Reviews tagging 'Death'

A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers

36 reviews

isabyrne's review against another edition

emotional hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective sad 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

4.75

This is the second book to the Wayfarers world. After having read The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet, you can read the other Wayfarers books in any order, but I would read this one next. It is a standalone that takes place during the final moments of the first book, and features characters who make a small appearance in the first book. 

 

This book is quite different from The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet. At first I felt disappointed that it didn't keep following the characters from The Long Way, but I got over that very quickly — it's really special in it's own way. It still has that Becky Chambers touch that is about taking care of yourself and others. 

This book is much more intimate in scope. You closely follow two characters over two timelines. This book is all about those characters' development over a long period of time. It is about the struggles of discovering oneself and finding your place in the world. It is also about finding your people in difficult circumstances. Some parts of it were sad and heartbreaking to read, but left me with an optimistic feeling. You get to know the characters really deeply and feel very protective of them and their happiness. 

I really loved the parts of this book that were "on the ground" as one other reviewer put it, where you get a taste of everyday life in Becky Chambers' universe through the eyes of a character experiencing it for the first time: mingling with other species, ordering food, going to parties, reading text chats. It feels very grounded and was one of my favourite features of the book. It made a world I was already in love with feel so real and relatable. 

 

Overall, it is a great book. It didn’t have the same impact that The Long Way did for me, because I really enjoyed the multiple-character, plot-driven nature of the first book, but it was nonetheless touching, affective, and hopeful in this author’s unique way. Becky Chambers just has this way of writing that is deeply sentimental and impactful. Her books just have so much damn HEART. At this point I will read anything in this universe that Becky Chambers puts out and can't wait to continue on with the rest of the series. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Child abuse, Death, Dysphoria, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, and Slavery

daniella_lo's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional inspiring mysterious sad 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? No

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child abuse, Abandonment, and Death

oceanescence's review

adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I loved this even more than A long way to a small angry planet. Explored a very interesting concept and I found the constant switching of focus of the chapters between the two characters very engaging.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Slavery, Grief, and Animal death

Moderate: Cursing, Death, and Drug use

Minor: Gun violence

madzobean'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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Animal death

Moderate: Slavery and Death

ratatouilllie's review against another edition

adventurous sad medium-paced

• 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

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Abandonment, Cursing, Death, Grief, Blood, Child abuse, Confinement, Colonisation, Violence, Eating disorder, Injury/Injury detail, Animal death, and Child death

Minor: Infertility, Excrement, Panic attacks/disorders, Vomit, Xenophobia, Drug use, Gaslighting, and Gore

athryn's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful medium-paced

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

4.5

A definite step up from the first book in this series. I really enjoyed the intertwining stories of

Spoiler

Sidra and Pepper

are very well done, exploring the world set up in the first book in different ways. The end was pretty touching to me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail and Animal death

Moderate: Forced institutionalization, Slavery, Blood, Child abuse, Confinement, and Death

Minor: Dysphoria and Infertility

maeverose's review against another edition

medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes

2.75

TL;DR: I was very bored. I liked the secondary pov more than Sidra’s. I don’t like how gender is handled. I’m realizing I’m not a huge fan of Becky Chamber’s writing style…

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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content, Child death, Death, Animal death, and Child abuse

Moderate: Vomit, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Panic attacks/disorders, and Blood

Minor: Excrement, Ableism, Eating disorder, Cancer, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, and Gore

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.

dancers_and_dragons's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful 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? It's complicated

5.0

Becky Chambers explores what it means to be a person in every which way throughout this poignant companion to The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet. While initially I was disappointed in not getting to see what the main cast of the first novel were up to, I quickly was swept up in the new family being found in this novel. 

This book was heartfelt and emotional in the best of ways, from the interactions between characters to the descriptions of memories, to the heart-wrenching low moments of the two main characters when they hit their lowest points. Without giving anything away, it's the story of two who are more alike than they know trying to make it through their respective journeys and managing the hiccups that come up along the way. I deeply appreciated the world building, much as I did with Chambers' first book, and I can't wait to read the next one when I have a chance. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Mental illness, Abandonment, Panic attacks/disorders, and Slavery

Moderate: Drug use, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Alcohol, Animal death, Blood, and Classism

Minor: Cannibalism, Medical content, Xenophobia, War, Cancer, Terminal illness, and Eating disorder

solenekeleroux's review

adventurous 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Death, Animal death, Panic attacks/disorders, Grief, Slavery, Child abuse, Child death, and Confinement

Moderate: Alcohol, Dysphoria, Blood, and Drug use

andloveistoolong's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful 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

5.0

I enjoyed the first book in this series well enough, but this one was definitely a step up. It had a totally engrossing story, characters I fell in love with, basically the whole package.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Physical abuse, Animal death, Slavery, Trafficking, Child abuse, and Emotional abuse

Moderate: Gun violence, Violence, Cursing, Panic attacks/disorders, Alcohol, Child death, Classism, Death, Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail, and Kidnapping

Minor: Dysphoria, Drug use, Medical content, Gore, and Infertility