clovetra's reviews
204 reviews

lighthearted relaxing fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

me before opening this book: haha since i read the first volumes ive changed a lot and im almost 20 years old and i don’t think ill like this as much because im older and it’ll be weird reading about teens haha:
me reading this book: stimming wildly the entire time

Content Warnings

Babel by R.F. Kuang

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adventurous dark emotional tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

ok. i gotta say it. least favourite r.f kuang book right here. which is crazy to say seeing as i haven’t finished the burning god but whatever.

first let me dunk on this book very briefly. i think this book has four issues that hold it back from a perfect novel.

one, rf kuang has set my expectations so high any imperfections seem so glaring when i adore her other works.

two. this book is repetitive at times. when you have 546 pages, i imagine there would be some repetition. but at some point after hearing about how lovell sucks, about how babel sucks, about how colonialism is bad, how exploitation of the lower class for the profits of the upper class sucks, and how racism sucks… i wanted more. which kind of brings up the issue of this book not going deeper with its analysis. ok yes i get it white people are perpetrators of colonialism and racism to the highest degree. now let’s add some more depth to this conversation. Nope! let’s instead

make lovell an almost cartoonish villain, make letty turn on her friends when she had a “redemption arc” coming her way, and have no depth beyond how white people are racist. after a while it felt like every white character became a mythic antagonist. i’m not saying humanise the racists! they can get fucked! especially letty you can eat dog shit at this point. what i am saying is let’s go beyond these fundamentals. rf kuang i know you can do this.

. i don’t think i properly explained what i mean here and i don’t think i actually possess those words. idk i just wanted a deeper analysis of the points kuang raises in this book. and this seems to be the issue with all themes in this book. the theme is explored in a surface way, and then fail to dig deeper and instead we get the same line rewritten every 20 pages. RF KUANG YOU CAN DO BETTER.

this also leads me onto the fact that there is no nuance in this book. everything must be black or white. britain is good or britain is bad. lovell is good or lovell is bad. babel is good or babel is bad. i expected MORE than just surface-level conversations that i’d expect to see on twitter.

robin sucks. robin swift the character isn’t a bad guy, he’s just badly written. at points he goes from the most obvious audience surrogate in the world, to someone with wants dreams and aspirations, to yet again as fleshed out as cardboard. at points robin felt so raw and honest, and other times he felt like he was just doing and saying shit just because the plot beckoned him to, not because that’s what his character would do. because he has no character!!!!! gun to my head other than listing characteristics of robin (e.g orphaned, chinese, a babbler), i could not name you 3 traits he has. i mean i could say he’s a good friend and that’s it.

and let me just say - this book is boring at times. straight up i did not care about this book until The Big Thing. like before that ok i was into this book, but i wasn’t gripped. there is no plot. there is no tension. and don’t sit here and tell me “oh it’s a school story at that point of course there’s no tension” SHUT UP. the poppy war’s school setting ate AND had a good plot. i don’t know what happened here shorty but it wasn’t great! it was fine. passable. tolerable. but not truly interesting.

ok now ive shit on this book let me tell you what i DID i like.

the linguistic side. idk it made this book feel more real. plus you could tell it was interesting and deeply researched
ramy. my love. my dear. you are babygrill. 🫶
after canton 2: electric bugaloo, the book REALLLLYYY gripped me. like i was HOOKED. i think from there i literally finished the rest of this book in one day.
the first half of this book was great in terms of atmosphere ! i actually was really digging it ! but after a while i realised the points raised weren’t really going to go past the basics i became a bit disillusioned

ummm otherwise idk what to say. i mean i very clearly had a good time reading this. i was invested and will always adore rf kuang’s writing. but this? this is a fall from grace compared to the beauty that is the poppy war trilogy.

i’m such a hater oh my god

Content Warnings

Empty: A Memoir by Susan Burton

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challenging emotional informative reflective slow-paced

3.0

oh i hate giving memoirs anything other than glowing reviews. it feels like im commenting not only on this person’s writing but their life. so believe me when i say i hate that i didn’t like this more.

