Reviews with content warning for Injury/Injury detail - The Book of Koli

My very favourite thing about this book is characters describing technology and other old-word items that they’ve never come across before, but are well-known things to the reader. It’s like a guessing game. A large piece of tech hammered together out of sheets of metal with wheels inside a great big metal band and a pipe sticking out. A soft slippery cloth puffed up like a pillow. Any guesses? There are loads of them, and I love it!

Language is another great thing. Seeing how it has evolved over time or how old and unknown words are pronounced and interpreted to make sense with the words people already know and understand. Mythen Rood, for example, had a previous and similar sounding name we’d be more familiar with. Koli doesn’t know how you communicate with tech and so when he learns the word he calls it an in-their-face. This shit is freaking catnip to me, I can’t get enough of it.

I don’t think I have ever been so keen to get on and read the next book in a series. There are so many hints and clues and foreshadowing and points to connect. I have theories, and I need to know how everything comes together, when and what details are revealed, and what the hell happened in the past and will happen in the future. Most of my theories involve Ursula. She knows so much. How? Who was she before she became a wandering doctor-of-sorts? How old is she? I have some ideas. I also kind of maybe half suspect (or, at least, I want to believe) that this story is set in the far flung future of The Girl With All the Gifts. It’s a stretch, but noxious trees and enough time… let me have this.

A longer review can be read at my book blog: Marvel at Words.

Content Warnings

vaguely_pink's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

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

3.0

Content Warnings

rebthack's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
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

4.25

100s of years Post-apocalypse. Survivors are eking out life in tiny communities that barely communicate, exchange ideas, or goods. Danger is everywhere - from killer trees that awake on sunny days to leftover weapons that descend on communities with no warning. And the most powerful in town are able to awaken and use the technology from before.

Narrated by Koli, he tells the story of his life - starting at 15 when he is old enough to go into waiting, aka, have his only opportunity to try and awaken technology. Koli is convinced he can make this happen, and his life will be all that he dreams it will be and more.

But things don’t quite work out.

This book is set up as a foundational piece and definitely the first in a trilogy. Initially, the uneven language was challenging to get past, but after a few chapters, I no longer was aware of Koli’s fractured grammar or disjointed vernacular. The story is interesting enough, but, working as the base of a larger story, the book was a little slow to start, albeit rich with details of the daily life of Koli and his village.

I’ll definitely be back at the library to reserve the next book in the series tomorrow!

Content Warnings

More...