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3.53 AVERAGE
3.53 AVERAGE
I wish I liked this book more.
The world-building was good. I enjoyed the writing. There were some interesting ideas.
But, there was very little happening, or to care about, with both the story and the characters. It really felt like almost nothing happened. Maybe that was intentional for a book about slow revolution, but it didn't work for me.
The few characters that I might have cared about took far too long for me to want to care, and then disappeared in giant time jumps. I got the need for time on the scale t's used, but it felt like it was just way to hand wave the end of character's arc.
It was a lot of time/words spent laying out "cool" ideas and technologies, with on-the nose social commentary, and an emotional "shoulder shrug" at the end of 350 pages.
The world-building was good. I enjoyed the writing. There were some interesting ideas.
But, there was very little happening, or to care about, with both the story and the characters. It really felt like almost nothing happened. Maybe that was intentional for a book about slow revolution, but it didn't work for me.
The few characters that I might have cared about took far too long for me to want to care, and then disappeared in giant time jumps. I got the need for time on the scale t's used, but it felt like it was just way to hand wave the end of character's arc.
It was a lot of time/words spent laying out "cool" ideas and technologies, with on-the nose social commentary, and an emotional "shoulder shrug" at the end of 350 pages.
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
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
Really enjoyed certain aspects of this one, particularly the main themes being a scathing indictment of capitalism and gentrification as well as a commentary on what it means to be a person, I really enjoyed the concept of the Great Bargain. It's a very inclusive book, very LGBTQ+ friendly with multiple characters representing a broad range of both sexual and gender identity.
What lets it down for me slightly is the pacing. Spoilers ahead...
The book features some pretty hefty time skips particularly between part 1 and part 2. Act 1 has a very fast pace and I really engaged with the characters and then all of a sudden their part is done and we skip ahead to a new main character and same again between part 2 and part 3. I enjoyed all of the characters, particularly Scrubjay, but I wanted more time with them. It really felt strange when each character's arc ended quite abruptly.
I was started to feel the narrative was losing it's way but then explodes into action for the final segment and ends on a hopeful note you can't help but enjoy.
I was started to feel the narrative was losing it's way but then explodes into action for the final segment and ends on a hopeful note you can't help but enjoy.
challenging
emotional
hopeful
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Inanimate objects and rodents as people? Meh! Sex between a robot and a cat? Why??
This book was a recommendation via an interview with the author on an NPR Podcast I subscribe to. It was made to sound like a fresh angle on Climate change and mitigation from elements of the environment like the soil and trees and animals that are able to communicate their wishes needs and general health to the people in charge of the environment. This allowed them to maintain balance in the ecosystem...or at least to know that when there is lack of balance, that nobody could claim they didn't know. However, this story took a turn for the fantastical with the introduction of naked mole rats as engineers and scientists and intelligent earthworms, and actually living breathing intelligent passenger trains. If this were about a struggle between different bioengineered humanoid species on the needs and expectations of the populations vs the health of the ecosystem, kind of what I was led to believe this would be, it would have been a fascinating angle to take. As it is, I finished the book with an image of an adult version of Thomas the Tank Engine.
This book was a recommendation via an interview with the author on an NPR Podcast I subscribe to. It was made to sound like a fresh angle on Climate change and mitigation from elements of the environment like the soil and trees and animals that are able to communicate their wishes needs and general health to the people in charge of the environment. This allowed them to maintain balance in the ecosystem...or at least to know that when there is lack of balance, that nobody could claim they didn't know. However, this story took a turn for the fantastical with the introduction of naked mole rats as engineers and scientists and intelligent earthworms, and actually living breathing intelligent passenger trains. If this were about a struggle between different bioengineered humanoid species on the needs and expectations of the populations vs the health of the ecosystem, kind of what I was led to believe this would be, it would have been a fascinating angle to take. As it is, I finished the book with an image of an adult version of Thomas the Tank Engine.
