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liolrugio's profile picture

liolrugio 's review for:

The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler
3.75
adventurous mysterious reflective medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

As much as I expected the octopus and the sci-fi, I really couldn't have predicted how much this would make me question human behaviour.

I love the linguistic aspect when it comes to making contact with non-humans, and wish the book was longer so we could've seen their thought process fail before it worked, especially since Ha makes a huge point of how difficult communication is. Also really wish Ha's book was real because every excerpt had me staring into space for a minute. 

The dialogue also got very heavy towards the end, as the characters revealed things to tie off the story; I love the premise so much that I wish it had taken just a little more time to get to that ending. 

In saying all that, there's a lot of themes that really reflect current ideologies and the technological landscape today, and seeing these repeated in the media I'm consuming is terrifying.