Reviews tagging 'Rape'

Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh

86 reviews

mellomorissa's review

adventurous dark emotional hopeful informative reflective sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, Racism, and Suicide

deedireads's review

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

All my reviews live at https://deedireads.com/.

Honestly, I can’t believe Some Desperate Glory wasn’t on my radar until it was nominated for the Hugo, especially with such blurb power (VE Schwab, Tamsyn Muir, Alix Harrow, Shelley Parker-Chan, John Scalzi, and more). But wow am I glad it showed up!!

The book is set in a future where Earth has been destroyed and the last colony of humans lives and trains to exact revenge. The main character, Kyr, is an unlikeable but highly skilled trainee about to receive her official placement — until that placement goes wrong and everything she thought she knew gets turned on its head.

This is one hell of a story. It especially picks up halfway — I think I literally said “whaaaaat!” out loud in a room all by myself. I’m not sure I’ve ever read a book about what is essentially an awakening from brainwashing, but it does set up a lot of exploration of important themes like racism, homophobia, sexism, suicide, and eugenics. In fact I’d almost say it’s a little heavy handed on some of this stuff, but in a forgivable way.

The audiobook performance was also good, but because there’s a decent amount of worldbuilding, I’d recommend starting the book in print and switching to audio once you’ve got a handle on things (or listening as you read along).

I could definitely see this winning the Hugo!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia, Suicide, Homophobia, and Xenophobia

Moderate: Death of parent and War

Minor: Rape

nerp's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

WOW. Wow. WOW!!! I thought I knew what this book was going to be—a sci-fi “I escaped a cult” reprogramming, like Adora escaping the Hoard but not having the princesses to run to. But that barely scratches the surface of Kyr’s character and journey. I love that this is a standalone and that there’s so much hope in what seems like a hopeless world. We’re in a blessed age of spec fic!!

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Suicide, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, Violence, War, Genocide, and Confinement

Minor: Rape

malinhalia's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

2.75

I think the base plot of this book is very interesting, although "humans discover they are the worst sentient species in the universe" isn't exactly ground-breaking. I think the world set up is pretty good, it feels fairly immersive throughout the book. However, I think the pacing feels off and there are just so. many. fight. scenes. towards the end they start feeling quite tedious rather than keeping your attention. I also found the characters in general a bit weak - I never really cared a lot about what happened to any of them.
Caution, major spoilers:

I think it's very brave to take on the alternative realities subject however I'm not completely happy with the logic of it all. I think something like this would never be fully explainable, and to an extent "space magic" can be an explanation for things, but if there are infinite realities, why can't Utopia exist? Sure, Earth is destroyed vs Humans conquer everything might be the most common outcomes if you run a scenario many times, but surely there must be one where everyone (or even no one) wins? Also, how can we trust that Yiso is telling the truth and the Wisdom is dead in the final timeline? As we can't tell if it's alive or not, how do we know this is the final reality? It could just be a reality where it's simulating its own death?

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Content Warnings

Minor: Rape

ddclarke's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

I wasn't sure what to expect of this book when I started. I went in knowing nothing but the back blurb (which felt very trope-heavy and YA focused) and the Hugo nom, and the beginning of the book propped that up... 

... but then I couldn't stop reading, and by about halfway through it was clear there was something great happening. 

I loved the turning of the tropes, the themes, and all they wonderful grey. I also love that this seems to be a standalone book; while I'd love more from the universe, I hope the characters specifically are let to rest. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Biphobia, Xenophobia, War, Violence, Sexism, Murder, Suicide, Homophobia, Sexual assault, and Genocide

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, and Rape

sincetheflood's review

adventurous challenging dark reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

tbh going into this book i really disliked how much of an asshole the mc was and i expected it to be more of a 4 star read, but she grew on me so much.  banger of a book

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, War, and Xenophobia

Moderate: Rape, Homophobia, and Sexual assault

avacadosocks's review

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual harassment, Xenophobia, Suicide, and War

Moderate: Violence, Misogyny, Rape, Sexual assault, Pedophilia, Homophobia, Death, Sexism, and Transphobia

Minor: Genocide, Abortion, Pregnancy, and Death of parent

emily_mh's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I read this book on a friend’s recommendation and honestly bless her, because it was phenomenal. It’s the kind of story where I had no idea what was going to happen next, and I mean that in the best possible way. Every time I would be like “ah, it’s this trope”, and then pages later Tesh would flip everything on its head. I was sooooo invested and truly hooked by this fresh, original approach.

The plot was not the only mind-blowing thing about the book. It was also packed with existentialism, posing questions such as: what choices in the past lead us to our current reality? Are there certain outcomes which are inevitable in every reality? Who gets to decide what is for the “greater good” - who gets to even DEFINE the “greater good”? I love when books pose these ethical and philosophical questions and then the whole narrative is an exploration of them. Some may be answered, some may be left open, ultimately beyond the scope of the story to answer. But in every case the reader is challenged to consider things they may never have before.

