Reviews tagging 'Classism'

Light from Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki

20 reviews

clarabooksit's review against another edition

emotional 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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Deadnaming, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Transphobia, Lesbophobia, Outing, Sexual harassment, and Dysphoria

Moderate: Bullying, Death, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Murder, Gaslighting, and Classism

Minor: Self harm, War, and Pandemic/Epidemic

eni_iilorak's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful mysterious sad medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Deadnaming, Physical abuse, Racism, Rape, Transphobia, Outing, Sexual harassment, and Dysphoria

Moderate: Bullying, Homophobia, Self harm, Murder, Lesbophobia, and Classism

Minor: Cursing, Drug use, Miscarriage, Suicide, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

riverleafing's review against another edition

challenging funny hopeful medium-paced

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

3.5

Appreciated the Asian representations and real reps of trans misogyny and challenges. 
Unfortunately, lots of different POVs mixing in--although somewhat related acceptance of life matters--ultimately took away any potential depth from everyone else and the BIG topics of Katrina's life.  

It felt like characters from different books were interrupting Katrina's with whole "hey, samsies!" bits.  e.g. The lutier's POV 

"sorry I wasn't born a son to carry on daddy's business"

and aliens

escape from plague feelings of purposelessness/wanting to just be free, live safely, love queerly

could have been greatly reduced or entirely deleted and we'd legitimately lose nothing significant.  Might have made an interestingly deep and wild Triptych of books, though!
Too many detailed other ppl's stories going on in Katrina's life for the length of book.  But good job making it unique (if a little unsubtle): Demons, aliens, and POC human transness

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia and Dysphoria

Moderate: Body shaming, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Misogyny, Rape, Sexual content, Murder, and Classism

queersicles's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective slow-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? Yes

4.5

I love slow paced, slice of life books. Much of what I love about this book is about that. The book describes food with such texture and depth, it feels very comforting to step inside this world where there are clear problems but those are taken just as seriously as the character's meals. I love the relationships between these different women, power dynamics of adult-teenager, cis-trans, human-AI, and parent-outside adult giving perspective on her parenting choices were all explored. It felt like love between women was the main focus of the book. Grappling with the outside pressures of war, immigration, misogyny, racism, transphobia, etc, were battled out. No one woman was saving anyone else, they were grappling with power dynamics and how to listen and respect one anothers autonomy throughout, which was beautiful to see unspool in such a cooky little world where the devil and aliens are running around
 That all being said, I felt frustrated by the ending.

the end leaves Shizuka (the woman who was selling the souls of her students to hell for her own fame/glory) with a happy ending and a gay relationship which had depth and felt interesting and flawed, but left Katrina with no romantic relationship (which would have been fine) except her getting a Tesla and seemingly carrying on some kind of relationship with a man who literally sexually assaulted her the very first time he met her (he grabs her genitals through her dress in a backstage dressing room with a bunch of people around) which felt just.. like such a betrayal? She starts the book running from her abusive family, escapes and finds a new family to be a part of, but then the end, the book doesn't focus on her growing friendship with an AI named Wendy who I think would have been a more satisfying ending to see how their relationship was developing, and instead ties her to this rich asshole where she is (this is a presumption on my part) still in some way doing sex work in exchange for money/a Tesla from a rich asshole? It just felt like a slap in the face. </Spoiler> that unsatisfying ending detail took a lot away for me, which is why I couldn't give it 5 stars

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Deadnaming, Death, Domestic abuse, Hate crime, Homophobia, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Transphobia, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Murder, Outing, Sexual harassment, Dysphoria, and Classism

allisong82's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful sad tense slow-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Alcoholism, Body shaming, Bullying, Deadnaming, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Racism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Transphobia, Dysphoria, and Classism

augustar14's review against another edition

challenging 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

4.5

One of the first books I've read that shifts character perspectives amongst many characters but not at chapters. Just, whenever it needs to happen. That took some adjusting but once I figured it out, I really began to enjoy how immersive it was.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Transphobia, Sexual harassment, and Dysphoria

