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secunda's review
challenging
emotional
funny
informative
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
4.75
This is one of the best fiction books I’ve read this year. I think the primary audience of course is well-educated Asian women, but I think anyone can enjoy this book. It’s a fantastic skewering of white-dominated Asian studies departments, unstrategic student activism, and grad school.
I was also confused for most of the book regarding the arc with the white fiancé, but I think the ending of the book more or less sorted it out when Ingrid leaves Stephen not necessarily for his Asian fetish, but because she doesn’t like him as a person. As an Asian woman who is currently dating a white man (and so faced similar questions to the ones Ingrid confronts), I find interrogating your own dating preferences over and over to be counterproductive to your ultimate happiness, so I feel that arc went on a little longer than I liked.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism, Cultural appropriation, Addiction, Self harm, Stalking, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Mental illness, Violence, Panic attacks/disorders, Gaslighting, Emotional abuse, Racial slurs, Drug abuse, Drug use, Colonisation, and Classism
Moderate: Bullying
Minor: Rape, Slavery, Religious bigotry, and Sexual assault
bookwormdystopian2's review
challenging
funny
reflective
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
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cultural appropriation, Racism, and Xenophobia
Moderate: Gaslighting and Emotional abuse
sissizc's review
reflective
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
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction, Emotional abuse, Racism, and Gaslighting
Minor: Vomit
christiona's review
challenging
funny
reflective
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
4.5
Clever writing on social issues, some of which I had no clue existed in other groups. I love the different formatting of the book, which added a lot to the story. I connected with the humor and enjoyed chuckling, especially in the later parts.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs
Moderate: Emotional abuse, Cultural appropriation, and Racism
ottotto's review
dark
emotional
funny
tense
fast-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
5.0
oh god, i loved this book. it's been a really long time since i've seen myself so clearly in a book. it was retelling me experiences i didn't know anyone else had. i'm so glad i read it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence and Emotional abuse
Moderate: Sexism and Racism
kathshiroma's review against another edition
- 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
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Stalking, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Racism, Gaslighting, Racial slurs, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, Cultural appropriation, and Drug abuse
Moderate: Sexual content, Bullying, Violence, and Sexual violence
Minor: Body shaming, Colonisation, Outing, and Deportation
jan_db's review
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
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
4.0
i had absolutely no idea where this book was taking me at times and i love it for that.
genuinely made me think about how society treats asian people, especially in a post covid world.
i enjoyed the characters interactions with each other; all of them were established really well i think.
made me laugh at how ridiculous these characters were at times (and also in disbelief that white people like the ones portrayed in this book actually exist…)
genuinely made me think about how society treats asian people, especially in a post covid world.
i enjoyed the characters interactions with each other; all of them were established really well i think.
made me laugh at how ridiculous these characters were at times (and also in disbelief that white people like the ones portrayed in this book actually exist…)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism, Racial slurs, and Xenophobia
Moderate: Emotional abuse and Gaslighting
frankiedoodle's review
dark
funny
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
I picked up this book because I loved Yellowface by RF Kuang and Disorientation was suggested to me as a similar book. It was strikingly similar (both in subject matter and writing style), but I'm not sure that having that comparison at the front of my mind as I read set Disorientation up for success. While both books use satire and absurdism to deliver a message about anti-Asian racism and the model minority myth, I found Yellowface to be slightly more subtle and fun to read. It's always a tall, somewhat unfair task for a book to be immediately and directly competing with one of your favorites, so feel free to take this review with a grain of salt.
This book had a lot to say about identity, academia, and the way that White Supremacy subconsciously infiltrates all of our senses of self, but I didn't feel super trusted as a reader to pick up on that message. Most of this book's more thoughtful points get delivered through lectures and op-ed style blocks of text (sometimes literally coming in the form of op-ed articles written by one of the academic characters), and it made the pacing drag quite a bit. I appreciated and even learned a lot from the points this book had to make, I just wished that maybe we had gotten the chance to find our way to those points through the plot, been shown more and told less.
