Reviews tagging 'Gaslighting'

Babel by R.F. Kuang

195 reviews

crybabybea's review

challenging dark informative slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

Well, I'm disappointed.

First of all, the dark academia aspect was done very well. It felt atmospheric, grand, with a hint of mystery. It felt gloomy in a really fun way. The settings outside of the tower itself were less immersive, but the majority of the story takes place inside the tower anyway so it wasn't too distracting. The dark academia vibe was a genius way to explore a story about decolonization and racism. The magic system was inventive and interesting, and I liked how it stood as a metaphor for the industrial revolution.

The characters were just okay. We get to see Robin, the main character, the most, and I felt really attached to him by the end. The other characters had interesting stories that I felt didn't get explored enough. I understand this book leans in to its literary side, and the characters and arguably the entire plot are just allegories for bigger issues, but I think this made the character work suffer and it made the explosive ending pack less of a punch. Don't get me wrong, I loved the ending, and I still cried, but some of the other moments that were meant to be heavy-hitting fell flat because I didn't feel the connection to the characters. The found family aspect didn't feel fleshed out enough because of this as well.

I think the character work is a side effect of Kuang's tendency to overexplain things rather than actually have things happen. Some of the messaging was so on the nose that it felt pedantic and almost condescending at times. I wanted to read this book to challenge my thinking, and I hoped it would leave me with lots of thoughts to reflect on afterward, but everything gets explained to you so plainly that it completely ruins the amazing research and work Kuang put into telling the story of racism and colonization in academia. I mean, there were literally times when something racist or sexist would happen, then the narrator would have a whole paragraph to say something like "Robin wonders if this white person realized how racist they were being". It got irritating... I felt like I was on Sesame Street. I will say the writing itself was done very well, the prose was accessible despite the scientific, historical, and literary references used, and I appreciated a lot of R.F. Kuang's comments and her sarcastic footnotes.

The last issue is the pacing, which I think is also a side effect of this "telling not showing" issue. This book only gets good around the 60-70% mark. It had an extremely slow start with very little intrigue. We spent a long time in lectures and I felt not enough time was dedicated to furthering either the charcters OR the plot. It was a lot of sitting around and waiting. I don't mind books that have a hill into a snowball second half, but I almost put this book down multiple times because nothing was happening, then one minor action would happen and I would finally think we were going somewhere, just for it to slow down again. 

All these issues made for a really weird reading experience where I absolutely dreaded picking the book back up, then when I started reading it was just fine and I wanted to know more, then it would get boring and the cycle repeated. I expected more from the rave reviews but left feeling like its potential got wasted. I still do think it's a good read overall, but it could have been better. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Bullying, Child death, Classism, Colonisation, Addiction, Misogyny, Fire/Fire injury, Toxic friendship, Emotional abuse, Violence, Torture, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, Physical abuse, Racism, Slavery, Domestic abuse, Gore, Kidnapping, War, Xenophobia, Death, Vomit, Murder, Drug abuse, Sexism, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Gaslighting, Police brutality, Blood, Death of parent, Drug use, and Genocide

ghoul_girl's review

adventurous dark emotional inspiring reflective sad tense fast-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

This book is extremely heavy but also so needed. The characters feel so real and the complicated emotions drive the story. I hurt for them and cried with them. 
The linguistics nerd in me was drawn to this book but the victim of religious trauma found a bit of healing. 
I highly recommend. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Racism, Xenophobia, Classism, Gaslighting, Colonisation, and Cultural appropriation

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Death of parent, Murder, Death, and Grief

taracloudclark's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark informative mysterious reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This book has a lot of juicy nerdy stuff in it. The tagline I’ve been considering is “This is the college Heroine Granger wishes she could go to,” and I think those who love the idea of magic school and love reading would agree. Kuang’s magical realism, alternate early Victorian setting reveals a lot about the power and nuance of language as well as historically-based realities of colonialism. I imagine she is very interested in the two subjects, and instead of writing two nonfiction books, she finds a more palatable vehicle for getting the ideas to readers. 

