kaitlynhermansen 's review for:

Semiosis by Sue Burke
2.75
Spanning across 7 generations and 8 different characters, Semiosis is a character driven novel about the colonization of a distant planet where they discover a sentient plant. I was looking forward to reading this because of the books promise- a lush, multi-generational novel about characters learning to live in a landscape they are constantly battling with- and ultimately, that’s not what this book felt like to me. Although the novel was character driven, I felt like its constant jump from generation to generation felt rushed, and there wasn’t enough time to sit with each character to really understand them or their actions. Most of the characters were pretty unlikable and I felt no connection to them. I also was expecting multiple sentient plants (and hoping for some evil ones I guess), but it’s actually just one plant, whose point of view we also hear from. At times this book was a true crime novel, at others a family drama, and at others a political drama. I felt like it really struggled to stand its ground on what it promised me, and the jump from genre to genre and character to character made this books execution fail for me. 
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