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3.93 AVERAGE
3.93 AVERAGE
adventurous
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
dark
hopeful
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
inspiring
lighthearted
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
jeff vandermeer u will always be famous 💖
read this book it’s so good and weird. amazing characters and story, so fun and fresh and horrifying while remaining lighthearted and wonderful and childlike in its hope and feeling, somehow. i loved it.
read this book it’s so good and weird. amazing characters and story, so fun and fresh and horrifying while remaining lighthearted and wonderful and childlike in its hope and feeling, somehow. i loved it.
dark
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
funny
reflective
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
This book moved very slow, but kept my interest just enough to finish it.
3.5 stars for the story, 5+ stars for the world building. VanderMeer’s concocted ecology knocks the socks off just about any other dystopian book I’ve read. Vastly imaginative biology litters the landscape along with discarded Bio-tech from failed experiments of The Company, making for a beautiful nightmare wonderland of a read. I wish I was more invested in the story of the scavenger Rachel, who takes in an oddly charismatic shape-shifting creature and cares for him; it should be right up my alley, but it took a long time for the story to start, and even then, not much happened. Fascinating setting though; I’ll probably read the companion novel Dead Astronauts to see if I like it any better!
I was not sure what to expect going into Borne. I loved parts of the Southern Reach trilogy by Jeff VanderMeer, many people will at least have heard of Annihilation which was made into a pretty striking Alex Garland film with Natalie Portman. The trilogy was equal parts ethereal and unknowable in a way that both enticed me and confounded me. Unfortunately, I think Borne falls more into the latter category for me.
Borne eschews Area X of the Southern Reach for an equally strange and opaque post-apocalyptic city ruined by some unsaid climate or technological disaster. In the collapse of human civilization, scavengers roam the cityscape trying to just make it to the next day. Amongst them a giant flying bear, some sort of biotechnical project, dominates the city and fights against a human named The Magician. Amidst the chaos, a scavenger named Rachel salvages a mutated creature she names Borne and raises him with her partner Wick.
The central crux is the relational dynamic between Rachel and Borne and how he develops as a sentient being with unknown powers. The structure of it all is very unconventional and the main thrust of the book did not do enough to keep me interested moment to moment. There were story hooks all around and VanderMeer often did not seem interested in using or resolving them in a timely way. All of the elements were there for something that could really captivate me but it just felt like they were not assembled in a satisfying way.
VanderMeer’s touch of poetic weirdness does stand out, his descriptions vividly paint the city and its strange inhabitants but it is unfortunate that the actual story and plot did not grab me in the same way.
Borne eschews Area X of the Southern Reach for an equally strange and opaque post-apocalyptic city ruined by some unsaid climate or technological disaster. In the collapse of human civilization, scavengers roam the cityscape trying to just make it to the next day. Amongst them a giant flying bear, some sort of biotechnical project, dominates the city and fights against a human named The Magician. Amidst the chaos, a scavenger named Rachel salvages a mutated creature she names Borne and raises him with her partner Wick.
The central crux is the relational dynamic between Rachel and Borne and how he develops as a sentient being with unknown powers. The structure of it all is very unconventional and the main thrust of the book did not do enough to keep me interested moment to moment. There were story hooks all around and VanderMeer often did not seem interested in using or resolving them in a timely way. All of the elements were there for something that could really captivate me but it just felt like they were not assembled in a satisfying way.
VanderMeer’s touch of poetic weirdness does stand out, his descriptions vividly paint the city and its strange inhabitants but it is unfortunate that the actual story and plot did not grab me in the same way.