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adventuresinfictionland's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
thwipys's review against another edition
2.0
okay…so.
first of all: adjectives. if you love adjectives and hyphenated descriptors in rapid fire assault on your eyes, this book will be like your wildest dreams.
most times, there was almost no sentence variety. of course there are short choppy sentences for which i was grateful, but the abundance of exhaustingly long lines made me wanna put the book down. i read this on my phone so the pages were already a little shorter than a print book, but sometimes the paragraphs were like impenetrable walls of text despite only being two or three sentences. and that’s coming from someone who loves writing long sentences.
take this line for example—it’s the opener to chapter 2 and the introduction of the main character:
“Once upon a time on a small, watery, excitable planet called Earth, in a small, watery country called England (which was bound and determined never to get too excited about anything), a leggy psychedelic ambidextrous omnisexual gendersplat glitterpunk financially punch-drunk ethnically ambitious glamrock messiah by the name of Danesh Jalo was born to a family so large and benignly neglectful that they only noticed he’d stopped coming home on weekends when his grandmother was nearly run over with all her groceries in front of the Piccadilly Square tube station, stunned into slack-jawed immobility by the sight of her Danesh, twenty feet high, in a frock the color of her customary afternoon sip of Pernod, filling up every centimeter of a gargantuan billboard.”
although that stuff let up a little as the book progressed, i never quite knew what was going on because everything demanded its own anecdote or infodump. i stuck with it anyway because i’m desperate for gay science fiction and the premise of this book really intrigued me.
that’s not to say i hated it. i like infodumping sometimes, and i found a scene in chapter 3 where an alien drops a ton of exposition very entertaining. the saving grace seemed to be the dialogue, though not always the case (when i’m trying to meet an essay’s word count: “N! O! Spells NO! The importantest word you can make out of teensy tiny N and weensy old O—that’s NO! The biggest little word I know, know, know! I mean no.” (dialogue taken from that aforementioned exposition scene)).
and hey, i am a huge hitchhiker’s guide fan. it’s clear that this novel isn’t just trying to capitalize on hgttg’s style, but instead that it’s written with a genuine love for that style. it isn’t the author’s fault that it’s a tough style to emulate successfully.
i’m not here to tell anyone not to read this. just trying to warn you what you’re getting into before you do. there are moments that cut through the noise and really spoke to me. questions of sentience play a big role in the plot and the prose—what does it mean to be sentient? what sets humans apart from every other living thing? are we actually that different from anything else? valente connects sentience to music and soul in beautiful, thought-provoking passages. those are the moments that got me to keep reading. at the end of the day, i’m glad i did.
i can say i came off the last page wanting to practice my guitar more, that’s for sure.
i do think my problems with this book stem from me just not being smart enough to engage with the rest of the rambling text. maybe you are. i hope you are.
i do however believe this book would make a truly fantastic film.
sirloyne's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
mizpurplest's review against another edition
crimelessvictim's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Moderate: Drug abuse, Sexual content, Car accident, Genocide, Deportation, Xenophobia, and Body horror
frogreads_'s review against another edition
I would say its so wordy about even the most innocuous thing. It makes sense given the premise of the book but I've learned i dont like that kind of prose.
aceinit's review against another edition
3.0
And though Valente remains at the top of her game when it comes to having a way with words, the story (has-been glam rock band must compete in intergalactic singing competition to save all of Earthy humanity) itself spends most of the novel as a barely-there thread to justify spending a lot of time doing a lot of infodump world(universe?) building. We really don't get to go on an adventure until the final third of the novel, which is a shame, because this novel has a lot to offer if it didn't get bogged down in its own structure.
While we are being fed the tiniest slivers about the why and how of saving our little planet, we are treated to very large, very wordy chunks regarding the other key players in the contest, complete with their histories and memorable past performances. So much time is devoted to these infodumps that huge sections of the novel turn into walls of text that succeed in burying the fun and wit and humor. And because the opening half of the book is so damned heavily-loaded with just these primers and histories, I felt like I was locked into reading a textbook or encyclopedia instead of going on an intergalactic adventure full of song and special effects. Which is not at all how Eurovision in Space should feel.
_zara's review against another edition
Not for me.