i think this is a perfectly fine book! i can understand why this resonates with so many people. i’ve not experienced the same eating disorders as burton has, but i do face ARFID and have always had issues with my body image, so im not completely isolated from her experiences. i did relate to her at many points in this book, especially her describing her relationship with food as a child. the only vegetable i ate until i was a teenager was cucumber (which i always had to have with tomato sauce mind you). we and toddler burton are like this 🤞 fr. i also really appreciate how burton didn’t focus on the glamorisation of eating disorders. that sounds like stupid praise because to write about the details of an eating disorder (e.g weight, methods, etc.) has been known to be a cardinal sin when recounting experiences. but just because it’s widely known that you shouldn’t do that doesn’t mean people don’t! especially since for burton i imagine her recounting her weight would only spur the feelings she explains in her book again. it’s not even that she tip-toed around the issue — she straight up doesn’t mention her weight, any methods she uses in her anorexia periods, she doesn’t shy away from the almost hidden nature of binge eating, and i adore her for that.

the thing i struggled with most in this book was the writing style. now ofc im not a fucking phd student of literature yet here i am critiquing a very well known author!!! who am i? but i cant ignore how i felt reading this. it almost felt like burton was writing a list, of getting to point a to point b and so on. although the story recounted her feelings, it didn’t feel like she was reliving them and i was an observer, it felt like i was watching a movie of burton watching a movie of these events. like it felt even more detached than second-hand, it felt almost robotic at times. and im not even knocking what some other reviews have, where they complain about this book repeating itself in a cyclical nature — newsflash that’s literally how eating disorders work (although i can’t lie and say it did get tiring as a reader, but im not gonna hold that against this book as those are the facts). but it felt like with every event, with every new change in burton’s life, the emotions were still flat. and yeah that can probably be ascribed to her fixation with food dulling her emotions, but it was hard to read as i felt like i was reading from a textbook, devoid of all feeling. the only parts i really felt “connected” to burton were parts i myself could relate to, but other than that it felt like this book was going through the motions.

either way though, i feel like this was a great insight into eating disorders in the long run — people don’t just “get over” eating disorders. it is a constant battle. this memoir also shines light on binge eating, a topic often forgotten about in conversations about eating disorders. it is just as real, just as harmful, and just as difficult to crawl out of.

Content Warnings

Severance by Ling Ma

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dark mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

holy shit. HOLY SHITTTTT. add this to ur tbr immediately. IMMEDIATELY.

this book reminds me of station eleven but more adult (and not written by a zionist 🤐). ling ma i could kiss you.

i’ll be real — my expectations were low. i read bliss montage last year, and i was not a fan. but this? this book reminded me of why i love dystopias so much.

god was this story captivating. not only following candence through her life post-shen fever but her life leading up to it.

now after living through a pandemic (kind of…), this book really rings true. like god the way ma described how corporations continued to exploit their workers whilst the world was crumbling…. Yeah. i especially loved that this plague doesn’t work in the classic sense of human-to-human infection, and doesn’t follow your stereotypical portrayal of those infected. especially in the last couple of chapters — i loved the portrayal there.

candence was quite a plain character with few discernible traits, but i think it worked here. she was the perfect audience surrogate, with just enough individuality to be interesting yet vague enough so i really felt like i was there with her.

the concept of the plot itself was a bit boring imo, but once things started happening (iykyk) i was more and more intrigued. the nonlinear narrative added to this, as if i got too “bored” (i didn’t really i was loving seeing how the world works on a fundamental level), i’d be taken to a flashback of life pre-shen fever where i found candence’s life quite relatable. i hate the concept of a 9-5 too girlie i get you.

ugh i can’t even describe why i loved this book. it’s so good. i understand after this book why people sing ling ma’s praises, and i will join in (only for this book sorry she still lost me in bliss montage)