Moderate: Body shaming, Cursing, Rape, Cultural appropriation, War, and Classism

Minor: Alcoholism, Child abuse, Deadnaming, Gun violence, Misogyny, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Gaslighting, and Toxic friendship

Internalized transphobia as well as external. Abusive family (escapes from). Alcoholic, violent, transphobic father and mother who makes excuses for him. So called friend who "suggests" she pay for rent in sex. Sex cam work with transphobic comments. Bad hookup for money. Other moments of sexual harassment, verbal and physical, past and present. Two characters killed with an alien blaster gun in another character's fit of rage at seeing something that ended up being not true. Somewhat graphic descriptions of their feelings and their deaths. Mother deadnames main character in one scene.

skudiklier's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional mysterious reflective 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

4.5

I feel a bit torn when it comes to this book. On one hand, I was very engaged with it and wanted to keep reading to find out what would happen. I liked the mix of characters and perspectives, and even some of the surprising things (that at first felt like a mix of too many genres) ended up feeling natural and fine. 

However, I also feel like I ended the book missing some of the point. Like, there was just so much going on, and I'm not sure what my takeaways were supposed to be. Also, there was just so much transphobia that Katrina had to deal with; it was hard to read and felt like some of it wasn't totally necessary? Idk. I get that that can be real but it's not like every single trans person has to go through all of the things she did, and it just was so rough to read. Between that and the racism and violence, I would definitely recommend checking out the content warnings before reading this. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Deadnaming, Death, Homophobia, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Transphobia, Violence, Xenophobia, Murder, Lesbophobia, and Outing

Moderate: Bullying, Child abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Ableism, Animal death, Body shaming, Child death, Fatphobia, Blood, Vomit, Abandonment, Alcohol, and War

dealingwithdragons's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful 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? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Child abuse, Deadnaming, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Hate crime, Homophobia, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Transphobia, Violence, Xenophobia, Trafficking, Religious bigotry, Suicide attempt, Murder, Lesbophobia, Outing, Cultural appropriation, Toxic friendship, Sexual harassment, Dysphoria, War, and Classism

kathleencoughlin's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad medium-paced

3.5

I generally enjoyed Light From Uncommon Stars. It was an interesting and rather stark mix of sci-fi and fantasy. I've rarely seen demons/hell and aliens in the same book which felt a bit dissonant to start, and I still have some questions about specifis there but I didn't find it too distracting.

Katrina is clearly traumatized by the way her family and other people have treated her in the past. It was honestly a bit hard to read at times.

After having spent some time being treated well by Shizuka, it was heartbreaking that Katrina didn't seem to feel betrayed by finding out what she'd been chosen for. She does not expect kindness for free. I hope she gets to go to therapy in the near future.

One of the most interesting and I think underexplored characters to me was Shirley. I find upacking the personhood of AI really fascinating and I think it's important philosophically to consider what makes a person a person.

It's clear Lan didn't fully process her feelings about where Shirley came from couldn't really allow herself to consider Shirley as a full person or truly her daughter. Watching Lan try to reconcile who Shirley actually was with her preconceptions about AI and her sadness about losing the original Shirley was interesting and proves that sometimes, even if you're smart, you need other people to point out what's right under your nose. I wish though, especially as a POV character, that we had seen more of how Lan actually processed that (if she did).

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Deadnaming, Homophobia, Racism, Transphobia, and Lesbophobia

Moderate: Body shaming, Rape, Sexual assault, Outing, Toxic friendship, and Classism

Minor: Miscarriage, Grief, and War

pkledgrape's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted mysterious reflective relaxing sad 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: Emotional abuse and Transphobia

Moderate: Alcoholism, Deadnaming, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Lesbophobia, Outing, and Sexual harassment

Minor: War and Classism