Tesh also tackles extremist indoctrination as a main theme, as MC Kyr (along with most of the SCs), experiences this having grown up on Gaea Station, a military post containing the humans who survived the destruction of Earth and seek revenge from the alien perpetrators. This was heavy to read about. Gaea’s society is founded on eugenics (specifically relating to race and ability), as well as misogyny, sexism, queerphobia, and bioessentialism, and the sexual violence these engender. And Kyr, at the beginning of the book, is the poster child for Gaea. Her character arc is inexplicably wrapped up in deprogramming her indoctrination as she is exposed to the world outside Gaea. It is truly astonishing how much Kyr changes over the course of the novel, and how much she discovers about herself when free from oppressive social constructs. Kyr is by no means perfect at the end of the book, but she also isn’t the same person she was in the first chapter. It is important to note that Tesh as the author always presents the above topics (eugenics, sexual violence) as abhorrent. Even when Kyr doesn’t understand their horrors, you as the reader know that Gaea is deeply, deeply wrong, that Kyr is deeply, deeply wrong, and Tesh does too.

I wouldn’t say this is “found family” like the synopsis proclaims. Every relationship in the book is too complicated and messy and often filled with both love AND hate, to fit neatly into a usually wholesome and straightforward trope. And that’s to this book’s credit. The characters all feel real because none of them can be perfectly squared away into an archetype, their understandably complicated reactions to one another birthed out of the complex situations they find themselves in.

I am so glad my friend recommended this to me and that I decided to give it a go. The only criticisms I can think of right now are that I wish the commentary on eugenics and disability had been made more explicit, and that the ending felt a touch deus ex machina (but maybe that was ironically intentional). Regardless, this book deserved its 5 stars.

Rep: queer MC, queer SCs, Afro-Latina SC

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, War, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Suicide, Child abuse, Murder, Violence, Genocide, and Gun violence

Moderate: Ableism, Homophobia, Cursing, Sexual harassment, Body horror, Animal death, Colonisation, Physical abuse, Sexism, Racism, Transphobia, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, and Death of parent

Minor: Vomit, Abortion, Rape, Torture, Blood, Suicide attempt, Fire/Fire injury, Slavery, Sexual content, Alcohol, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Self harm, and Drug use

Major: queer used as a slur 6 times, loss of a loved one, bioessentialism, eugenics, misgendering Minor: suicide ideation

brekaboujie's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This book was SO GOOD. Another point to add to my mental list of "why do I bother reading sci fi by men, women do it so much better". This is a great combination of flawed and interesting characters, extreme high stakes, wonderful twists and turns, great pacing, and a really clear idea from the author of what they wanted to get out of this story. The whole premise of Gaea and our introduction to a terribly biased narrator was brilliant. I had such a sinking feeling through the beginning of the book and going on that journey of discovery with the main character was GREAT, it was so tense and emotional and interesting. 

It was also super immersive - I was completely sucked into this world and every scene and section felt necessary and useful to the plot (seems a low bar but honestly such a relief after my recent reads which were not like that at all), and I loved how everything kept falling into place perfectly set up from the previous scenes and knowledge I'd been given. 

Also the end !!!!!!!!!! Heck yeah. Solid ending. Love a good ending. 

Final point - it's quite an intense book, and the version I read had content warnings at the beginning which was cool. I will say that everything was done really sensitively and well - very little explicit showing of the nasty content warnings, much more themed and just general knowledge of things Just Being Like That. It did remind me a bit of The Handmaid's Tale thematically, but imagine that's a side plot and it's not quite as bad and also they're in space and have guns. So nothing like it really. But regardless, there was a point towards the end of this bookwhere in my mind I literally went WOMEN YES WOMEN THE CONNECTION OF UNIVERSAL SUFFERING !!!!! So enjoy that moment if you read this. Great book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Xenophobia, Violence, War, and Suicide

Moderate: Homophobia, Rape, and Genocide

Minor: Child abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Pregnancy, Abortion, Racism, Emotional abuse, and Misogyny

A lot of heavy themes but all dealt with sensitively! There is one scene where somone

shoots themselves in the head in front of the main character. This is sudden, and there is a description after of the image of the death. However, they move on quite quickly in the book and (bigger spoiler here on the actual plot) that person doesn't stay dead.

The rape tag is not explicit, people just talk about how that probably was what happened to someone in the past, and it goes hand in hand with the pregnancy tag, which the author calls "forced pregnancy" in their content warnings. This again isn't explicit, it just is accepted as normal in their society and only questioned fully towards the middle and end.

rikagx's review

adventurous dark fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Death of parent, and Rape