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claudiearseneault's review
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
medium-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
3.0
Holy mixed feelings batman. Or X-men, in this case, I guess.
To say I came to this book with high expectations is an understatement. Superheroes? Found family? Queerness? I love all these things so much. I wanted a fun wholesome romp full of cheesy tropes and a bunch of new children to love. And when it does the superhero stuff, Cute Mutants is at its best. The powers these kids inherit are super creative, it's fun to see the tropes played straight and lampshaded all at once, and it brings back the eternal questions of vigilante justice and what that looks like. Dylan's power in particular is just all kinds of incredible.
It's just.. a lot of the rest fell flat to me. Enough that at 50% I was seriously considering quitting. It's a combo of stuff that just aren't my thing and others that I think could use better execution. For exemple, repeatedly having to witness real-world bigotry, across just about every axis, is not what I expected from this and just really not my jam (especially when the racism comes with some white saviour aftertaste). I got used to Dylan's narration sounding like the internet, even if the metric-ton of references* often lose me, but it also sadly comes with the non-stop string of ableist slurs, so watch for that.
It also tends to flatten thing,especially characters. You know that thing fandom does where they attribute 1-2 characteristics to a character and that's suddenly all they are? That's what it felt like for Alyse, Emma, and Bianca. Coincidentally the ones that are not love interests, hm. And that's the second thing. Everyone talks about the big found family in this book and like, yeah, the Cute Mutants are all together!! But wow do the friendships feel underdeveloped to me.. except maybe Alyse's? Part of it stems from Dylan's social anxiety (which, top notch on that front), because a lot of the book is spent on Dylan even believing she has friends to begin with. Maybe this gets better in later books. Not sure I'll stick around to find out.
I think that sums up my main gripes. Don't get me wrong, I can easily see where people would fall head over heels for this. I'd probably have loved it more if I had been prepared for how dark it actually is, but the gushing reviews and cute cover forgot that bit. XD I wish I'd loved it more than I ended up doing. Kinda feels like I'm missing something.
*Including several Harry Potter references, which considering how much "stand up to transphobia" happens in this book, which is self-published, and thus fairly easy to update.. really caught me off guard
To say I came to this book with high expectations is an understatement. Superheroes? Found family? Queerness? I love all these things so much. I wanted a fun wholesome romp full of cheesy tropes and a bunch of new children to love. And when it does the superhero stuff, Cute Mutants is at its best. The powers these kids inherit are super creative, it's fun to see the tropes played straight and lampshaded all at once, and it brings back the eternal questions of vigilante justice and what that looks like. Dylan's power in particular is just all kinds of incredible.
It's just.. a lot of the rest fell flat to me. Enough that at 50% I was seriously considering quitting. It's a combo of stuff that just aren't my thing and others that I think could use better execution. For exemple, repeatedly having to witness real-world bigotry, across just about every axis, is not what I expected from this and just really not my jam (especially when the racism comes with some white saviour aftertaste). I got used to Dylan's narration sounding like the internet, even if the metric-ton of references* often lose me, but it also sadly comes with the non-stop string of ableist slurs, so watch for that.
It also tends to flatten thing,especially characters. You know that thing fandom does where they attribute 1-2 characteristics to a character and that's suddenly all they are? That's what it felt like for Alyse, Emma, and Bianca. Coincidentally the ones that are not love interests, hm. And that's the second thing. Everyone talks about the big found family in this book and like, yeah, the Cute Mutants are all together!! But wow do the friendships feel underdeveloped to me.. except maybe Alyse's? Part of it stems from Dylan's social anxiety (which, top notch on that front), because a lot of the book is spent on Dylan even believing she has friends to begin with. Maybe this gets better in later books. Not sure I'll stick around to find out.
I think that sums up my main gripes. Don't get me wrong, I can easily see where people would fall head over heels for this. I'd probably have loved it more if I had been prepared for how dark it actually is, but the gushing reviews and cute cover forgot that bit. XD I wish I'd loved it more than I ended up doing. Kinda feels like I'm missing something.
*Including several Harry Potter references, which considering how much "stand up to transphobia" happens in this book, which is self-published, and thus fairly easy to update.. really caught me off guard
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism, Sexism, Homophobia, and Lesbophobia
Moderate: Transphobia, Gore, Sexual assault, and Suicidal thoughts
Minor: Ableism and Acephobia/Arophobia
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