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issymaae's review
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Death, and Child death
Moderate: Medical content and Body horror
miaaa_lenaaa's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Much preferred this to the previous book i read by schweblin, a curious fever dream following a mother piecing together her memories and trying to protect her daughter
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Animal death, Child death, and Terminal illness
ribbenkast's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
3.25
This book is exactly what the title suggests: a complete fever dream.
The prose and storytelling devise were interesting enough. I liked the themes of motherhood, grief and the various motives used by the author. Overall I think this book is very clever and has all the checkmarks of becoming a future classic.
But (and this might be a translation issue) I found it hard to understand what was going on. Despite It's overall literary quality I couldn't quite manage to connect with the book personally. I like unreliable narrotors, especially ones that also have no clue about what is actually happening, but I felt like the hints that are supposed to tell the reader what was actually going on where too hidden away in throwaway lines and are easily missed. You have to be paying attention to every single little word in every sentence and whilst I can respect that whenever an author is doing that, I just didnt care much for it with this particular story.
Also, the back blurb and especially the recommendation qoutes on the inside promised me a bone chilling horror story that would "make me lock the doors at night". Why? The "danger" in the book (if you could call it that) has nothing to do with horror and does not leave you spooked.
The prose and storytelling devise were interesting enough. I liked the themes of motherhood, grief and the various motives used by the author. Overall I think this book is very clever and has all the checkmarks of becoming a future classic.
But (and this might be a translation issue) I found it hard to understand what was going on. Despite It's overall literary quality I couldn't quite manage to connect with the book personally. I like unreliable narrotors, especially ones that also have no clue about what is actually happening, but I felt like the hints that are supposed to tell the reader what was actually going on where too hidden away in throwaway lines and are easily missed. You have to be paying attention to every single little word in every sentence and whilst I can respect that whenever an author is doing that, I just didnt care much for it with this particular story.
Also, the back blurb and especially the recommendation qoutes on the inside promised me a bone chilling horror story that would "make me lock the doors at night". Why? The "danger" in the book (if you could call it that) has nothing to do with horror and does not leave you spooked.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Animal death, Child death, Medical trauma, Terminal illness, Death, Grief, Medical content, and Pandemic/Epidemic
athompson0429's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
I really loved this concept and execution.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Child death and Chronic illness
applesodaperson's review
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.0
So yeah no surprise, this book did feel a bit like a fever dream. But not in a cool abstract way, but in a "I had no idea what was going on" type of way. And it just ended up being increasingly frustrating. I guess I'll start with the one I did like, the format. I think the conversation format really worked. I kept imagining a cool low-budget short film with only the two characters reading out the book like a script in a hospital room. If they could get a good child actor, I think it would work really well and not take too large of a budget.
But the format was pretty much the only thing I liked about this book unfortunately. My number one problem was that literally nothing was explained or resolved. I just kept expecting there to be some big reveal where everything clicked into place and I understood what was going on. But that literally never happened. I just ended so incredibly confused. Like I understood what was going on for most of the book, because I think I have above average media literacy, but then none of the plot points or mysteries were resolved. Like I still have no clue what was going on with the poison or the body swapping.
And honestly I don't think about this a lot, but I wonder if the book felt so off because of the translation. I don't know much about how books are translated, but something just felt off about this book, in a way that the other translated books I've read haven't. Usually I don't even notice or think about it when reading a translated book.
Overall I was just very confused by this book.
Read from the BYU library.
But the format was pretty much the only thing I liked about this book unfortunately. My number one problem was that literally nothing was explained or resolved. I just kept expecting there to be some big reveal where everything clicked into place and I understood what was going on. But that literally never happened. I just ended so incredibly confused. Like I understood what was going on for most of the book, because I think I have above average media literacy, but then none of the plot points or mysteries were resolved. Like I still have no clue what was going on with the poison or the body swapping.
And honestly I don't think about this a lot, but I wonder if the book felt so off because of the translation. I don't know much about how books are translated, but something just felt off about this book, in a way that the other translated books I've read haven't. Usually I don't even notice or think about it when reading a translated book.
Overall I was just very confused by this book.
Read from the BYU library.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Child death
opal_scorpio's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
super suspenseful and confusing book. i started it at like midnight thinking i’d just read a bit but instead i ended up staying awake until almost 4 am reading the whole thing in one sitting. and it was so worth it!!
the environment being the villain/killer of the story was really interesting instead of it being david’s change haunting the town. it’s such a rational explanation that you don’t even think about it!! but the deformities and miscarriages of the children of the town and the mysterious animals deaths could be explained by whatever that chemical was in the barrels.
it’s sad that david is blamed for the spooky stuff when in reality his brain was probably fried from the illness that killed the horse and the subsequent fever that lasted for days, NOT his soul being split.
throughout the story it’s hard to tell what is reality and what is made up, but the entire conversation is probably also made up in amanda’s head. but i think what really drives home the “fever dream” is amanda seeing her husband visit david’s father looking for answers and her imagining her daughter had switched souls with david. so scary and kinda plausible within the world but since she, the narrator, dies at the end of the story it makes you, the reader, rethink everything she has recounted up until that point.
fantastic book!! 10/10!
(any technical issues i have with the book are being attributed to its translation from spanish to english. i think the plot was fantastic, just some words here and there that maybe didn’t make a lot of sense but again i think it’s a translation issue and not the author’s fault.)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Death, Death of parent, and Animal death
Moderate: Body horror and Mental illness
Minor: Abandonment, Medical trauma, and Miscarriage
librarymouse's review
emotional
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
I'm really not sure what to think of this book. It's very consumable. I read it in just over an hour. At a few points, I wondered if this book is an allegory for the changes that occur when a child starts showing signs of autism, since both David and Nina are noted to line up things just before their poisoning becomes severe. I'm not sure that that is the case, but this book, as per the title, reads like a fever dream. There's definitely a commentary being made on the visibility of disabled children, how they're viewed when the disability is developed, and on a wealth disparity between the urban well to do and the rural poor.
I'm sure if I were to read this again and again, I'd find a new understanding each time.
the confirmation of the migrations being done in the greenhouse being real, at the end, is an interesting twist (?). I don't know that it can be called a twist because David is co narrating, and were told by Carla that it is real, but Amanda's scepticism is infectious. Nina being in David's body at the end of the book, unrecognized by her father is heartbreaking. Carla saying that if she could have another child, she'd want one like Nina is made all the more unsettling and sad with the ending. Her tying knots, as if trying to reinstate the snapped, ineffable rope that connects her to her mother
I'm sure if I were to read this again and again, I'd find a new understanding each time.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent and Terminal illness
Moderate: Grief, Medical content, Animal death, Child death, and Confinement
kalira's review
dark
tense
slow-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death and Terminal illness
Moderate: Child death
jjjreads's review
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
Content Warnings
Graphic: Abandonment, Animal death, Classism, Death, Stalking, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Animal cruelty, Child death, Terminal illness, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis
autumnrevisited's review
dark
emotional
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
I like how this book kinda makes you stumble in a way where you expect it to go a certain way and it keeps changing.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Medical content, and Death