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gavgaddis's review against another edition
emotional
funny
hopeful
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
A phenomenal followup to Finna that is both an excellent stand-alone and an excellent addition to the world established by the first book. Not unlike how Peter Clines' `14 and The Fold partner with each other perfectly. This review only covers details you'd already be able to intuit from the description above with one easy-to-guess implication of a spoiler.
Derek works at LitenVärld. He's socially-awkward but limitlessly sincere and great at being a LitenVärld employee. He also lives in a shipping container in the parking lot. Derek's going through some issues with his body and now he's confronted with the extra headache of four near-identical copies of him, all a glimpse into different people Derek could have been, or could be.
It's queerness. Cipri's built a phenomenal novella around queerness, neurodivergency, or both. One enables enough self-introspection to discover the other, leading to murky waters so intermixed it's no wonder Defekt functions as a story about coming to terms with one (or both). It also directly shines a light on the guilt and self-loathing necessary to sit by and watch others crushed under the boot of power-hungry corporate drones and the courage needed to step up and do something. Defekt has little sympathy for people who were "just taking orders."
Finna and Defekt are both like old-school Star Trek in that way, the papier mache covering of sci-fi intentionally left as minimal as possible so as to not allow even the least-attentive of readers the argument "well that's just how things are in that character's world." Cipri grabs the reader by the collar and forces them to look at characters being complicit in empowering corporations and/or the megalomaniacal white cis men with superiority complexes they foster. I love it dearly.
Derek works at LitenVärld. He's socially-awkward but limitlessly sincere and great at being a LitenVärld employee. He also lives in a shipping container in the parking lot. Derek's going through some issues with his body and now he's confronted with the extra headache of four near-identical copies of him, all a glimpse into different people Derek could have been, or could be.
It's queerness. Cipri's built a phenomenal novella around queerness, neurodivergency, or both. One enables enough self-introspection to discover the other, leading to murky waters so intermixed it's no wonder Defekt functions as a story about coming to terms with one (or both). It also directly shines a light on the guilt and self-loathing necessary to sit by and watch others crushed under the boot of power-hungry corporate drones and the courage needed to step up and do something. Defekt has little sympathy for people who were "just taking orders."
Finna and Defekt are both like old-school Star Trek in that way, the papier mache covering of sci-fi intentionally left as minimal as possible so as to not allow even the least-attentive of readers the argument "well that's just how things are in that character's world." Cipri grabs the reader by the collar and forces them to look at characters being complicit in empowering corporations and/or the megalomaniacal white cis men with superiority complexes they foster. I love it dearly.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Homophobia and Transphobia
Moderate: Body horror and Blood
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