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harpoonholly's review
adventurous
emotional
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
0.5
Here's the thing: if you spend a lot of time trying to find spoilers for a book (an audiobook in my case) so you won't feel guilty about not wanting to finish, it's a bad book.
I've read Gladstone before; the "Craft Sequence" is great and I love This is How You Lose the Time War, co-authored with Amal El-Mohtar.
The man can do prose like poetry and has demonstrated that he can write female characters quite well.
The problem with Last Exit is it makes me wonder if Gladstone fired his editor. It should've been nowhere near as long, the characters' personalities were not consistent, the inner dialog, introspection, and flashbacks kept tripping up the story, and the symbolism was like taking bricks to the dome in rapid succession.
The action sequences are amazing, but everything in between is so tedious all the horror and adrenalin are overshadowed. Every review from other authors are all glowing, which makes me think there's a conspiracy to coddle Gladstone or not one of them actually read it.
I like Gladstone, but this book has seriously pissed me off because he refused to kill any of his darlings and, if he had an editor, they were too mealy mouthed to confront him with a red pen.
Because of the similarities of themes and eldritch monsters, Last Exit has retroactively made me dislike NK Jemisin's The Cities We Became. It's not fair and completely my problem, because Jemisin might be as heavy handed with metaphor as Gladstone, she wasn't trying to be subtle and her work has the refinement only a good editor (or a team of editors) can enable. I just need time.
After Last Exit and having also read Empress of Forever, I can only surmise that Gladstone should not write anything longer than 300 pages.
I've read Gladstone before; the "Craft Sequence" is great and I love This is How You Lose the Time War, co-authored with Amal El-Mohtar.
The man can do prose like poetry and has demonstrated that he can write female characters quite well.
The problem with Last Exit is it makes me wonder if Gladstone fired his editor. It should've been nowhere near as long, the characters' personalities were not consistent, the inner dialog, introspection, and flashbacks kept tripping up the story, and the symbolism was like taking bricks to the dome in rapid succession.
The action sequences are amazing, but everything in between is so tedious all the horror and adrenalin are overshadowed. Every review from other authors are all glowing, which makes me think there's a conspiracy to coddle Gladstone or not one of them actually read it.
I like Gladstone, but this book has seriously pissed me off because he refused to kill any of his darlings and, if he had an editor, they were too mealy mouthed to confront him with a red pen.
Because of the similarities of themes and eldritch monsters, Last Exit has retroactively made me dislike NK Jemisin's The Cities We Became. It's not fair and completely my problem, because Jemisin might be as heavy handed with metaphor as Gladstone, she wasn't trying to be subtle and her work has the refinement only a good editor (or a team of editors) can enable. I just need time.
After Last Exit and having also read Empress of Forever, I can only surmise that Gladstone should not write anything longer than 300 pages.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Abandonment, Toxic relationship, Toxic friendship, Blood, Grief, Suicidal thoughts, War, Body horror, Death, Xenophobia, and Violence
I hope he didn't want people to fall in love with his characters, cuz fuck 'em.aardwyrm's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- 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
Gladstone's prose is in a class by itself. Language flensed and rebuilt. The worldbuilding, the characters, the magic, all are phenomena in their own right, but nobody bites with words quite like that. Also he almost made me care about muscle cars, which has never been done before.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Abandonment, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Homophobia, Medical trauma, Alcohol, Hate crime, Police brutality, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Vomit, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Bullying, Car accident, Classism, Colonisation, Confinement, Cultural appropriation, Death, Drug use, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Grief, Genocide, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Lesbophobia, Medical content, Mental illness, Murder, Racism, Sexual content, Slavery, Torture, Toxic friendship, Violence, and War
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