Reviews

Palimpsest by Catherynne M. Valente

mccullah's review against another edition

slow-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

kmacdo23's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful mysterious slow-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

Mrs. Valente, I'll love you forever. These words wash over me, cleansing as rain.

You take the train to heaven, listen to the bees, circumnavigate fairyland with your skirt as your sail, be a beast amoung beasts, fall in love with the ghosts of your childhood. 

Take me to Palimpsest, dip my feet in the ink, wrap me in red, read my cards. I'm ready for the real world.

This is my favourite love story.

bourbon72's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad 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

4.5

mayakanga's review against another edition

3.0

3.5

aleffert's review against another edition

5.0

This book claims to be about sex, but it is really about drugs. And it is really really about the struggle in that moment when you feel like you should drag yourself out of bed in the morning, but you're only half awake and the thing you want most in the world is to just lie cozy and unconscious and as long as you do that there's absolutely nothing the world can do to hurt you. It is about how in those moments the world can still hurt you.

This is a book about a sexually transmitted city. It is strange and dreamy and beautiful. If that is not enough to compel you to seek out this book then it is not for you. Also, I am not sure we should be friends.

This is not a perfect book. It is weird and warty. There is not much plot. The characters are not particularly sympathetic. It works though. It carries itself on sheer literary fireworks.

carmiendo's review against another edition

5.0

this book is strange and sexy and kind of unreasonably beautiful.

k8s's review against another edition

2.0

2.5

bahoulie's review against another edition

5.0

I loved this book. The characters are totally in the dark as to what is going on for a good chuck of the book, and the author did a good job of keeping me feeling lost enough to experience a. Little of what the characters were going thru, while providing enough hand-holds to keep me reading. I also loved the dream-like quality of her descriptions of place. A totally unusual, if fairly awful story, told beautifully.

emmadash2's review

adventurous emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

5.0

Erotic read

skovlyste's review against another edition

5.0

I had a friend read this aloud to me, which was amazing. It was such a poetic, colourful, cute, sensual, depressing, disturbing, relatable book!