jqnk210's review against another edition
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
bookly_reads's review
1.0
Szpara wrote in The Mary Sue, "People tell me reading Docile feels like reading fanfiction, which I assume means it reads like an author wrote exactly what they wanted." I find that quote wildly disingenuous, because there's no way he doesn't know that people say it feels like reading fanfiction because he used a bunch of old rehashed fanfic tropes. I read many stories about slaves who take drugs that make their submission feel pleasurable as a teenager, long before I learned that real life sexual slavery is on the rise globally, not a thing of the past.
Docile all takes place in America but never once mentions actual American slavery. It is inspired by chattel slavery, in that the slaves of this world are seen as less than people, with no autonomy, and yet chattel slavery is never once acknowledged even as other parts of real life history are. It is an odd and gaping lacuna.
The races of characters are described boringly, incessantly, and obsessively—basically the only descriptors characters get are a running catalogue of skin shades. Light-skinned, pale, dark brown, warm, Black—shade after shade, at the sacrifice of more detailed or varied descriptions. I cannot tell you what most of the characters looked like beyond their skin—no hair styles, no eye colors, etc. Yet race is never acknowledged as anything beyond the visual; again, it is literally not mentioned once that Black people were enslaved in America, even though the characters talk about the 1800s repeatedly. The only hint that racism might still exist is that a Black sex slave is named "Onyx" by his "master," indicating that race fetishization is still a thing. But this is never explored more deeply than the name itself.
Books that *actually* contain themes of anti-capitalism, queerness, romance, slavery, and race:
-An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon
-The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
Like if you just wanna be horny, have fun, but don't pretend it's deep.
Furthermore, it's a bad slavefic? It's a poorly told story.
I found Docile deeply psychologically unconvincing. Firstly, the "Docile" Elisha becomes a perfect little slave after just six months. I found it unbelievable that someone could change so quickly and think a better writer could have juggled a more extensive timeline.
Yet at the same time, Elisha never had much fight in him to start with. Not taking the drug Dociline was his one and only rebellion, and even that was accepted pretty easily by his "master." I found his lack of willpower throughout incredibly boring. It deflated so much potential tension and made him hard to root for. For example, he's approached many times by an anti-slavery organization that wants to free him—but he never once is tempted to spy on his "master" for them or seek freedom. Literally the same proposition kept popping up in scenes that were nearly identical, but since it was obvious from that start that Elisha was never going to become a spy, those scenes were a waste of space. I would have much preferred reading about an Elisha who was trying to balance spying with falling in love with the enemy.
There's one scene that seems compelling for a moment— As if the stakes never actually mattered in the first place.
Combining this with how under-developed his friend was (Dylan and Elisha had a passing conversation in the beginning, in which we are told but not shown that they're like family. Even this scene was oddly devoid of tension, as she's the only person who knows he's going to leave home to sell himself for his family, but she barely seems bothered by it.), and it was hard to care at all. When I think of writers like Suzanne Collins, who made us care about Katniss's connection to Peeta through a quick but heart-wrenching flashback where Peeta the baker gave some forbidden bread to a starving Katniss, I know it's possible to make readers care quickly and to develop characters properly in the amount of words Szpara uses. I wish his editors had pushed him to do that.
The most unrealistic thing!! Seriously.
Firstly, what a condescending portrayal of rural people. Secondly,
And finally, the last hundred or so pages of the book are literally a dull It is CRAZY to me that an editor didn't recommend that all be cut and condensed into 20 pages at the MAXIMUM. Or maybe an editor did but was ignored. Who knows.
There's an emotional numbness through the book. Read it if you like horny fanfic—or just read horny fanfic, which is free.
Docile all takes place in America but never once mentions actual American slavery. It is inspired by chattel slavery, in that the slaves of this world are seen as less than people, with no autonomy, and yet chattel slavery is never once acknowledged even as other parts of real life history are. It is an odd and gaping lacuna.
The races of characters are described boringly, incessantly, and obsessively—basically the only descriptors characters get are a running catalogue of skin shades. Light-skinned, pale, dark brown, warm, Black—shade after shade, at the sacrifice of more detailed or varied descriptions. I cannot tell you what most of the characters looked like beyond their skin—no hair styles, no eye colors, etc. Yet race is never acknowledged as anything beyond the visual; again, it is literally not mentioned once that Black people were enslaved in America, even though the characters talk about the 1800s repeatedly. The only hint that racism might still exist is that a Black sex slave is named "Onyx" by his "master," indicating that race fetishization is still a thing. But this is never explored more deeply than the name itself.
Books that *actually* contain themes of anti-capitalism, queerness, romance, slavery, and race:
-An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon
-The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
Like if you just wanna be horny, have fun, but don't pretend it's deep.
Furthermore, it's a bad slavefic? It's a poorly told story.
I found Docile deeply psychologically unconvincing. Firstly, the "Docile" Elisha becomes a perfect little slave after just six months. I found it unbelievable that someone could change so quickly and think a better writer could have juggled a more extensive timeline.
