Take a photo of a barcode or cover
purpledragonfly48 's review for:
The Diabolic
by S.J. Kincaid
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This type of book (YA dystopian sci-fi) is generally not what I gravitate towards. However, I liked the first half pretty well, and then the second was kind of frustrating for me. In the second half, it felt like a lot of things happened mostly for their shock value to the reader, and weren't really processed by the characters. (For example, the death of the dog Deadly. There was some kind of moments of grief, but mostly I felt like Deadly just died kind of suddenly and then was hardly mentioned.) And sure, some surprises are (usually) good, but they should be used in moderation, in my opinion. Also, some of the surprises were...not entirely surprises, but not so much because the book had good foreshadowing, but because they just aligned with all of the genre/trope conventions (Oh! The mad prince isn't actually mad but is pretending so his evil uncle doesn't kill him??? What a shock! ). However, there was a lot of tension, and what-will-happen-next, and what not, that did at a few points make it hard to put the audiobook down.
I think my biggest issue came when Nemesis, the main character, who is a genetically engineered human created to be a uber-loyal bodyguard for the one person she is bonded to, and is therefore seen as non-human/not a person, makes out with the love interest and feels all tingly, and then has some thoughts along the lines of "Oh, this feels so wonderful, I guess I must be a person after all because I can feel romantic love." A year ago I probably wouldn't have batted an eyelash, but as someone who has recently realized they are aromantic asexual, and is coming to terms with this realization, it upset me. The ability to feel (or not feel) romantic love isn't what makes us people. I don't really think any one thing makes us people, but probably some combination of things. I don't really think this was intentional on the author's part, but it's still alienating for those of us who don't feel sexual and/or romantic attraction. While there are other moments in the book where the reader can see Nemesis becoming more human/acting as a person rather than a killing machine, they aren't really recognized by Nemesis as such and I would have liked Nemesis's self-revelation to be around something else: her bond with Deadly, or her friendship with Neveni (sorry about spelling, I listened to the audiobook), rather than solely romantic feelings. I was also annoyed by the way the friendship with Neveni panned out.(I would have liked them to remain friends.)
I think my biggest issue came when Nemesis, the main character, who is a genetically engineered human created to be a uber-loyal bodyguard for the one person she is bonded to, and is therefore seen as non-human/not a person, makes out with the love interest and feels all tingly, and then has some thoughts along the lines of "Oh, this feels so wonderful, I guess I must be a person after all because I can feel romantic love." A year ago I probably wouldn't have batted an eyelash, but as someone who has recently realized they are aromantic asexual, and is coming to terms with this realization, it upset me. The ability to feel (or not feel) romantic love isn't what makes us people. I don't really think any one thing makes us people, but probably some combination of things. I don't really think this was intentional on the author's part, but it's still alienating for those of us who don't feel sexual and/or romantic attraction. While there are other moments in the book where the reader can see Nemesis becoming more human/acting as a person rather than a killing machine, they aren't really recognized by Nemesis as such and I would have liked Nemesis's self-revelation to be around something else: her bond with Deadly, or her friendship with Neveni (sorry about spelling, I listened to the audiobook), rather than solely romantic feelings. I was also annoyed by the way the friendship with Neveni panned out.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Acephobia/Arophobia