Every single character in this book fits neatly and completely into a trope. I couldn't decide whether I liked that or not, honestly. I think it was an intentional choice...Disorientation reads as parody, it exists in a world where, by the end, everyone has dropped any inhibition or pretense. Everyone is always at every turn saying the quiet part out loud. On the other hand, existing in the head of an unreliable narrator who's doing outrageous things gets a little less enjoyable when NOBODY in this literary universe is any more reliable or any less outrageous. I guess I was just expecting a little more grounding and had to work to suspend my disbelief as I caught up with what kind of book this was going to be.
Ingrid's visceral journey to find herself and her voice was evocative and fulfilling, and I think will likely hold a lot of validation for AAPI individuals or those in academia. It might have been a little bit on the nose about it all, but overall I found it a very ambitious and creative undertaking and I enjoyed it.
This book had a lot to say about identity, academia, and the way that White Supremacy subconsciously infiltrates all of our senses of self, but I didn't feel super trusted as a reader to pick up on that message. Most of this book's more thoughtful points get delivered through lectures and op-ed style blocks of text (sometimes literally coming in the form of op-ed articles written by one of the academic characters), and it made the pacing drag quite a bit. I appreciated and even learned a lot from the points this book had to make, I just wished that maybe we had gotten the chance to find our way to those points through the plot, been shown more and told less.
Every single character in this book fits neatly and completely into a trope. I couldn't decide whether I liked that or not, honestly. I think it was an intentional choice...Disorientation reads as parody, it exists in a world where, by the end, everyone has dropped any inhibition or pretense. Everyone is always at every turn saying the quiet part out loud. On the other hand, existing in the head of an unreliable narrator who's doing outrageous things gets a little less enjoyable when NOBODY in this literary universe is any more reliable or any less outrageous. I guess I was just expecting a little more grounding and had to work to suspend my disbelief as I caught up with what kind of book this was going to be.
Ingrid's visceral journey to find herself and her voice was evocative and fulfilling, and I think will likely hold a lot of validation for AAPI individuals or those in academia. It might have been a little bit on the nose about it all, but overall I found it a very ambitious and creative undertaking and I enjoyed it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Colonisation, Racism, Emotional abuse, and Cultural appropriation
Moderate: Addiction
Minor: Sexual assault
partlyclaudia's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
funny
informative
inspiring
reflective
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
found a rec for this at a local bookstore. really loved the self-critical tone of the narrator and seeing her develop over the course of the book. big themes of identity and belonging as well as criticism of academia. mild mystery and heist scenes as well as playing with a number of different writing styles. a really poignant look at academia, its faults, and the polarization of race and identity in today’s society. ingrid is deeply relatable and approachable as a lost phD student, struggling to understand her own identity and place in the world.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Emotional abuse, Racism, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, and Xenophobia
Minor: Bullying
emotional manipulation and gaslighting prevalent themesgomhearts's review
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
informative
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
this book provoked me so much. everything about it was so ... destructive (in both good and bad ways). at multiple points i had to stop reading just to take a breath... from either how terrified i was of the next page, trying to process what happened, or just to pace myself to enjoy the book more. (i failed -- i binged more than 200 pages within a night when i promised i'd go to bed early).
at first, i thought i knew what the book would be about: ingrid coming to terms with her asian identity and the internal racism she harbored in her childhood would manifest into her phd dissertation while researching poet xiao-wen chou.
oh my god i was so wrong.
i started to make hypotheses of what would happen next and each time i was debunked. i was in awe by how the book made you feel defenseless. as someone well-versed in the asian-american diaspora and reading about someone who was just so... anti-asian-american, i felt so frustrated with ingrid but wouldn't put the book down since i was determined to see it through that she changes in the end.
did she change?
i don't really know. and i think she's lying to us all.
it irks me to know that she doesn't divulge into academia again. it sucks that the white man wins. there's even a quote vivan says to her regarding how xiao-wen chou writes chinese poetry to benefit the white community. there's no justice for the dissertation riot. god knows i'm so happy that ingrid is foregoing her dating life but it sucks to hear that her asianness in the end depended on removing a white man from her life (WHICH IS GOOD - i never had good vibes about stephen in the first place, but her speech, as tiktok-drama-infused as it is, was only concocted through a 10-minute manipulation quiz?? seriously?) by accepting that she shouldn't date more white men, does she truly understand her belongingness in america? like come on even at the end, she gets placed on asian tour groups "always" she might add. and not to mention: john smith coming to her at the end? how could she forgive him in the first place? after his storytelling, i starting ripping my hair out in utter shock and blatant racism and ingrid, as an asian american (who may honestly be a placeholder for a white woman), forgives him immediately, even working with him in the process.
