blueberrybanana 's review for:

Hummingbird Salamander by Jeff VanderMeer

2.5

challenging slow-paced

Loveable characters: No

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This had so much potential to be good and interesting! Boy I wanted to like it! But wow this lady sucks lol! Extremely dislikeable the whole way through and never got better. I hated her narration and justification for her actions. The interesting/relevant parts were crammed together at the end and the message felt very abstract to me when I think Vandermeer was trying to make it impactful. Instead I felt annoyed. The way she completely destroys the lives of people around her without a single thought felt ironic given that she was trying to chase down Silvina and (maybe?) change how people viewed the world. The book picked up in the last 25% but took wayyyy too long to get there. Shoutout to the commenter who said Jeff VanderMeer's refusal to commit to narrative structure was frustrating for them. Me too queen 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death