Reviews

The Spider and Her Demons by sydney khoo

aielylois's review

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

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

4.25

jay_bubblez's review

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.25

I have never in my life had a more interesting reading experience. In the beginning I couldn't tell if I liked it or not but like, I kinda love it? A lot?? TSahD somehow managed to be endearingly heartfelt and off-the-walls insane all at once. I couldn't put it down for the life of me. The POV writing style is odd at first and takes some getting used to but the detached tone of the narration works perfectly with the two main characters and the super disturbing and graphic parts of the book. Dior is such an interesting character and she made me genuinely nervous, but I have to tip my hat to the author because GOSH she was interesting. The commentary on love and being worthy of existing really hit home as a queer girl myself.

Overall TSahD was a really good time and I reccomend it! It's got elements of the coming of age, superhero, thriller, and urban fantasy genres all woven together and I'm excited to watch and see where the author goes in the future.

pageglue's review

I’m too bored. I don’t wanna dismiss this book as being all about “teenage girl drama”, but there’s a lot of interest surrounding one of the main characters, Dior, and I just don’t care about her at all. It was also really hard to read about the abuse that Zhi experiences from her aunt - I hope by the end of the book Zhi realises that she doesn’t deserve to be treated that way. 
I will say that I grew up in Sydney and khoo captures the city really well. I loved what little horror there was. 

trulybabzz's review

medium-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

4.75

jess64au's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-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

4.75

 Am loving the non binary writers and how that influences their writing and world building.   Amazing book.  I hope th kids who need this book find it and that it doesn’t get ruined by being a class novel.  Awesome story.   

willowmae's review

adventurous emotional inspiring reflective tense fast-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

Really amazing book, love it 

doddyaboutbooks's review

dark emotional hopeful mysterious tense medium-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

4.75

stephanienguy's review

adventurous lighthearted medium-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

4.0

himalaya's review

4.5

I loved this so much!
1: you give me a teenage girl with giant hairy spider legs who scuttles across her bedroom wall on page 3 and then eats a man and i am already sold. 2: the author is aroace and it really shines through here - so many discussions about different kinds of love and very aspec vibes but also some kind of not-entirely-platonic sapphic friendship (could def be a QPR - the part of me who wants more aroace YA wishes it was a little more specific, but also I do love ambiguity and I think it wouldn't be true to the characters who are clearly not even ready to start figuring that stuff out). I also always love the familiarity of aus books compared to the amount of american books i read.

tdlr: diversity win! these fucked up monster girls are aroacespec/queer

alkbass's review

funny hopeful mysterious medium-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

3.75