Reviews tagging 'Child death'

Obsidio by Jay Kristoff, Amie Kaufman

25 reviews

ktrecs's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful tense fast-paced

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

2.0

Holy shit I finished a book!!!! 

This was the dynamic finale I expected from this series, but it just didn't *hit* like the others. I think part of the problem is that the irreverent humour and liveliness with which the narrative parts are presented seem particularly incongruous in this section, mixed up as they were with detailed descriptions of straight up genocide so like. There was that. 

Also, I'm not usually one to complain about a HEA but I really really *really* hate bait and switch death scenes, and the ending of this had so, so many. It just feels like a cheap thing to do, you know? Kill your characters or don't, but don't try to capitalise on their death scenes and then in the very next chapter undermine all of the emotional power by bringing them back to life. 

I did like the themes of conscience, consciousness and humanity (a staple theme in scifi) but I'm a little disappointed too that we didn't get to see the larger ramifications of the Kerenza IV conviction. The whole series harps on about how complex and redeemable humanity is, so making the Big Bad just..... a woman..... and to suggest on top of that that she is somehow less redeemable than the soldiers who actually committed the heinous war crimes she ordered them to seems to be a little bit abortive. Where is the systemic analysis here?  The logical conclusion of the arguments the whole series makes seems to be that capitalism is the real evil - through this lens, slapping some corporate head honchos with a guilty verdict hardly seems to qualify as the justice owed to the Kerenzan refugees. 

Maybe that's a lot to ask of a series like this, but it just didn't sit right with me.

Despite all these complaints (and a lamentable dearth of queer characters, like wtf was with that??? Three central couples and all of them hetero????), I really loved this series. Kaufman and Kristoff really do The Most with form, and I think it's brilliantly executed. Found footage is an absolute FAVE of mine, conceptually speaking, but I often find the actual works hard to digest (lookin @ you, shaky cam footage), but the frame narrative drew everything together neatly here. AIDAN was a particular favourite of mine, because it added a really excellent element of exisistential dread all the way through the series (and because I am a SUCKER for a what-makes-us-human AI plotline). Most impressively, I my opinion, is that the threads of emotional anguish stayed taut throughout even the most clusterfucky action sequences and I think that's a really hard line to walk without becoming heavy-handed. I found this particularly incisive because of the way that aligned with the goals of the Illuminae Group - I'm thinking specifically of the choice, both by the authors and by Kady & co., to include the notes from Dr. Grant - seemingly irrelevant to the narrative itself but serving a particular persuasive purpose in the context of the court case. 

Anyway this is the longest review I've written in approximately 1 million years so I guess it deserves recognition for causing a stir in my cold, dead heart. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, and Murder

Moderate: Genocide

Minor: Confinement and Sexual harassment

anticapitalist_2000's review against another edition

adventurous slow-paced

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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Colonisation, Death, Genocide, Gun violence, Police brutality, and Violence

Minor: Toxic relationship

second chance romance

nomora's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

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

4.0

I like this book far better than the previous one, but not as much as the first. It wasn't a blatant copy of Illuminae like Gemina was, and we got more of the "global" happenings which is something that I'm really happy about. The action sequences were great and the terror of warfare is probably the area in which this book shines the most. The romance I didn't really care about. It is obvious the characters were introduced solely for the purpose of being our eyes into what was happening on Kerenza IV and had just the right skill set for things to turn out okay. Out of all the cast couples they were the least fleshed out. A thing that especially grated on me was the amount of offhand remarks about queer relationships when all three of the main couples were straight. I realize that this is probably due to writers who each took a portion, Amie the main girl characters and Jay the main guy characters but it was still a pain to read. It also would have helped not to have three same relationship dynamics. They could have at least gone for something drastically different in the middle book where the two mains weren't separated due to circumstances. I loved the format, and I loved the conflict, and I loved AIDAN, but the teenage posturing at the trials I could have done without. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Genocide, Violence, Death, and Gun violence

Minor: Body horror, Grief, Torture, Medical content, and Suicide attempt

Additional content warnings:
Minor
Body Horror:

a soldier lost a tip of his tongue by biting it off, told as a funny anecdote

Grief:

Hannah is still dealing with the death of her father in the previous book, as is Ella

Torture:

we only see the aftermath, but it is mentioned Asha is not treated nicely while BeiTech goons try to get information out of her

Medical Content:

Ella is hooked up to some medical machinery, as is Kady's dad while he is still post-op

Suicide Attempt:

At one point while believing there is no other way out, Kady turns to self-destruction as the only available option to take out the enemy, but is foiled

Moderate
Child death:

A pre-teen is killed on page with moderate detail.

Genocide:

BeiTech is attempting to kill off the whole population of Kerenza IV and there are a lot of dead.

Violence:

A lot of straight out fights, with weapons and without.

Gun Violence:

A lot of guns are used to kill people on page.

ravensandlace's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful tense slow-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? No

3.5

 Find this review and others like it at https://aravenclawlibraryx.wordpress.com

So I adored the first two books of this series. I was so intrigued by the way it was written. It wasn’t a typical novel. It had chat logs, texts, video surveillance, etc. This book series got me interested in science fiction. But this book in particular was a bit of a disappointment to me.

So normally the first two books are about a couple. We had Kady and Ezra in Illuminae. There was Nik and Hanna for Gemina. This one promised the same thing with Asha and Rhys but it didn’t happen as much as it did in the first two books. Asha and Rhys took a back seat to the drama that was happening with Kady and the ship she was on. I honestly can’t remember what the ship was called, I’m so sorry. I was confused about what was going on with the ship and what they were trying to do, to be honest. There was just so much science and war terms. 

The characters were okay. Like I mentioned above, Asha and Rhys were the “it couple” for this book. But they took a back seat so I didn’t get to know them as well. I don’t really have much of an opinion on them. I did like Asha pretty well for the brief times we did get to read about her. Her determination and her love for a child that wasn’t even hers warmed my heart. 

Basically I spent my time being confused while reading this book. This book and the series in general, has a problem with having a lot of scientific terms and theories. I got a C in science for my entire high school and college career. I only know about the human body and brain and I barely know that much. There were also parts of the book that were about war and strategy. My only knowledge in that is playing Stratego and I won that game by getting Russia early on and slowly taking over Europe. So you all can imagine how confused I was. 

Overall, this was okay. It was a nice ending to the series. I just have a small side book to read and I’ll have completed this series fully. I think this series changed the game with how it was written. I hope we see more books written like this because it truly makes reading a lot more fun!

Ps. I still dislike ADIAN. Sorry not sorry. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Grief, Gore, Gun violence, Medical trauma, Murder, and Violence

alexandrapaul's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny lighthearted fast-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Death

Moderate: Grief