Reviews

Frontier by Grace Curtis

Only show reviews with written explanations

interrobang_1's review against another edition

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adventurous funny hopeful lighthearted mysterious fast-paced

Loveable characters? Yes

4.0

A really fun, fast-paced, queer, space western. What's not to love?

artemine's review against another edition

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immediately catapulted to one of my favorite books of all times. simply stunning, does so much with so little. rarely read something this vivid. what a ride... now THAT'S a western. cannot rec it enough, it's thrilling, moving, very clever, AND ALSO GAY

imyril's review against another edition

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hopeful tense medium-paced

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

2.5

Expect a mosaic of Western archetypes clinging to hardscrabble life on a crumbling earth, loosely connected by the travels of a nameless offworlder in search of someone she loves (although we don’t know who or why until a lengthy flashback in the final act).

This is a solid case of not objectively terribly (although not great) but not for me. I’d like the time I spent reading it back please levels of not for me. As a novella, I might have forgiven its lack of depth and dimension; at novel length, the edges rubbed. For most of the book it fails to deliver on the love / loss / laser guns marketing (not the author’s fault, of course), but it also failed to provide anything else to sink my teeth into as almost all the characters drop out of the narrative just as they get established and the world-building is the second hand tinsel of borrowed tropes. I finished it because it’s short and fast reading, and I kept hoping it would redeem itself in the final act.