Reviews tagging 'Colonisation'

Record of a Spaceborn Few by Becky Chambers

19 reviews

ritabriar's review against another edition

emotional inspiring reflective tense 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? It's complicated

5.0

This series takes another turn, this time with only a tenuous connection to the crew from book #1. (One of the families in the story is related to the captain of the ship.) 

This book is an in-depth study of society, how it's structured, and how we care for and neglect each other. 

At the same time, it has rich, well-developed characters who each have their own personalities. The seemingly-unrelated stories of each do intersect and affect each other, resulting in major life changes for many of them. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Grief, Gaslighting, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Drug use, Panic attacks/disorders, Alcohol, and Colonisation

Explosion of a colony space ship happens in the introduction, but it forms the historical setting of other events. Death is of

a point of view character

due to

accidental air-pressure explosion

Cultural gatekeeping, both to an outside academic and someone trying to re-connect to his cultural heritage

plantdonut's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny hopeful reflective 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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Grief

Moderate: Animal death, Bullying, Drug use, Racism, Medical content, Murder, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Alcohol, and Colonisation

Minor: Cancer, Hate crime, Sexual content, Violence, Death of parent, Pregnancy, and War

lynxpardinus's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death

Moderate: Animal death, Bullying, Drug use, Sexual content, Xenophobia, Medical content, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Alcohol, and Colonisation

Minor: Vomit, Toxic friendship, War, and Pandemic/Epidemic

amyreh's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Drug use, and Grief

Moderate: Bullying, Xenophobia, and Alcohol

Minor: Sexual content, Colonisation, and War

bme244's review against another edition

emotional reflective relaxing 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Death, Grief, and Murder

Minor: Ableism, Animal death, Bullying, Sexual content, Violence, Colonisation, and War

rbour26's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing slow-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

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death and Grief

Minor: Murder and Colonisation

_david_'s review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective slow-paced

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

3.5

This book had some great moments and I do recommend reading it if you liked the rest of the series! I think the author nailed the use of multiple characters to tell the story about a whole culture. It created beautiful dialogue and told an interesting story about the value of tradition. I adored the characters, especially Isabel and Tamsin since they remind me of my own relationship.

I have two reasons why I've rated it lower than the other Wayfarer books so far. A small downside of especially the beginning of the book is that there are a lot of similar names for characters and a lot of characters without a very clear identifying feature at first. I can imagine that it's very hard to go through this book slowly since you might forget which character did what. The other, bigger downside is how some characters' stories ended. I didn't mind the endings themselves, but for a few of them they were told about it by others. The book expressed its morals by a very much "tell don't show" way. I think it's a shame, it made the book feel very biased, I think the same story could've been told without the very explicit dialogue. The moments I mean are:

Isabel talking to Kip and 'Pop' talking to Tessa. I think the museum scene for Kip and the talk with George for Tessa would've sufficed.

Having said that, I still really enjoyed the book! It's just the weakest in the series so far to me and I wanted to reflect that in my rating. As I've expressed in the beginning of this review, it contains some beautiful moments.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Confinement, Death, Grief, and Abandonment

Moderate: Racism, Xenophobia, and Alcohol

Minor: Drug use, Hate crime, Panic attacks/disorders, Racial slurs, Sexual content, Violence, Religious bigotry, Pregnancy, Colonisation, War, and Classism

In the first chapter

Aya is unharmed. She screams because she sees something shocking.

arinheck's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful inspiring reflective 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? Yes

4.5

This has been my least favourite Wayfarer book thus far. And yet, it made me laugh out loud and cry just as much as the others have. Although it was a bit slow to get going, Becky Chambers has yet to truly disappoint.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death

Moderate: Panic attacks/disorders, Grief, and Alcohol

Minor: Sexual content, Colonisation, and War

tallulahlucy's review

emotional hopeful relaxing slow-paced

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

3.0

I don’t understand this being marked medium paced - it’s slow. Don’t go in expecting anything else and you won’t be disappointed. Think of it as a documentary about the fictional Fleet rather than a single story. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Death, Drug use, Grief, and Alcohol

Moderate: Colonisation and Classism

Minor: Bullying and Confinement

lipstickitotheman's review against another edition

adventurous emotional slow-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

4.0

Through the grief, this book is still wonderfully hopeful. It was really hard for me at first to keep all the narratives straight, but it got easier as I got to know the characters better. It was beautiful how they all intersected with each other and with the first book in the series. 

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Content Warnings

Minor: Bullying, Death, Drug use, Xenophobia, Medical content, Grief, Alcohol, and Colonisation