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3.46 AVERAGE
3.46 AVERAGE
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
This started off great, but when events really start coming together, the story starts dragging and loses steam.
adventurous
dark
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Es war eine ganz nette Leseerfahrung. Science fiction, die ohne alte Frauenbilder funktioniert und aktuelle Konzepte verarbeitet. Dennoch war es mir Stellenweise zu jugendlich geschrieben und die Charaktere waren mir nicht sehr wichtig.
3.5. I love Tade and I really enjoyed his Afterword in this book. I think it’s great that he is learning how to go into other genres, but I didn’t feel it was, as he said, a murder mystery. A lot of the book kind of phases in and out, and I couldn’t really tell what it was meant to be about (other than revenge, obviously). Definitely no where near his Rosewater books (which I love). But not horrible, either.
I really liked the Rosewater books and would really recommend them and their oddness warts and all. I think this was an incredibly disappointing follow up.
A really strong central premise. The odd bit of good writing. There are some good ideas here and there. But it's just not a good novel.
It's also not at all the novel it is set up to be.
It sells itself as a locked room murder mystery on a spaceship. It is not in any way a mystery or detective novel. It is a disaster novel with some other stuff bolted on (which I won't go into cause of spoilers).
It's really astonishingly disjointed. Weirdly inconsistent and confused at times both in story and in world building terms. And just loads of stuff doesn't make sense or add up. Characters have had thought put into them but are so weakly defined in the actually writing at points just just forget who. There's a really poor sense of the ship and the physicality of stuff. And the more the novel goes on the more stuff doesn't make sense or contradicts itself.
As I already mentioned it absolutely wastes it's central concept but it really is worth explaining why.
There is a murder, you don't know who did it and there's a detective ostensibly there to investigate it (although that doesn't really happen in the book he's mainly just another character going I've got a murder to solve you know to remind you he's the detective) but that's about it. It really shares nothing else with mystery writing and I found the solution almost insulting. It's just not a mystery.
In reality it is actually a sci-fi disaster novel. But even in those terms that it's really flawed and disjointed and unsatisfying.
And I listened to this on audiobook and that made it a significantly worse experience over reading it. The audiobook narrator has a nice speaking voice but is not a good fiction narrator at all.
Incredibly monotone to the point you can't differentiate between characters, and half the time everything just flows into each other and it's hard to tell who is saying what. He or whoever was giving direction kept making really odd choices etc and scenes shift and you only realise because suddenly there's been a. Hange you haven't noticed and everything's delivered in the same tone and voice
But I'm not factoring that into my review of the book itself. I initially thought it must be the terrible narration that's just bigging me but as I got used to that I realised it wasn't.
A really strong central premise. The odd bit of good writing. There are some good ideas here and there. But it's just not a good novel.
It's also not at all the novel it is set up to be.
It sells itself as a locked room murder mystery on a spaceship. It is not in any way a mystery or detective novel. It is a disaster novel with some other stuff bolted on (which I won't go into cause of spoilers).
It's really astonishingly disjointed. Weirdly inconsistent and confused at times both in story and in world building terms. And just loads of stuff doesn't make sense or add up. Characters have had thought put into them but are so weakly defined in the actually writing at points just just forget who. There's a really poor sense of the ship and the physicality of stuff. And the more the novel goes on the more stuff doesn't make sense or contradicts itself.
As I already mentioned it absolutely wastes it's central concept but it really is worth explaining why.
There is a murder, you don't know who did it and there's a detective ostensibly there to investigate it (although that doesn't really happen in the book he's mainly just another character going I've got a murder to solve you know to remind you he's the detective) but that's about it. It really shares nothing else with mystery writing and I found the solution almost insulting. It's just not a mystery.
In reality it is actually a sci-fi disaster novel. But even in those terms that it's really flawed and disjointed and unsatisfying.
And I listened to this on audiobook and that made it a significantly worse experience over reading it. The audiobook narrator has a nice speaking voice but is not a good fiction narrator at all.
Incredibly monotone to the point you can't differentiate between characters, and half the time everything just flows into each other and it's hard to tell who is saying what. He or whoever was giving direction kept making really odd choices etc and scenes shift and you only realise because suddenly there's been a. Hange you haven't noticed and everything's delivered in the same tone and voice
But I'm not factoring that into my review of the book itself. I initially thought it must be the terrible narration that's just bigging me but as I got used to that I realised it wasn't.
adventurous
dark
mysterious
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
Probably closer to 3.5 stars since I wasn't super thrilled with the final reveal and direction of the ending. But, on the other hand, I couldn't put the book down. And while the end goes a bit "bigger" than you'd expect from the beginning, I goes bigger well and it's exciting.
