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3.53 AVERAGE
3.53 AVERAGE
adventurous
hopeful
inspiring
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:
No
This is good, solid sci-fi with interesting world building and characters. The story feels a little too modern day focused, which feels especially silly being plopped into circa 57,000. For example, everyone introduces themselves with their pronouns. I’m pro-pronouns, but they feels like a very 2020s conversation…surely the future is beyond it. But, I liked the focus on community and hard work that sees little, hopeful changes.
I DNF this one which I'm kind of sad about because the world and the commentary were very interesting to me. It's very fantastical and I was thrilled with it not being a dystopic read, but the sex scenes are just not for me.
adventurous
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:
No
Kept me entertained enough to finish it, but the writing was really heavy handed. It didn't feel like speculative fiction so much as it felt like the author was just describing the exact specific societal and political issues of today, but in space and in different bodies. None of the characters felt multi-dimensional or complex, or even very different from each other. It was *almost* an interesting and imaginative book and I kept wanting to like it, but it just had so much room to do so much better than it did in nearly every way.
informative
reflective
slow-paced
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
relaxing
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
While I liked the overall „good-vibes“ style of this book, it lacked tension to me. The threats in the story never really felt that dangerous, as they were often resolved again after a few pages, making it hard to get too excited. Especially in part one and two – whereas in the third part the story finally got a little more dramatic.
And while I like being thrown into settings and scenes with weird tech and characters that only make sense later on in the story, some of it felt a bit too fantastical for me to really hold my attention. A moose that communicates with humans by sending texts, has a drone for their best friend and is able to fly around a planet in couple of days? Feels a bit over the top. Surprisingly I liked the third part most, which is told from the perspective of a sentient flying train – but this character seemed so much more well rounded that I enjoyed reading from their pov most.
Overall the themes and ideas are great, but it didn’t really work for me in regards to plot and pace to make it a great book.
And while I like being thrown into settings and scenes with weird tech and characters that only make sense later on in the story, some of it felt a bit too fantastical for me to really hold my attention. A moose that communicates with humans by sending texts, has a drone for their best friend and is able to fly around a planet in couple of days? Feels a bit over the top. Surprisingly I liked the third part most, which is told from the perspective of a sentient flying train – but this character seemed so much more well rounded that I enjoyed reading from their pov most.
Overall the themes and ideas are great, but it didn’t really work for me in regards to plot and pace to make it a great book.
I don't ever read sci-fi, so I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked this book. It did get a little too out there for me at times (the last part is from the point of view of a sentient flying train), and I thought it was a bit too broad and far-reaching to completely make sense. Overall I thought the writing was great, and the worldbuilding was impressive.
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
adventurous
hopeful
lighthearted
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Sweeping, grand, and grounded.
Terraformers has got the heavy sci-fi of, well, terraforming, plus cooperative/council-based governance and models of community living (the acknowledgements mention Cree futurism) tucked right up against corporate-owned resort planets with slaved workers built for and owned as property by those corporate interests/investors, PLUS ethical considerations for living in a universe where "person" is a legal status given to any sapient being with sufficient intelligence (with all the debates over how intelligence is measured) and people (and animals, and machines) can be purpose-built to limit their ability to express intelligence.
By the end of the book a flying train and a cat are in love and it isn't even weird because they're both people, but it is still real fuckin weird that the corporate interests attempting to claim the planet on which they were generated are deliberately building a "virgin Pleistocene-era Earth replica" and consistently refusing to acknowledge the sovereignty of the cooperative government they treated with only under threat of those free people activating the planet's latent plate tectonics system (which would destroy their marketability and property values because no one who could live on a spaceport is going to put up with planetary inconveniences like natural disasters).
The lack of a hard resolution feels very appropriate given that the conflict isn't between people, but between systems, and any one individual's role in a system isn't going to be "heroically swoop in and save the day forever" but to do their small part to push toward progress.
Terraformers has got the heavy sci-fi of, well, terraforming, plus cooperative/council-based governance and models of community living (the acknowledgements mention Cree futurism) tucked right up against corporate-owned resort planets with slaved workers built for and owned as property by those corporate interests/investors, PLUS ethical considerations for living in a universe where "person" is a legal status given to any sapient being with sufficient intelligence (with all the debates over how intelligence is measured) and people (and animals, and machines) can be purpose-built to limit their ability to express intelligence.
By the end of the book a flying train and a cat are in love and it isn't even weird because they're both people, but it is still real fuckin weird that the corporate interests attempting to claim the planet on which they were generated are deliberately building a "virgin Pleistocene-era Earth replica" and consistently refusing to acknowledge the sovereignty of the cooperative government they treated with only under threat of those free people activating the planet's latent plate tectonics system (which would destroy their marketability and property values because no one who could live on a spaceport is going to put up with planetary inconveniences like natural disasters).
The lack of a hard resolution feels very appropriate given that the conflict isn't between people, but between systems, and any one individual's role in a system isn't going to be "heroically swoop in and save the day forever" but to do their small part to push toward progress.
Content Warnings
Minor: Slavery