I really enjoyed it. I am recommending it to people who I think will like it. But I also give warning. 

It can be dense and dry at times. And it’s way longer than it needed to be.  

A review from a book influencer I follow noted the author talks down to the reader. I disagree, strongly, but I can see how someone may come to that conclusion. There are a lot of facts provided through exposition (tho creative devises are employed) and footnotes. 

I believe that, instead of the author showing the reader she’s smarter than them, she’s just indulging her own interests. And I’m here for that. Because she does know more about this stuff than I do, and I’m honored she’d share it with me. 

And there isn’t a lot of action. In the total book there is, but most of it is exposition loaded up front and action at the end. 

Also, if characters are a big deal to you, be aware that this book is not for that. The friendships and warmth we see in other magical school stories isn’t accomplished here. The characters don’t change much IMO and their relationships aren’t developed enough for me to care when there are divisions and worse. Unfortunately this hurts the author’s attempt to bring marginalized perspectives to the  reader’s understanding and becomes more of a telling than showing situation. I still appreciate the telling, because it’s helping me see what I’ve learned about marginalized peoples experiences in a different light, but it’s not done through character growth and rich “found family” presentations. But the characters and relationships aren’t terrible. It’s still yet readable and enjoyable. Just not as delicious as I’d like. 

The narrators were very good. The main reader, Chris Lew Kum Hoi, has a rich tone and switches accents well. The footnote narrator being female, Billie Fulford-Brown, was an excellent choice to help delineate. I do get a bit annoyed when female authors have male narrators (tho the main character is male, so I’ll allow it 😉), and white people narrate for authors of color. But the main narrator is, at least, Asian. Both gave nuance to foreign words that made them feel authentic and added to the intricacies on the emphasis of language in the story, though I’ve no idea if they are accurate.

I would like to add a special note about my personal experience. Because of the way Libby delivered by holds to me, I read Yellowface by the same author and then this. And half way through I read a scathing review of Babel that sounded a little more like white fragility than true criticism. The landscape within which I read this, therefore, was fascinating. I imagine this book to be much like the stolen novel in Yellowface, a passion project for the author with cultural ties to the subject matter. And the review similar to some of those mentioned in Yellowface. The juxtaposition of the two in two different time periods was super fun, as well. It was a much richer experience because of that, and I wish it was read this way in a classroom setting so I could indulge with other readers. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Violence, Trafficking, Grief, War, Colonisation, Gaslighting, Classism, Xenophobia, Cultural appropriation, Racism, Toxic friendship, Death, and Child abuse

Moderate: Bullying

Minor: Rape

celery's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Medical content, Misogyny, Genocide, Grief, Gun violence, Trafficking, Vomit, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Child death, Religious bigotry, Sexual harassment, Torture, Xenophobia, Kidnapping, Sexual violence, Slavery, Drug abuse, Gore, Stalking, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Bullying, Terminal illness, Mass/school shootings, Antisemitism, Hate crime, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Suicide, Alcohol, Child abuse, Cultural appropriation, Colonisation, Cursing, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Islamophobia, Police brutality, Self harm, Abandonment, Addiction, Suicidal thoughts, Classism, Sexual assault, Death of parent, Deportation, Medical trauma, Drug use, Emotional abuse, War, Murder, Racism, Sexism, Toxic friendship, and Confinement

mels_reading_log's review against another edition

adventurous emotional inspiring mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

The world within this book is one in which languages are used with silver bars to run most of England. The bars can control anything from a building’s architectural stability to the health of the citizens. The most important thing needed to make this process work is people who speak other languages, but not just know words, but understand the other languages. So Babel, the college that controls this whole process, finds smart children in other countries and raises them to remember their home language but also have a very upper class English life. This sculpts those kids into the perfect students for the school and perfect workers for Babel. But what happens when those kids learn about the injustices that England is putting the rest of the world through?

