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ritabriar's review against another edition
- 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
Graphic: Child abuse and Slavery
Moderate: Animal death, Child death, Gore, Blood, Grief, Dysphoria, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Confinement, Drug use, Physical abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, and Colonisation
Accidental explosion, explicit, resulting in child death Child murdered by robot caretaker Bad dogs attack a child, and the child kills them for food Explicit malnutritionsaucy_bookdragon's review against another edition
- 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
I am a simple man. You write a book about robots learning to be human and understanding their feelings, I'm going to have a good time.
A Closed and Common Orbit is a lot darker and more existential than its predecessor, which makes sense given the setup for it in A Long Way To a Small, Angry Planet was the most tragic section of that book, but damn it was a lot darker. In this, we follow an AI in an illegal synthetic body and a clone trying to escape a desolate planet with the help of an AI.
Something I've noticed in this and Becky Chambers's other series, Monk and Robot, is that she's in love with the cultural and sociological aspects of world building and it just oozes off the page. Though her books certainly have plots, they tend to be slower and lacking in tension. Really what makes them good is the world building, so fascinating, so alien, and so goddamn optimistic! She creates worlds I want to live in and populates them with lively characters and emotional bonds.
As for this book specifically, I found it so deeply fascinating and thought-provoking, questioning who gets to be counted as sentient in this galaxy. As I said, this is a lot darker than the first book, specifically with the clone storyline. The added edge made the optimism strike so much deeper, it was bittersweet and just so earned. But it's also still a story about what mundanity looks like in an interstellar society, which maybe paradoxically, makes this series stand out.
TWs not included under the tag: dogs die and there's dog-on-dog cannibalism.
Graphic: Animal death
Moderate: Gore, Medical content, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail
plantdonut's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Graphic: Animal death and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Cancer, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Gore, Violence, Blood, Medical content, and Grief
Minor: Panic attacks/disorders, Vomit, and Colonisation
thoseoldcrows23's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Panic attacks/disorders, and Violence
Moderate: Child death, Cursing, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Slavery, Blood, Medical content, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Suicidal thoughts, Xenophobia, and Vomit
weareinheritors's review against another edition
- 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
Graphic: Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Blood, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Drug use and Sexual content
rachel17's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Moderate: Gore
Minor: Vomit
scifi_rat's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
Prose: 3 ★
Pace: 4★
Concept/Execution: 4.5★/4★
Characters: 3★
Worldbuilding: 4.5★
Ending: 3.25★
Moderate: Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Eating disorder, Violence, Blood, Grief, Abandonment, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Drug use, Gore, Infertility, Panic attacks/disorders, Xenophobia, Excrement, Vomit, and Gaslighting
chf1895's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Child abuse
Moderate: Child death
Minor: Gore
maeverose's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
2.75
I love her other books, but so far this series is not working for me and I’m considering dnfing it. I was so bored. I didn’t really care for Sidra’s storyline at all, even though I typically love sentient AI stories. Jane’s pov was far more interesting, but I really didn’t like her narrative voice. Her constant categorizing of things into ‘good’ ‘bad’ or ‘wrong’, saying something is ‘real ___’ over and over, her angsty teen phase… It made complete sense for her character but it was overdone and got very annoying for me to read.
As well, it really bothers me how gender is handled in this series. Becky Chambers handles it much better in the Monk and Robot series (though it’s still not perfect). I think it was probably unintentional, but in this book and in small angry planet, she always strictly ties gender to biological sex. There’s an alien species that has four sexes, so they use different pronouns for each of those sexes, but none of the characters identify as trans, and when it comes to most species it’s treated as a given that they just identify as a man or woman based on their biological sex. They always rely on someone’s physical characteristics to judge what pronouns to use.
I wish I liked this series but I just don’t
Graphic: Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Death, and Medical content
Moderate: Body horror, Panic attacks/disorders, Blood, Vomit, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Ableism, Cancer, Eating disorder, Gore, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, and Excrement
Graphic: dog death and eating of dogs (it’s mentioned very often) Moderate: explosion (that killed people) Minor: not an actual eating disorder but someone has to skip meals to survive and ends up extremely thin and malnourished.andloveistoolong's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Animal death, Child abuse, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Slavery, and Trafficking
Moderate: Child death, Cursing, Death, Gun violence, Panic attacks/disorders, Violence, Kidnapping, Abandonment, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism
Minor: Drug use, Gore, Infertility, Medical content, and Dysphoria