podanotherjessi's reviews
703 reviews

The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 37%.
I was just, at no point in this book, engaged in the story. 90% of why I was reading was because I thought Whisper was really cool. And that's really it.
The world building was confusing to me. It felt like it was trying to be whimsical and fun, the kind of thing you don't ask questions about. But the book was just too hard sci-fi to get away with that. So I had dozens of questions that the book seemed to have no interest in answering. It was distracting.
I didn't care about the characters. The plot was uninteresting. The themes were incredibly blunt and left no room for the reader to form their own opinions. And then something happened at the end of part one that infuriated me so much I just couldn't make myself continue.

But honestly, the worst part is that this book isn't at all what the synopsis makes it out to be. Maybe it's my fault for interpreting it the way I did, setting myself up for disappointment, but I do think the synopsis is inaccurate.
What I thought I was getting: A character that terraforms planets for the greater good, thinking she's doing right by humanity. And then she reaches a planet that's already inhabited, and she (and the reader) have to grapple with what the right course of action is. Should she continue the terraforming project, knowing the life already there will suffer as a result, but that it will create a new home for humanity? Or should she allow humanity to suffer to save these other beings?
What the book actually is (spoilered, because apparently readers shouldn't know this going in):
A woman working for an obviously evil corporation terraforms planets for no apparent reason. While she's doing this, she finds a group of people that were previously terraforming this planet for the same corporation but were supposed to have dies off when Destry and her coworkers came. Because the corporation is obviously evil, Destry immediately sides with this other group and starts planning how to help them maintain their place on this planet.

There's just no internal conflict, and it's boring.
Tree Thieves by Lyndsie Bourgon

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informative sad medium-paced
This book was a great overview of a topic that I'm sure could get very complicated and deep. It was very much just an introduction to the topic of tree poaching, and very narrow in scope to a specific region, but the introduction is very upfront about that, and it serves the purpose well.
I felt like Bourgon was very fair and balanced in her discussion of the topic. She provides reason for protections to be in place, but never vilifies the people that go around them. She's very sympathetic to the people who are in circumstances that would lead to committing these crimes. And I left the book feeling educated.
The Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human by Siddhartha Mukherjee

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hopeful informative slow-paced
This book had a lot of elements that I understand, but that annoyed me nonetheless.

First, Mukherjee does a remarkable job through most of this book of explaining complex biological topics in ways most people will understand. This is really good, and I commend him for it. That said, he fails to do this at points in the book, largely in the introduction. I have a biology background, and even I found myself lost with the jargon he was throwing around at the beginning of the book.
But on the other hand, the first 20, maybe 30 percent of the book is dedicated to explaining what a cell is and where it comes from. And this section to me felt too rudimentary. It was information, in my experience, that anyone with a high school level science education would already know. I understand needing to include this as background because if you didn't understand those things, much of the rest of the book would have been incomprehensible. But I think it could have been condensed to keep things moving.

Second, almost all of the modern examples are pulled from Mukherjee's personal experience. If the case studies weren't of people he treated himself, they were close friends of his, or someone treated by a doctor he went to med school with or did a post-doc with. And if they somehow didn't fit those, it was someone he had met, and he used an anecdote about that meeting as a jumping off point to talk about their condition.
This is likely a practical issue of patient confidentiality, but it came off as slightly braggadocios. It read, to me, as if Mukherjee was using these examples to show off his brilliance. I'm positive that was not his intent, but it was the feeling I was left with anyway.

Third, I wish that so much of this book hadn't been focused on cancer specifically. In retrospect, that was the topic Mukherjee was clearly most interested in exploring, and that's alright. I just wish it had been clear earlier. I wanted to hear about other things - and there are other diseases that are briefly touched on, but none so much as cancer. Covid, the part I was perhaps most curious about, was given barely any attention, having the shortest section.

But there's a lot to really recommend this book. I loved the historic background whenever that was the focus. As I said, Mukherjee does a remarkable job making the material accessible. So I do think anyone interested in cellular biology and how medicine is advancing (specifically as it pertains to cancer), I would recommend picking this up! But not the audiobook. The narrator's pronunciations in parts were really rough. Especially when it came to words in other languages. I never want to hear Boutsikaris try to say anything in German ever again.

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Scattered All Over the Earth by Yōko Tawada

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 34%.
I just had too many questions about the world that stretched my disbelief and made it impossible to buy into the world. There are people that lived in Japan and are relatively young, but o one remembers the name of the country?? And no one knows what happened to it? I just couldn't buy into it.
Forest of Memory by Mary Robinette Kowal

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

3.25

I have no idea what happened in this book, but I've been thinking about it basically since I finished reading.
The Marquis who Mustn't by Courtney Milan

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emotional inspiring medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

This was a sweet, fun book! It took me a long time to warm up to the characters, but I don't think that's a weakness. The story was so heart-warming. And Naomi's mom was literally the best person I've ever read.
The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin

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

3.75

This is at least the third time I've read this, once in school when I was very young, at least once since then, and now. And I am pleasantly surprised at how well it holds up. It's not perfect, but it's a fun read.