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Misogyny, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Violence, Racism, Religious bigotry, Classism, Colonisation, Gaslighting, Grief, Gun violence, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Child abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Death, and Murder

uninvestedreader's review

challenging dark emotional informative sad tense slow-paced

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

4.5

This book elicited a lot of thoughts and feelings (though let's be honest, most of the feeling was anger) from me. I don't think I was fully the type of reader Rebecca wrote this for - I know people who capital-F felt the friendship between Robin and his colleagues in a way that I wasn't particularly interested in at the start, and so some of the very terrible things that happen amongst those friends just felt... expected, and very sad (but didn't wreck me). Alternatively,  the relationships between Lovell, Robin, and Griffin left me totally, totally devastated. Robin deserved so much better, as did Griffin. This book made me feel unrelenting anger through understanding how people of power choose to divide a group of people that they see as beneath them, and then use some of those people to hurt their own while never offering anyone equality.

Yeah, this book made me very angry. I expect this book's message to live in my head for many years to come.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Colonisation, Death, Toxic relationship, Emotional abuse, Misogyny, Violence, Child abuse, Sexism, and Torture

Moderate: Slavery, Suicide, and War

Minor: Cultural appropriation and Gaslighting

tarasoraptor's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Child abuse, Colonisation, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Blood, Classism, Racial slurs, Xenophobia, Misogyny, Racism, Torture, Violence, Drug use, Islamophobia, Physical abuse, Sexism, Toxic friendship, Confinement, Death, Sexual harassment, Slavery, Addiction, Grief, Gun violence, and Murder

xx_salem's review

adventurous emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

The first 200 pages of this book where incredibly difficult to get through, I would put it down for weeks and only get through a couple pages. Reading it made me feel good and intelligent and yet I don’t think I picked up nor absorbed much of the content or the message for the first while. The last 200 pages though were intense and interesting and I couldn’t put it down. The ending was satisfying and made me want a second book so I could watch the fallout, it felt realistic. But I never loved the characters, their deaths meant nothing and I simply couldn’t be attached to any of them. They felt so lackluster and unfeeling, it was really the plot and the intrigue and what thoughts it provoked that made this book good.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Grief, Panic attacks/disorders, Addiction, Blood, Violence, Child abuse, Sexual harassment, Murder, Mass/school shootings, Toxic relationship, Gaslighting, Hate crime, Misogyny, Bullying, Suicidal thoughts, War, Xenophobia, Emotional abuse, Gore, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Racism, Abandonment, Cursing, Drug use, Racial slurs, Slavery, Gun violence, Body horror, Car accident, Colonisation, Cultural appropriation, Death, Death of parent, Alcohol, Sexism, and Toxic friendship

sweetpersephone's review

challenging dark emotional informative inspiring reflective tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

Fascinating examination of colonisation and living under colonialism through fiction. Anyone interested in how colonisation impacts language would be particularly encouraged to read it. One of the most unique magic systems I've come across. On the negative side, felt that the darker skin characters were under developed which reduced the impact of the story.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Colonisation, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Sexism, Slavery, Cultural appropriation, Death, Gaslighting, Medical content, Xenophobia, Toxic friendship, Violence, Classism, Racism, Emotional abuse, Grief, War, and Torture

Moderate: Drug abuse and Sexual harassment

legendarycai's review

challenging dark informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

the writing and content was phenomenal. there were so many paged i tabbed and quotes that moved me. it touches so many important topics and i loved how i really felt like i was learning more about languages and people and history. the pacing was NOT it for me. i was asleep half the time when reading, but the writing was so good....i had to keep reading. also maybe i should research content warnings before i read bc.... LOL THE ENDING. anyway content warnings are so mid...i like a surprise.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Slavery, Murder, Gaslighting, Torture, Islamophobia, Hate crime, Genocide, Colonisation, Suicide, Racism, Racial slurs, Classism, and War