Reviews with content warning for Suicide attempt - Die Gesetzlose

I was sold on this book for the queer rep, but that aspect of it was kind of lackluster. Some characters are implied to be queer, there is a trans woman and a non binary character. However someone needs to introduce this author to the concept of pronouns that aren't he or she because any scene around the Kid got a little tiresome. Is 'they' really that hard to write?

I also felt like the plot was a little lackluster. The first third of the book is centered on getting the main character to the other main ones, and then there's just a long waiting period where she sits around and feels left out. This is definitely character driven, as a LOT of the book is a reflection on the main character's life and history, and flashbacks are frequent. While I think these flashbacks were well done and I appreciated how she built them up before they came back to be relevant later, I do think this slowed down the main plot.

The writing for this book was really well done, and I felt like the characters were fairly fleshed out - although I'm not sure they entirely lived up to that first scene where Ada meets the rest of the gang and there was so much promise for an interesting group dynamic! But then we mostly got snapshots of individual interactions, so while we know how each gang member feels about Ada and the Kid, I have no idea how, for example, News and Agnes Rose get along. I wish we could have seen more of the group than just their individual opinions on Ada. But the action scenes were exciting, I got attached to the characters enough to be upset when bad things happened, and it was a fast enough read that I didn't grow to resent its faults too much. I was just hoping for more.

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pconley's review against another edition

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adventurous tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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astoldbyangela's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional hopeful reflective 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

5.0

to me, this book is a modern handmaid’s tale & a must-read.

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eleanora's review against another edition

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adventurous 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? It's complicated

3.75

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dinospider's review against another edition

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adventurous 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? It's complicated

3.75

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nothingforpomegranted's review against another edition

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2.25

Ostensibly set in a mostly-dystopian 1894 Texas town that places a premium on women's ability to bear children and suspects infertile women of witchcraft, this book is narrated by Ada, a seventeen-year-old wife and midwife's apprentice who has been exiled from her community after a year of marriage with no child. Passionate about science and serving women, Ada finds herself in the company of the Hole in the Wall gang, a group of outlawed outsiders with a flexible and fluid approach to gender, love, sex, and justice.

This feminist take on a Western novel, filled with crime, adventure, and challenging authority, was certainly creative, but I was quite the right audience for it. Indeed, I was so distracted by the references to race, doctors, baby Jesus, the Flu and Fever, and the seeming dissolution of the United States that I was almost more focused on trying to figure out whether this was a dystopian alternative history (a Confederate win in the Civil War?) or a dystopian future (post COVID-19?), and I'm honestly still confused.

I also was pretty confused by the role of religion and by all of the characters. There were many, each with a painful background, but none was particularly well-developed, and the sub-plots detracted rather than added to the story. The one exception to this, in my opinion, was Lark's story, which surprised and intrigued me, but he, too, was an underdeveloped character who stuck around too briefly.

I appreciate the reviewer who acknowledged that this book offers a different take on the Hole in the Wall gang. I had no idea that this gang was a real concept and really disappointed that there was no Author's Note explaining that research and that choice (which guess means this is an alt-history novel?).

I picked this up because I needed a quick read to help propel me out of a slump (too many classics in a row/at a time can do that to you), and it was definitely successful in that respect. The story was engaging enough and kept me turning the pages for the few hours that this took to finish, but ultimately, I think Anna North bit off more than she could chew--infertility, religion, feminism, justice, gender fluidity, insomnia, mental health, medicine, mothering, Western adventure--and it really didn't work for me.

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kitty03's review against another edition

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adventurous hopeful reflective 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? Yes

3.5

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squish's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional reflective tense 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? No

4.5

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