the book is satirical. it's so hyperbolic i can't even tell what's meant to be taken seriously. are we supposed to take the poc caucus protest seriously? what about her saviorism when it comes to timothy - and why didn't she do anything about it in the first place? is michael supposed to stand in as a metaphor for asian-using-online-propaganda-brain-rot? and how about alex's detachment from the blond, white woman who he only viewed as a symbol for sex. yet another glorification of the white woman as she can come and go as she pleases. vivian was maybe the most authentic character yet. i never hated her. i actually think i may have hated ingrid even though i understood what she was going through.
as i was writing this review, i went from believing this book hailed a 5-star rating to a 3.75. and i wanted to talk about that. from a book that i believe is supposed to speak about asian-american model minority myths and how these stereotypes are perpetuated in modern life, the exaggeration from Vivian's broadcast to Michael's sinophilic rant to John Smith's puppet-playing facade... felt almost backfiring to me.
i cried a lot during this book. and at its peak, i recognize that it's GREAT fiction. very well-written, humorous when needed, personal, and do touch on many aspects of an asian-american's upbringing. however, the feeling i get after reading is synonymous to dread and confusion. what do i feel about ingrid? should i be happy for her? because honestly i'm not. about eunice? about stephen's performative activism? (not to mention, but hello - why was it never addressed that he keeps those raunchy photos AND the recent search history??? ingrid, why didn't you go for it???) anyways.
after reflection, this book gets a 5 in its provocation. but in the aftermath of how i feel, i have to go to a 3.75 for it (with sadness).
at first, i thought i knew what the book would be about: ingrid coming to terms with her asian identity and the internal racism she harbored in her childhood would manifest into her phd dissertation while researching poet xiao-wen chou.
oh my god i was so wrong.
i started to make hypotheses of what would happen next and each time i was debunked. i was in awe by how the book made you feel defenseless. as someone well-versed in the asian-american diaspora and reading about someone who was just so... anti-asian-american, i felt so frustrated with ingrid but wouldn't put the book down since i was determined to see it through that she changes in the end.
did she change?
i don't really know. and i think she's lying to us all.
the book is satirical. it's so hyperbolic i can't even tell what's meant to be taken seriously. are we supposed to take the poc caucus protest seriously? what about her saviorism when it comes to timothy - and why didn't she do anything about it in the first place? is michael supposed to stand in as a metaphor for asian-using-online-propaganda-brain-rot? and how about alex's detachment from the blond, white woman who he only viewed as a symbol for sex. yet another glorification of the white woman as she can come and go as she pleases. vivian was maybe the most authentic character yet. i never hated her. i actually think i may have hated ingrid even though i understood what she was going through.
as i was writing this review, i went from believing this book hailed a 5-star rating to a 3.75. and i wanted to talk about that. from a book that i believe is supposed to speak about asian-american model minority myths and how these stereotypes are perpetuated in modern life, the exaggeration from Vivian's broadcast to Michael's sinophilic rant to John Smith's puppet-playing facade... felt almost backfiring to me.
i cried a lot during this book. and at its peak, i recognize that it's GREAT fiction. very well-written, humorous when needed, personal, and do touch on many aspects of an asian-american's upbringing. however, the feeling i get after reading is synonymous to dread and confusion. what do i feel about ingrid? should i be happy for her? because honestly i'm not. about eunice? about stephen's performative activism? (not to mention, but hello - why was it never addressed that he keeps those raunchy photos AND the recent search history??? ingrid, why didn't you go for it???) anyways.
after reflection, this book gets a 5 in its provocation. but in the aftermath of how i feel, i have to go to a 3.75 for it (with sadness).
Content Warnings
Minor: Colonisation, Hate crime, Racial slurs, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Cultural appropriation, Toxic friendship, Racism, Sexual content, Suicide attempt, and Toxic relationship