Content Warnings

Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

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adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

i dont have the faintest on how to feel about this book. it is somehow an amazing book and a dreadful book at once. i loved every second.
now, lets address the elephant in the room - this book is too goddamn mysterious, and thats its downfall. with gtn it works because gideon isnt kept in the dark, she just doesnt give a shit. with htn, we have no idea whats going on and harrow doesnt either. which only works so far in a world well established. this was not. like still what in the everloving fuck is that epilogue. im so lost.
and that is the only point this book fails at.
god harrow is great. i love her. i would kill for her. i enjoyed ianthe, shes the much needed comic relief to harrow's constant somber aura. god is actually so fucking funny - i think this characterisation of god ate so hard. all the other characters undoubtedly also turned it tf out. special shout out to mercymon tho she was a hoot.
the writing of this book.... delectable. like hello the decision to make this book second-person tense until a certain you know what??? HELLOOOOO???????? tamsyn muir you delectable genius. i could kiss you.
thank god there was More Gay in this. i needed some explicit Gay in my book and thank god i got it here! gtn was more subdued with its sapphic tones but my god this was not and i loved it!!!!
the plot was bonkers but hey when is this series ever not bonkers. i would say i had a good time. i did want to gouge my eyeballs out half of the time tho simply because i had no idea what in the everloving fuck was happening on a surface level, let alone trying to work out the 57 mysteries that are occurring simultaneously. you almost need to be sherlock holmes to understand what is going on in this book without outside references. sigh tamsyn muir i love you but i would also love to read your book without having to ask people who've already read your story "hey am i right in thinking this happened or did i just black out and write my own fanfiction". and the crazy part is most of the time outsiders will go "yeah it sounds crazy cuz it fucking is. but ur on the right track". like im sorry what other series does that /pos.
the ending was confusing, but of course it was. it always is. but man even those last chapters..... Huh. ive read 3 different explanations and i still feel like im missing something. I Feel Left Out of the Loop. Still.
anyways im exhausted because i basically binged the second half of this book. i cant lie and say i DIDNT have a good time. but man i shouldnt have to reread ur book at a later date to fully enjoy it 😭 like i should be able to enjoy it to like. 95% of its full potential first read. and then 100% at a later read. here it feels like my first read i enjoyed 70%, and second read ill grasp like. 90%. ill still miss that 10% because its the locked tomb series ofc ill be lost.
anyways all that is to say i need an alecto release date ASAP im too gay, autistic and impatient to wait. tamsyn muir please im on my hands and knees. i beg.

Content Warnings

It Would Be Night in Caracas by Karina Sainz Borgo

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challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

i’m not exactly sure how to feel about this book. i was really hooked at the beginning, and it felt like this book kind of fizzled out, but in a way hard to describe.

adelaida was quite an interesting protagonist, and i enjoyed her inner monologue, but it almost felt like she had no personality. yes i was told her past experiences and relationships, but i felt i didn’t know anything about *her*. other than her relationship with the photographer do i feel like i got to know more about adelaida, but yet again, it was through a relationship.

at points this book felt like it had no plot. like i was just there for the ride. everything kept constantly changing which meant the tone was drastically changing, and i almost couldn’t keep up. i will say though this book did keep me on my toes, as i could never guess where the book would take me next.

i was fascinated by the grittier aspects of venezuela in this story. i’m not knowledgeable enough about history to know how much of this was fact or fiction, but i will say the portrayal of adelaida’s world was gripping. a lot of things felt like they weren’t explained properly in terms of context, almost feeling like the audience already knew that information, so at times i felt quite seperate from the story.

this book was very odd with its non-linear structure, as one minute i would be fearing for adelaida’s life and the next i would be in a past memory. this constant fear to relaxation was quite jarring, and although i was a fan of the flashbacks and current day stories separately, together they didn’t click for me. also, at times adelaida’s memories felt compelling, such as her stories with her aunts, but other times to me i couldn’t discern the significance of the memory, and thus i was bored.

by the end, it felt like i was reading an entirely different book to the beginning, with adelaida turning into a narrator who repeats a handful of phrases and feelings. something something meta commentary about her adapting over the course of the book. say it with me - if ur meta commentary bores me, it didn’t work.

anyways, as much as i dunked on this book, i did have a good time ! but i do think the book’s short nature was defo a factor here - if i had to keep reading past the last page i feel my enjoyment of this book would severely plummet.

anyways, thank you karina sainz borgo for taking me to venezuela from my kobo.

