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tinyel 's review for:
Witch King
by Martha Wells
Original statement from January 15 2025:
I borrowed a sample of the audiobook from libby, but the list of meaningless names at the start literally took up all but 50 seconds of the 5 minute sample, which means I got to "sample" nothing of the actual story to see if I want to read more. So that's not looking promising at all.
Seriously, I haven't even read the book yet. Why are you telling me all this nonsense about characters I haven't met yet and have no reason to care about yet?
The fact that we're getting random little bits of information along with their names that seems like it should be in the actual plot, makes me fear that they're not actually going to get introduced or explained properly when they do show up, and I'll have been expected to just memorize the nonsense at the start to know who they are.
I really hope I'm wrong about that but I can't see any other reason you would put this at the start of the book instead of the back unless that weren't the case. It feels like the author couldn't keep track of the characters so had to write these notes to herself and now I'm just supposed to memorize them all.
I'll update this review and rating when I get to listen to more of it, since they only have the audiobook, not the book itself.
There's an aproximately 24 week wait until I get to borrow the audiobook. So. Bye until then.
______
Upate June 14 2025: I'm literally still waiting to borrow the audiobook. But I was able to find a hardcover copy at Goodwill for a few bucks so I bought it.
It took 27 and a half hours for me to read this book.
This is one of the worst books I have ever read in my entire life. I cannot fucking believe anyone let this get published, let alone thought it was reasonable to charge $28.99 for it.
This book is horribly written, it's racist, it's misogynistic, it tries to normalize pedophilia and eugenics, Martha Wells continues to be a fucking bigot towards nonbinary people, it's pretentious, it reads like a highschooler who bullshitted their way through an essay, then got out a thesaurus to replace every other word with a "more smart sounding" synonym.
This book is shit. There is no worldbuilding. There is no exposition. There is hardly any setting.
The characters have no personality outside of being edgy for the sake of being edgy, and it is utterly fucking ridiculous.
I'll write a more detailed review later. This book is so fucking bad. Do not let anyone convince you it's some fucking genius. It's written like shitty fanfiction, as though it's book 4 of a series and not book 1 that was supposed to be standalone.
Shitty pathetic cashgrab taking every flaw of Martha Wells' writing and magnifying it tenfold, because apparently the fame of The Murderbot Diaries has convinced her to double down on everything she's ever done wrong instead of learning and growing and improving as a person and as a writer.
Cis people are fucking pathetic. This book is just more cissexist, biological essentialism masquerading as gender essentialism as though that isn't just as fucking bigoted and short sighted. Holy shit.
Feel free to watch my "liveblog" of this on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLpFcEwm88RUvOvHxrKsM1Am6aJwZoCel5. Transcript version coming...relatively soon. For the videos, click the fast forward key until you see me talking again.
I borrowed a sample of the audiobook from libby, but the list of meaningless names at the start literally took up all but 50 seconds of the 5 minute sample, which means I got to "sample" nothing of the actual story to see if I want to read more. So that's not looking promising at all.
Seriously, I haven't even read the book yet. Why are you telling me all this nonsense about characters I haven't met yet and have no reason to care about yet?
The fact that we're getting random little bits of information along with their names that seems like it should be in the actual plot, makes me fear that they're not actually going to get introduced or explained properly when they do show up, and I'll have been expected to just memorize the nonsense at the start to know who they are.
I really hope I'm wrong about that but I can't see any other reason you would put this at the start of the book instead of the back unless that weren't the case. It feels like the author couldn't keep track of the characters so had to write these notes to herself and now I'm just supposed to memorize them all.
I'll update this review and rating when I get to listen to more of it, since they only have the audiobook, not the book itself.
There's an aproximately 24 week wait until I get to borrow the audiobook. So. Bye until then.
______
Upate June 14 2025: I'm literally still waiting to borrow the audiobook. But I was able to find a hardcover copy at Goodwill for a few bucks so I bought it.
It took 27 and a half hours for me to read this book.
This is one of the worst books I have ever read in my entire life. I cannot fucking believe anyone let this get published, let alone thought it was reasonable to charge $28.99 for it.
This book is horribly written, it's racist, it's misogynistic, it tries to normalize pedophilia and eugenics, Martha Wells continues to be a fucking bigot towards nonbinary people, it's pretentious, it reads like a highschooler who bullshitted their way through an essay, then got out a thesaurus to replace every other word with a "more smart sounding" synonym.
This book is shit. There is no worldbuilding. There is no exposition. There is hardly any setting.
The characters have no personality outside of being edgy for the sake of being edgy, and it is utterly fucking ridiculous.
I'll write a more detailed review later. This book is so fucking bad. Do not let anyone convince you it's some fucking genius. It's written like shitty fanfiction, as though it's book 4 of a series and not book 1 that was supposed to be standalone.
Shitty pathetic cashgrab taking every flaw of Martha Wells' writing and magnifying it tenfold, because apparently the fame of The Murderbot Diaries has convinced her to double down on everything she's ever done wrong instead of learning and growing and improving as a person and as a writer.
Cis people are fucking pathetic. This book is just more cissexist, biological essentialism masquerading as gender essentialism as though that isn't just as fucking bigoted and short sighted. Holy shit.
Feel free to watch my "liveblog" of this on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLpFcEwm88RUvOvHxrKsM1Am6aJwZoCel5. Transcript version coming...relatively soon. For the videos, click the fast forward key until you see me talking again.