Reviews tagging 'Death'

Borne by Jeff VanderMeer

19 reviews

kuronekostea's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious 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

An incredible narrative about a young woman and her struggles to survive such a unique, scary apocalyptic city. I absolutely loved the characters in this book. 
Easily my favorite book of this year.

I enjoyed the progressive play through of Rachel, Wick and Borne as they all grew and developed as characters who inevitably came to their own conclusions about the world around them and their places in it. I also found the underlying mystery fascinating as well. Like many of VanderMeer's books there are many questions still left unanswered. I plan to read the others in this series and hope we hear more about the possible AMC TV Series based on this novel.

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bulwark's review against another edition

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challenging dark 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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bookmaxxing's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful 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

woah. this book rules

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annenichols's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional mysterious tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.25

I think I really enjoyed this. At first, I wasn't sure I liked the voice (meaning the tone - I read this with my eyes, not audio). I think it calmed down a bit, or it grew on me. The start is very, very weird - stick with it. The relationship
between Rachel and Borne
was so beautiful - a stunning reflection on
motherhood
. Borne is a fascinating character.

The atmosphere was so tense; I stayed up so late reading it. The protagonist
is in constant danger
, which makes the book fast-paced and exciting.

The book requires quite the suspension of disbelief because the scifi isn't really explained or sensical. I usually prefer things to make sense, but accepting the world at face value was worth it for the story and the thoroughly rendered sense of place. The world is very well-woven if you accept the premise.

There were some good plot twists. The ending was somewhat
happy, which I appreciated
.

The dystopian features of how humanity destroyed itself were interesting as well.

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toastrats's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense fast-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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cryosphinx's review against another edition

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adventurous dark 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

4.75

I went into this knowing very little, having a friend recommend it to me. I was sold on post apocalyptic but that's quite it for my knowledge.

VanderMeer's writing style took a little bit for me to get used to, coming off a long string of romantic fantasy books so the beginning was hard for me to get into, but once I got a feel for the writing and the vivid and lush environment and characters, I was invested. His writing does so much in such an a beautiful and unique way they I felt sucked into this world, even with the mysteries such as why is there a giant bear flying around?

There's a lot of turns in this and it's been a long while since I've had a book where I read a sentence and had to put the book down to stare and mentally recover from what I just discovered. I did find the book was on the slow side, with a bulk of the book being centered around Rachel and Borne in the Balcony Cliffs (but I supposed the book IS titled Borne after all). It's very character driven with the great plot just being about survival in this strange but plausible apocalypse.

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msawyer77's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful reflective sad tense 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

4.5


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gogol's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny inspiring mysterious 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? Yes

4.0


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crowcore's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5


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edensbookshelf's review against another edition

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emotional 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


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