Content Warnings

Monstrilio by Gerardo Sámano Córdova

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

what a batshit story. who sits there and thinks "oh yeah im gonna write a story about a monster growing from a little boy's lung. sick." (i say that with love).
ill be honest and say i found it hard to read this book. not because it was boring, or because it was bad per say, but grief is always a hard read for me. shocker im not the first person to know someone whos passed away 😱 but idk this book very much hit the primal feelings i have of grief. something something ties into the overall themes of this book especially with M yap yap yap. i fear i am not eloquent enough to articulate that. so pretend i wrote something coherent there.
the first quarter of this book in magos' POV was HARDDDDDD. i honeslty found myself really disliking magos, so it was hard for me to connect with this book when i hated everything this woman stood for. who the fuck cuts a piece out of a dead body. no i am not questioning how someone grieves im questioning why. its explained why in the book but still. Why. and then why oh why would you fucking FEED IT. yet again not grief shaming but..... Ok! idk i found her very grating. you could probably say i didnt like her as much because her grief for santiago was atypical but honestly she was just pissing me off. yes grief is irrrational but i am autistic. i do not make the rules i just have to follow them set out by my little autistic brain. and my little autistic brain says that bitch is crazy!!!!!! also not her doing lena dirty again and again and again!!!!!! magos hates sapphics confirmed (this is a joke i do not think magos hates sapphic people). i just couldnt fucking stand magos. she was almost mythic in her insanity. everyone around her was sane meanwhile why is this bitch running the show??????????
i enjoyed lena to begin with, but once she became a people pleaser in my mind she could join magos in my shit bucket. by the end these two wouldve probably nuked a whole country for M and i just couldnt grasp it. yet again autism brain is running the show here. joseph was really the only tolerable member of the main cast, and i only enjoyed M when i got to see from his POV. shout out to uncle luke tho he really matched M's freak i live.
the plot of the book almost felt... dare i say dumb? not dumb as in shit writing from the author. dumb as in.... bro why are yall jumping over so many hoops for this mf. like again and again and again M keeps showing his monstrous side and everyone around him is like "omg baby grill its ok <3". like i get it, its showing just how far parents will go for their kids, especially in grief, ESPECIALLY magos, but... at some point i cannot suspend my disbelief anymore. and dont get me started on the time skip. i do think the time skip worked, i just found it so incomprehensible M hadnt gone on numerous murder sprees during the skip. like how is he undetected. How. yes yes magical realism but idk it felt Too Magical for me. we're in a contemporary setting but yet im sat here picturing M as peter when he turns into a fucking monkey from jumanji. LIKE I JUST CANT NOT PICTURE IT LIKE THAT IM SORRY. like homie essentially can dislocate his entire jaw and youre telling me hes been living like a Normal Guy. oh ok! like idk the constant passes M gets where hes like "man i just want to eat another family pet"... i feel bad for him. like dude should not have existed in the first place and i can almost feel his despair over this fact in the book which i loved. M solos. but the human cast? everyone except uncle luke can kick rocks. joe is on thin fucking ice.
also side note but i love that M being gay is literally just like. "oh ok. anyways dont eat ur crush M or they'll die". the way sapphic and achillean rep is handled in this book was really sweet, and this book excelled there.
well, what else do i have to say? i am terrified of raw meat, and i dont think ill be doing a jumanji rewatch anytime soon.

Content Warnings

Graveyard Shift by M.L. Rio

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mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

i mean…. this was fine. incredibly underwhelming.

i was excited at the beginning, but the plot almost felt like a waste of time. we build up to the “horror” and then it’s resolved in like 20 pages, so the rest of the novella is us just following the characters. the thing is tho — it’s a novella. there’s not enough time to develop characters deeply. meaning i don’t really care about them. therefore i don’t really care about what happens to them. therefore i don’t really care about the book.

like edie was fine.. hannah was intriguing, and everyone else was there.

the start of this book felt like it was following the pace of a 300 page book; the middle felt like it was racing to the end making it almost anticlimactic; and the ending means nothing to me because we were already told about that ending like 50 pages ago.

sigh i had such high hopes as i had seen so much excitement buzzing for this book.

novellas often have an issue about pacing, but honestly i think the issue is the plot. because how in the hell do you stretch this to 200 pages or even more. a lot would need to be added and the stakes higher and then ur just completely changing the book.

the actual premise was kinda sick, myocology has always interested me and you know i love my science. but idk this book didnt really get me excited in any way shape or form!

