! There are so many implied/described sound effects in the story that are brought to life in the audiobook - Crisp and Hellfire's doubled speech, our various bots' conversational sound effects, the train song in part three (perhaps my favorite part of the entire story!). This narration elevated the reading experience for me (and I say this as a reader who generally has not enjoyed Graphic Audio productions that include sound effects).
I wouldn't consider this a sci-fi entry point for newer readers to the genre, but it is a thought-provoking and unique read for sci-fi fans!
Graphic: Murder, Violence, Colonisation, Death, Classism, and Police brutality
Moderate: Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail, Slavery, and Animal death
Minor: Sexual content
greystory's review
Sooo when I borrowed this book from my library, the blurb for it only mentions Destry's story and that it spans thousands of years. Nowhere is Misha or another major character mentioned like the Goodreads blurb so I was completely unprepared for the sudden time jump and announcement that the vast majority of all characters I'd come to know and was invested in were now dead.
Had I known that - had I seen the blurb here where it mentions a second story about Misha, I would have looked into it more. I would have tried to determine if these are two stories told at the same time or what, and discovered that they're told chronologically. Had I done all that, I would have decided to not read this book.
I feel like I'm starting a second book after the first book had only a mildly satisfying but too short ending. I get that the overall story for this book is meant to be about the planet and the very, very long-term repercussions of ecological decisions but I can't bring myself to give a shit. I'm not invested in the planet. The planet is a backdrop, an interesting place to build your story but not strong enough to be The Story itself. Even in the universe Newitz created, the planet Sask-E could have easily been replaced with any other planet in the system and the story would have felt the same.
It was the people, the characters, making the story special and that's what you spent half the book getting me invested in. I don't want to start over with a second story about new characters, and judging from the goodreads blurb mentioning a future child, I don't even trust that I wouldn't have this second set of characters ripped from me as well to have a third character story going at the end. No thank you.
ETA: I skimmed a lot of other reviews after I decided not to continue and I agree that the good vs bad distinction was pretty black and white, that the ecoconservatism was very heavy handed (although it didn't bother me as much), and a lot of stuff was cool in terms of world-building but storywise not necessarily nuanced.
Moderate: Murder, War, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Death, and Animal death
wlewis98's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.5
Graphic: Death, Colonisation, Sexual content, and Animal death
soph_e_c's review
- 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
3.75
Moderate: Death and War
remingtonjill's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
- I really enjoyed this one!
- The concept of terraforming new planets and prioritizing environmental protection was refreshing and engaging for me
- Of the three parts, the first one was by far my favorite and the easiest to follow. The abrupt shift from part one to part two was a little difficult for me, and the story of a main character in part one felt unresolved to me. I would have liked more closure on their story.
- I like how the three parts connect, but I feel I would have enjoyed them more as three separate novellas, rather than one long book, similar to the Wayfarer’s series by Becky Chambers.
- I appreciate the way these parts explored such a long stretch of time on this planet, and how no matter the good intentions, there is not a perfect way to colonize a planet (even if uninhabited), and people in power will often not choose to meet the needs of the majority of citizens and instead prioritize profits.
- I also enjoyed the way this novel explored the boundaries of who counts at a person and what the ramifications of that are.
Moderate: Death and War
schnaucl's review
- 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
4.5
I did like the concept of the minority getting one concession from the majority that the minority gets to specify when a vote is taken, although I feel like that only really works if there's agreement on why the minority is voting against the majority. And if everyone is operating in good faith, of course.
Graphic: Classism, Death, War, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Colonisation, and Gun violence
Moderate: Blood, Murder, Death of parent, and Animal death
jodean's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.75
The writing style is the only thing I can't get past. It's not my thing. But the premises were interesting enough that I had to keep reading.
Graphic: Racism, Sexual content, Slavery, Xenophobia, and Police brutality
Moderate: Death and Death of parent
Minor: Violence and War
laurareads87's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
3.25
What I liked: I quite liked the incorporation of multiple POVs using jumps in time period, and the incorporation of items like reports and transmissions into the text. I liked the exploration of speciesism & the world-building in which animals of all types are, in at least some contexts, meaningfully conceived of as persons. I like SFF that contrasts societies with dramatically different worldviews and that look at political decision-making as a process, and felt like this was handled well.
What I didn't love: I feel like there was very little ethical ambiguity in the characters, and that many (most) of the characters read as rather immature despite their lengthy lifespans. The antagonists at times felt like cartoon villains. Of the three, I found the middle section dragged on a bit and was less compelling than the other two.
Content warnings: violence, murder, animal death, human death, slavery, classism, war
Moderate: Death, Slavery, Classism, War, Violence, Murder, and Animal death
tigger89's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
For the most part, I also found the characters to be a major strength. They do have a distinctly Becky Chambers vibe to them, though with variations on human and animal genomes rather than alien physiologies. This book has homo sapiens, neanderthal throwbacks, designer human genomes, robotic drones, sentient infrastructure, intelligent animals, collective beings, and many flavors of mechanical enhancement to biological bodies. The explorations of personhood were particularly intriguing, if horrifying when pushed to their inevitable conclusion under capitalism.
And yes, this is an extremely anti-capitalist book. In fact, if I'm going to point to anything as its flaw, it's probably related to that. Specifically, the two primary villains, the faces of the evil corporations, felt very one-dimensional to me. I'm someone who appreciates a nuanced villain. I see where Newitz did try to add some layers to the two of them, a cycle of revenge spanning hundreds of years, but ultimately it felt like their primary motivation to be evil was because they're part of a corporation, and didn't you know corporations are evil profit-suckers? I especially felt that the primary villain of the last section escalated from like 25% evil to 125% evil out of nowhere. I suppose it could have been a result of the 900-year time skip between sections two and three, in the sense that having so much time to stew might drive anyone to extremes. But there were other long-lived characters who didn't fall off the deep end while we weren't watching, so if that was Newitz's idea there(and I'm speculating, really), I think they needed to explore that contrast a little more in order to do those ladies justice.
This book has a number of LGBTQ(and probably some other letters that don't exist yet) characters, for those who are interested. Minor themes of chosen family might also be relevant to many readers. There are a few sexy scenes, skimmable if that's not your vibe. Nothing massively plot-relevant happens in them, just character development and curious physiology(I'm never going to look at a flower the same way again, there's knowing flowers are sexy and then there's knowing). All in all, I'd recommend the read. As I said before, parts of it feel cozy, but there's also a violence and sense of revolution to it that contrasts very nicely with the cozier parts. It also ends on a note that's undeniably hopeful, yet not saccharine.
Graphic: Violence and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Colonisation, Death, Death of parent, War, and Murder
There's recurring themes of species-ism(non-human species being discriminated against) as well as intelligence-based discrimination. It's not quite racism and not quite ableism, respectively, but it's in the same ballpark.