Reviews with content warning for Child death - The Midwich Cuckoos

Reviews tagging 'Child death'

The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham

8 reviews

emilyandthewhippet's review against another edition

slow-paced

3.0

Though it's one of the classic sci-fi books, it was written in the 50s, and therefore needs to be considered as such.

In short, everyone in a village falls asleep mysteriously and the army is called in to stand around looking confused. When they awake, all the women are pregnant. Lots of assumption that it's female hysteria, before they go 'oh actually seems a bit odd it's happened to ALL these women at once. Eh, I guess it's another species then that's infected them but best not tell any of them because some of them are suicidal and wouldn't it be cool to see what happens when they give birth to a monster'.

I started this book on kindle and my goodness did I struggle. The premise was interesting, no issues there, but there was an awful lot of waffling from dull male characters that was difficult to get through. I finished it on audiobook and at about 3 hours and much easier to get through. Until I started on audiobook, I had no idea what the book was about beyond the village being mysteriously asleep but felt the story and ending was very predictable. Perhaps this is from other books I've read which have followed this original idea or maybe I've read it in the past and not remembered it. Perhaps it was just super obvious. It was a tidy ending.

I didn't find it creepy in the slightest. For the most part, the kids don't do much and we don't see them much on account of lots of dialogue between a couple of main characters about them.

My main issue is the way that the women were described at points and how the book was pretty entirely men talking. For a book that centres around all women becoming mysteriously pregnant, it would have been really interesting to explore more on how they experienced it all. It was clear that the author had no interest in this.

It's odd, I want to rate it higher but I also want to rate it much lower.

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mjmiller_'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? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

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akira_outofthegravity's review against another edition

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mysterious tense medium-paced

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

2.0

I feel like I should rate this higher, but I can’t do it just because it’s a classic, because I enjoyed this a medium amount. I can understand why it’s so influential, I imagine it was quite groundbreaking and I do like the concept- but it’s too much telling and not enough showing.

There’s just not enough meat on this book, there’s nothing to compel readers to keep going in my opinion. The concept is interesting and terrifying as someone who has a womb, and is slightly scared of pregnancy, but there’s never any stakes. When the action does happen it’s very detached and matter of fact, why should I care about any of these characters?

Disappointed but I may try his other books.

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alexisgarcia's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious reflective sad 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

4.0

this book is absolutely wild. i do not typically read sci-fi, and did not really know what i was getting into when i picked this up. i especially did not know this was an older book due to my lack of knowledge on the genre. i struggled with the writing style quite a bit but the story was something i have never read before. and the ending was phenomenal.

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