Such a thoughtful read! Questions of human rights. Animal sentience. Hired help versus enslaved poor. 50,000 years in the future where anything with a brain (robots, humans, cats, worms, smart transit) is considered a person. Trains and buildings made of organic matter have whole relationships with others. Homo Sapiens is a distant ancestor of the various H. subspecies to come. Listened mostly on audio. Totally enhanced my experience. I also would wholly sign up to have both petals and stamen!
adventurous
hopeful
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
This is my first read of anything by Annalee Newitz. There are a lot of cool ideas in this novel. The main premise of getting to follow what seems like a rather mundane and remote existence of a crew terraforming a planet for a millennium is interesting. Add in some conflict with inhabitants that were planned to have died out but didn’t and an overreaching super corporation that spans multiple solar systems dictating most of what you do, and you get some thought-provoking interactions and themes. The Terraformers feels like if you took the scope and scale of Children of Time added in some cozy, inclusive, queernorm and the banter of a crew from A Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet and then combine those with some conversations on sentience and personhood from both those novels and you get the vibe of this novel. There is also a good bit of what I feel like is just Newitz as well. I'm not familiar with their journalism or other novels but from what little I know it seems like their research and other work plays into the themes of this one.
There is even some off-the-wall imagination on display with a flying, talking moose and a cyborg cow. Where it didn’t quiet work for me was with the jokes. The humor and I didn’t jive for some reason. I also thought it was too preachy in parts and not in the good ways, it felt more like a monologue dump that was a facebook post than a dissertation or long form journalism. And lastly, I think the scope and scale messed with the pacing and detracted from giving the book a character or group of characters to latch onto. Seeing the different generations of terraformers and following the logistics of a terraforming process would seem to dictate that you have to jump around characters to cover the full procedure. But in the end, I was left wanting more slice of life moments with them and less worrying about what would happen in the end. I felt like the novel was built more on ideas and themes than a plot. The fate of planet or the people on it over the course of a thousand years or so was secondary at best in my reading. As the story progress though, the plot takes main stage, and I thought it took away from the other elements. This left me with an uneven overall experience.
Recently, I decided to make some chocolate chip cookies that were different from what I usually have. I went all out and bought and made some seriously premium individual ingredients. By themselves, what I added into the batch was all delicious, but the result just didn’t taste as good as the standard recipe I have been using for a decade. That is how this reading experience felt to me. All the elements it was made up were good, but together, they fell flat. The Terraformers lacked cohesion for me and it didn’t fully pull me in at any point. I didn’t connect with any of the many characters or get invested in the plot or the fate of Sask-E, I didn’t even get whisked away in the thought experiment or themes. I liked all these elements by themselves. Together they just left me feeling whelmed.
There is even some off-the-wall imagination on display with a flying, talking moose and a cyborg cow. Where it didn’t quiet work for me was with the jokes. The humor and I didn’t jive for some reason. I also thought it was too preachy in parts and not in the good ways, it felt more like a monologue dump that was a facebook post than a dissertation or long form journalism. And lastly, I think the scope and scale messed with the pacing and detracted from giving the book a character or group of characters to latch onto. Seeing the different generations of terraformers and following the logistics of a terraforming process would seem to dictate that you have to jump around characters to cover the full procedure. But in the end, I was left wanting more slice of life moments with them and less worrying about what would happen in the end. I felt like the novel was built more on ideas and themes than a plot. The fate of planet or the people on it over the course of a thousand years or so was secondary at best in my reading. As the story progress though, the plot takes main stage, and I thought it took away from the other elements. This left me with an uneven overall experience.
Recently, I decided to make some chocolate chip cookies that were different from what I usually have. I went all out and bought and made some seriously premium individual ingredients. By themselves, what I added into the batch was all delicious, but the result just didn’t taste as good as the standard recipe I have been using for a decade. That is how this reading experience felt to me. All the elements it was made up were good, but together, they fell flat. The Terraformers lacked cohesion for me and it didn’t fully pull me in at any point. I didn’t connect with any of the many characters or get invested in the plot or the fate of Sask-E, I didn’t even get whisked away in the thought experiment or themes. I liked all these elements by themselves. Together they just left me feeling whelmed.