Kinda wish I had skipped this one. At first I thought I wasn't enjoying it because sci fi is not a genre I read much, but I actually think the book just wasn't good. The plot had interesting ideas but the story advanced at a weird pace and the tone was distractingly inconsistent. The ending was abrupt and felt unfinished. I don't recommend.
This is mildly and vaguely (and then also clearly) spoilery here and there - proceed with caution!
This was an intriguing book and (would have been) a fast read (had I had more time for it in the past few days), but in the end it was also a mess!! It was such a clear 4 from the start until maybe like 3/4 of it, but now I'm teetering between 2/3/4?? The more I think about all the things that confused or annoyed me, the lower my rating dips. BUT, this was still an interesting ride, and some parts and quirks I did like quite a lot!
So yeah, I feel conflicted about many things in this book.. I liked the writing but at the same time was frustrated with it. There were jewels of sentences in there, but the dialogue - both inner and between characters - that at first seemed refreshingly stylistic and deliciously sarcastic, somehow turned into laconic and pretty depressing as the story went on. I found the ending rather dispiriting,
A non-exhaustive list of other things that bothered me:
The whole thing got a bit confusing at a point, what with all the POVs, and some parts of the tangle were plain weird and felt simply superfluous (like the "demon sex with lava" dream stuff, what was that about??). It was as if after the middle of the book or so there were storylines branching all over the place, and even though on one hand I often like this kind of messiness and loose ends and when a story stirs more questions than gives you clear answers, on the other I also tend to get frustrated when there are juicy-seeming plot lines poked and hinted at and then left hanging for good. This was going on a lot in this thriller/murder mystery/space thingy.
The same with, for example, Shell's brothers and their letters?? What was the point of them in this book???
I was also like 99 % unmoved by the "romance" between Fin and Joké - BUT I liked Lawrence and Joké's relationship (or the little that was revealed about it) a lot! It was probably the one storyline that did anything to me emotionally during the whole ride, alongside with the aforementioned occasional top-notch wordings, and some details about the passengers and their identities.
Plus, it also got a little too horrory and icky to my taste at places towards the end..
All that said, I clearly find myself concentrating more on what I didn't like and didn't feel than what was good about the book. Which is too bad! This really did start out so good for me! And I'd still recommend this, just for the good kind of weirdness of it if nothing else, so go figure.
Settling on a middle rating for now.
This was an intriguing book and (would have been) a fast read (had I had more time for it in the past few days), but in the end it was also a mess!! It was such a clear 4 from the start until maybe like 3/4 of it, but now I'm teetering between 2/3/4?? The more I think about all the things that confused or annoyed me, the lower my rating dips. BUT, this was still an interesting ride, and some parts and quirks I did like quite a lot!
So yeah, I feel conflicted about many things in this book.. I liked the writing but at the same time was frustrated with it. There were jewels of sentences in there, but the dialogue - both inner and between characters - that at first seemed refreshingly stylistic and deliciously sarcastic, somehow turned into laconic and pretty depressing as the story went on. I found the ending rather dispiriting,
Spoiler
and I can't say I agree with especially Shell's arc or the state of her psyche in the end. How was the whole thing her responsibility?? It really wasn't Ragtime's, either, or Salvo's, and while I get the need for quarantine and precautions, I really do not vibe with all the blaming and condemning that the story was left at.A non-exhaustive list of other things that bothered me:
Spoiler
Brisbane and Carmilla were introduced way too fast and were not fleshed out enough, and the ultimate motive/reasoning behind Carmilla's untiring scramble for the goal no matter the costs (never mind the seemingly invincible means the AIA possessed) was also way too vague and/or poorly executed.The whole thing got a bit confusing at a point, what with all the POVs, and some parts of the tangle were plain weird and felt simply superfluous (like the "demon sex with lava" dream stuff, what was that about??). It was as if after the middle of the book or so there were storylines branching all over the place, and even though on one hand I often like this kind of messiness and loose ends and when a story stirs more questions than gives you clear answers, on the other I also tend to get frustrated when there are juicy-seeming plot lines poked and hinted at and then left hanging for good. This was going on a lot in this thriller/murder mystery/space thingy.
Spoiler
Frances. He was cute and all and I liked that he was there, but why exactly was he there (on the cover, no less?)?? I feel like the wolf did little to the plot in the grand scheme of things, despite helping the crew fight the bots etc.The same with, for example, Shell's brothers and their letters?? What was the point of them in this book???
I was also like 99 % unmoved by the "romance" between Fin and Joké
Plus, it also got a little too horrory and icky to my taste at places towards the end..
All that said, I clearly find myself concentrating more on what I didn't like and didn't feel than what was good about the book. Which is too bad! This really did start out so good for me! And I'd still recommend this, just for the good kind of weirdness of it if nothing else, so go figure.
Settling on a middle rating for now.