There is some very outdated language. Mostly in reference to a character with a physical difficulty, and one directed toward a Chinese character. But for a book that's nearly 50 years old, that's not terrible. The Asian representation is dubious. Mrs. Hoo was hard to read at times.
Beyond that, however, the story itself is really fun! Even though I remembered a lot of details of the mystery, I still found myself surprised at some of the reveals. And I didn't find myself annoyed at the characters not figuring out what I already knew. The characters weren't super deep, but they did show growth, and there was some great theming around not judging on first impressions only.
The ending was maybe overly cheesy, but I didn't mind too much. I even felt myself getting a little emotional.

Overall, I don't know whether I could recommend this to someone who doesn't have the nostalgia attached that I do. But I think it could be a fun book to share with a child, while understanding there would need to be some discussion over the dated elements.

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Butts: A Backstory by Heather Radke

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fast-paced
The short review of this book is that the topic is far too broad (no pun intended) to be covered in a book this short, and yet Radke barely sticks to the specific topic of butts.

If I were to explain what this book is actually about, I'd say it's a very, very thin overview of women's body standards in the 20th and early 21st centuries. While there are moments Radke zooms in on the specifics of butts, that is maybe half of the book. Much of it has a more general focus on women's bodies in their entirety.
Even if I were expecting that, I would still find this hard to recommend. A large portion of the book is given to personal anecdotes of Radke's own experiences, which she often then uses to assume the universal experiences of all women. She'll make a sweeping statement such as "nearly all women have attempted to transform their shape in some way" and then divert into a story about stuffing her bra or the first time she wore shapewear.

This wasn't the full overview of butts I was looking for. It was just a few observations many of us have already made (Western fashions cycle though periods of emphasizing the butt and periods of hiding it!) with little additional commentary. And you can hardly call it a backstory when - except for one brief section on a fossil - it starts off mid-19th century!

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Our Share of Night by Mariana Enríquez

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

4.0

This is one of those rare instances where I try to find a middle ground between my enjoyment of the book (around a 3 out of 5) and the objective quality of the book (which I would say is about a 4.5). This book was not a favorite of mine for a few very subjective reasons I don't think are a weakness of the book itself.
The one thing I think is an actual flaw of the book and one I imagine many other people will have struggles with is the pacing. This book moved at a glacier pace, and it took forever (at least halfway through the book) until I had any idea what the point was. Who are Juan and Gaspar and why should the reader care are questions that take far too long to answer in a book asking me to commit to reading this many pages. And then the ending somehow feels very abrupt.

I have many more subjective complaints. The characters I found the most interesting were largely sidelined by the story.
What happened to Rosario's sister (who's name I literally cannot find anywhere and I don't have a physical book to check)?? And Paolo and Vicky were missed greatly at the end.
And I despised Juan, and the book really spends a lot of time justifying his actions that are impossible, in my opinion, to justify.
I am very much not familiar with the political and historical context, which I mention because it did impact my reading. I genuinely think the setting and the way Enríquez wrote about everything was incredible, but I found myself at times confused and lacking context. That's entirely my flaw as a reader, and not the book's fault, and it's a gap in my knowledge that I will work to remedy. But it feels worth mentioning.
I also really could have done with more horror (specifically of the supernatural variety). My favorite moments by a large margin were the creepy and scary ones, but they were few and far between. This is partially an expectation issue because I was looking for horror in what is primarily literary fiction, so it's definitely something to be aware of going into the book.

But objectively, I think almost everything in this book was amazing.
The characters are so well-realized. Gaspar is so nuanced and given a lot of grace by the narrative. The villains have varied and realistic motivations. Juan's brother is wonderful. The one-off perspectives add so much depth.
The writing is beautiful. Whether this is from Enríquez herself, the translator McDowell, or some combination therein, I was blown away by the prose.
And the setting itself was incredibly well-realized. Enríquez uses the history of Argentina to fuel the horror she is exploring. I especially loved the cultural ties that were so strongly incorporated. I didn't know all of the poets being referenced, but I loved seeing the impact they had on the story.

To make a long story short, I highly recommend this novel. Go in expecting a very slow, literary horror and you will likely enjoy it.

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The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren

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

2.0

I finished this book in a day, which has absolutely nothing to do with how much I liked it. In fact, I probably should have DNF'd because I knew I didn't like it fairly immediately, but it was just so easy and quick to read that I pushed through.

There were two big problems that I had.
First, I don't believe this couple is in love. Everything about their relationship feels like it stems from lust, and that's fine for the start, but it never feels like it gets past that.
After the third act breakup, the big romantic gesture barely even talks through the actual conflict and instead focuses on how hot Olive thinks Ethan is and how much they can't wait to get into bed together.
Olive - who's head we're in - barely thinks about anything she likes about Ethan besides his body. And Ethan really has no reason to like Olive given how she treats him.
Which is my second problem. Olive is insufferable. She hates Ethan on the premise of something that is so obviously a misunderstanding. She always immediately assumes the worse, which is meant to be a flaw she grows out of, but this trait only ever seems to apply to Ethan. Any other time she assumes the worst, she's proven right. And she just treats Ethan so terribly. She never considers his perspective in any situation. And she's so mean and awful to him in a way I think the reader is supposed think is fun banter but in reality was just rude.