sr_marshrat's reviews
54 reviews

Moon Witch, Spider King by Marlon James

Go to review page

adventurous challenging dark emotional 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

4.25

The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi

Go to review page

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

3.25

My favorite parts of Bacigalupi's works are his vividly believable dystopian landscapes, harsh predictions about the trajectory of our world if climate change is not addressed. But Water Knife's cautionary drought tale is overshadowed (and accordingly underdeveloped) by a James-Bond-style race-for-highly-valuable-object, rife with violence for shock value and improbable coicindences. What could have been a heart wrenching mystery centering on a tough-skinned orphan is instead a shallow action movie centered around two washed-up, and frankly less engaging, adults.
Expand filter menu Content Warnings
Nosey Beast: Natural History of the Coatis by Christine C Hass

Go to review page

adventurous informative medium-paced

3.75

Tender is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica

Go to review page

challenging dark emotional sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Predictable, but still poignant, commentary on Homo sapiens general disregard and disrespect for other living beings. A little more subtle or a little bit more over-the-top, and this could have been a 5 star read. As is, it's like noticing something atrocious and hurrying past, eyeing it sidelong. Not facing it head on or being truly forced to acknowledge and confront.
Expand filter menu Content Warnings
The Snow Leopard by Peter Matthiessen

Go to review page

adventurous challenging emotional reflective slow-paced

3.25

More like reading a long meditation than a story with a plot, Snow Leopard's bright spots are its musings on the natural world and its inhabitants as well as thoughtful passages about grief and loss. Between those moving and thought-provoking moments, though, is clumsy, stream-of-consciousness rambling that reads like conversations had lazing around, stoned, at the end of a college party.
Expand filter menu Content Warnings
Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law by Mary Roach

Go to review page

challenging funny informative reflective medium-paced

4.0

I picked this up expecting laugh-out-loud-funny: thieving primates and avian vandals. There's a little of that, but Roach also covers the heavier side of human-animal conflict. Roach never makes-light of or trivializes the scenarios she spotlights, recognizing that the non-human animals are rarely at fault, while also handling human upset with deft sensitivity.
Expand filter menu Content Warnings
The Ivory Key by Akshaya Raman

Go to review page

adventurous emotional hopeful fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.5

The 1.5 stars are for the unique and colorful setting. 
Otherwise, The Ivory Key is a continent wide and an inch deep. The colorful setting is made of cardboard. There aren't enough pages to properly develop the four to five main characters. The plot is driven by improbable and lucky coincidences. Misplaced romantic encounters and non-English words whose meanings couldn't be parsed from context clues were the salt on top of this valiant, but ultimately under-executed YA high fantasy adventure.
The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker

Go to review page

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

1.0

Silence of the Girls had the potential to be an enlightening, if depressing, view of the Trojan War from the perspective of women in the Greek camps. Instead, it's overwritten version of the myth we already know. A few chapters from Briseis' perspective (that truly had potential to be engaging on their own, hence the 1 star) and some ham-handed emotional dialogue between Achilles and Patroclus do not make this a more "real" Troy story.
Expand filter menu Content Warnings
Finch by Jeff VanderMeer

Go to review page

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

5.0

Raccoon by Daniel Heath Justice

Go to review page

funny informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

The ecologist in me cringes just a little at some passages in this book that are by turns a bit melodramatic or bleeding-heart. But, honestly, this was otherwise a practically perfect read. Easy narration style, a perfect balance of summarized facts and anecdotes, and fabulous art/culture examples throughout make this book both informative and enjoyable.
Expand filter menu Content Warnings