Content Warnings

All About You by Shaina Veronica

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funny lighthearted relaxing medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

thank you shania veronica for providing me with an arc in return for an honest review <3 eek baby’s first arc from the author themselves i can’t believe it. and my god what a perfect book.

now, i want to start off by saying: i wouldn’t say romance is my favourite genre. sure i like books where there is romance, but usually it’s a subplot. so i’ll be honest and say i was a bit worried i wouldn’t enjoy this. well lucky this book proved me wrong!!!!!!!

never before in a book have my emotions followed the main character so closely. at the beginning of the book i was right there with jaslene with hating marlon, and ended the book literally kicking and squealing because THEYRE JUST SO CUTE!!!!!!! like my god. some of the scenes in this book with the two of them?????? who do i need to sell my soul to to get a female-marlon in real life. please i beg universe.

jaslene herself as a character is so relatable it almost hurts. and it’s not even in a try-hard way that some books have the mc be relatable and quirky. nope! jaslene feels so authentic, like i feel like i know this girl. i’ve walked past her. i went to school with her. the way she is written is so realistic, and that extends to every other character. her family’s dynamics, marlon, even rita felt like people i know. i think some of that can be attributed to veronica’s writing style, as homegirl was whipping out kpop & book references like it was nobody’s business. mind you im not knocking it!!!! i’m so autistic about until dawn im not kidding when i say reading a line about it in this book literally had my apple watch alerting me because i was so excited. DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG IVE BEEN WAITING FOR A BOOK TO REFERENCE UNTIL DAWN??????? a million brownie points from me for that. and i mean hello all the other references just kept adding to the brownie pile.

i do find that sometimes romance books can use tropes as a bit of a crutch, and i was worried this book would. but IT DIDNT!!!!!! like cmon now the fake dating trope was so cute here, especially with how it ties in to the general plot (as in, how it starts). sometimes i find fake dating to feel a bit hamfisted but the reason for this book’s fake dating worked so well. and that goes for every other “trope”in this book. veronica sets it up, and then delightfully grows and expands beyond tropes. i loved it.

i also need to shout out marlon’s writing cuz thank GODDD his characterisation at the beginning wasn’t something like he’s an actual asshole, i liked that it was lowkey both of them just being stubborn and enjoying fighting with each other 💀💀💀 godddd i relate to jaslene SO HARD.

anyways, tldr; pick up this god damn book.

Content Warnings

Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover

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challenging emotional tense medium-paced

5.0

wow oh wow oh wow. i did not expect to love this as much as i did.

i usually am not the biggest fan of nonfiction, and memoirs especially are a hit or miss for me. but my god was this a hit.

this was such a fascinating read, not only as someone raised secularly, but as someone who isn’t american. to not only read about how far religious bigotry goes, especially when you throw in some good old fashioned mental illness, plus the paranoia was astounding to me. after every few chapters i’d go up to my mum and be like: “that book i’m reading about that woman who lived in idaho? she got her first birth certificate at 9 years old. and she only learnt what the holocaust was in college. and instead of taking her mum to the hospital after a severe car accident they left her at home and she had migraines for months. and multiple times someone was set on fire and they didn’t go to hospital.”

reading this for me almost felt like a sick perversion, as i grappled with understanding that this is not fiction: this is real, this is how some people live, and this is a true story of a true family.

there are so many facets of this book that are intriguing: life on the mountain, her father’s beliefs, her mother and her complacency, but the character at the heart of this book (in the worst way) other than tara is shawn. my god. i was horrified reading this. the amount of gaslighting, shoving things under the rug, ignorance. gobsmacking. before this book i thought americans were being a bit dramatic, and highlighting the worst parts of fanatics. reading this truly brought to my attention that no, those videos you see online of republicans spouting vile remarks and being supported by those around them are not far and few in between, and the stories are not dramatised. holy shit.

i get i probably sound a bit naive, but truly i didn’t realise just *how bad* it was. the delusions, the twisting of history to fit a narrative, the cognitive dissonance, the religious bigotry, the violence, the mistrust. just. wow.

truly a remarkable book.

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clovetra's reviews 204 reviews

clovetra's reviews
204 reviews