Yet at the same time, Elisha never had much fight in him to start with. Not taking the drug Dociline was his one and only rebellion, and even that was accepted pretty easily by his "master." I found his lack of willpower throughout incredibly boring. It deflated so much potential tension and made him hard to root for. For example, he's approached many times by an anti-slavery organization that wants to free him—but he never once is tempted to spy on his "master" for them or seek freedom. Literally the same proposition kept popping up in scenes that were nearly identical, but since it was obvious from that start that Elisha was never going to become a spy, those scenes were a waste of space. I would have much preferred reading about an Elisha who was trying to balance spying with falling in love with the enemy.
There's one scene that seems compelling for a moment—
Spoiler
when he finds out his friend from home, Dylan, has become a slave and he wants to free her. But the scene where he seeks to free her lacks any twists, drama, or tension. He runs in a race and wins neatly after just a few paragraphs. Furthermore, after he succeeds in freeing her, he doesn't even think about her except briefly 2 pages later.Combining this with how under-developed his friend was (Dylan and Elisha had a passing conversation in the beginning, in which we are told but not shown that they're like family. Even this scene was oddly devoid of tension, as she's the only person who knows he's going to leave home to sell himself for his family, but she barely seems bothered by it.), and it was hard to care at all. When I think of writers like Suzanne Collins, who made us care about Katniss's connection to Peeta through a quick but heart-wrenching flashback where Peeta the baker gave some forbidden bread to a starving Katniss, I know it's possible to make readers care quickly and to develop characters properly in the amount of words Szpara uses. I wish his editors had pushed him to do that.
The most unrealistic thing!!
Spoiler
Was when Elisha's father!! Told Elisha to go back to his "master" early!! After Elisha's FIRST permitted weekend home!! I could sort of believe his father wouldn't want Elisha's sister to see Elisha's docility and be influenced by it, but that apparently wasn't his father's main grievance. No—it was that Elisha had learned to play piano and now took morning runs. Those changes pushed Elisha's father to kick him out of the house—Elisha had sold his entire life away to save his family, but since he wasn't a quaint farmboy anymore, f*ck him.Firstly, what a condescending portrayal of rural people. Secondly,
Spoiler
if Elisha became a slave to protect his family and we don't care about his family because his family randomly doesn't care about him, then. where. are. the. stakes??And finally, the last hundred or so pages of the book are literally a dull
Spoiler
trial in which characters painstaking recap each and every event in the book.There's an emotional numbness through the book. Read it if you like horny fanfic—or just read horny fanfic, which is free.
lamegod's review
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Slavery, Sexual content, Physical abuse, Confinement, Trafficking, Sexual violence, Emotional abuse, Rape, Classism, Domestic abuse, and Toxic relationship
Moderate: Torture, Gaslighting, Suicide attempt, Drug use, and Injury/injury detail
Minor: Suicide, Blood, Grief, Medical trauma, Chronic illness, Drug use, Alcohol, Forced institutionalization, Cursing, Death of parent, Toxic friendship, and Medical content
melaubs11's review
4.0
I loved this.. this got to my head.. the courts section was slightly dragging and I wasn’t into it much then but it did pick up for the end. 4 Stars!!!
futuremrsdarcy's review against another edition
5.0
This book is...heartbreaking. It very much reminds me of Margaret Atwood in that it pulls no punches, holds nothing back, and is unafraid in its portrayal of the very worst of humanity alongside the breathtaking hope for change and improvement within each person.
As a member of the BDSM community, I found myself frequently shaken and horrified at the behaviors of some of the characters, which was completely the point. The conversation about consent which permeates the book and is reflected all the way through the story is exceptional. Make no mistake, this is not a sweet and happy love story. This is gilded horror, made all the more painful for the sheer fact that the reader can see the seeds of reality within its pages.
As a member of the BDSM community, I found myself frequently shaken and horrified at the behaviors of some of the characters, which was completely the point. The conversation about consent which permeates the book and is reflected all the way through the story is exceptional. Make no mistake, this is not a sweet and happy love story. This is gilded horror, made all the more painful for the sheer fact that the reader can see the seeds of reality within its pages.
esseastri's review
3.0
Okay, this wasn't earth-shattering by any means, especially if you've read any fanfic whatsoever, but the WRITING! It's a pretty standard BDSM fanfic (tho much better written than a lot of BDSM fanfics, especially other ones that have been traditionally published...). But it digs into questions of consent and personhood and personality. It's not as nuanced or subversive as I wanted it to be, but it made me think--I was thinking about it constantly whenever I had to put it down, and I've been thinking about it since. So it must have done something right!
And the writing was quality. The character work was exquisite, and the gradual changes in both Alex's and Elisha's personalities as they affected each other were subtle and beautiful and horrifying. It's a creeping, unsettling, tender, lovely sort of horror that had me reading until 4am two nights in a row. It's almost a Frankenstein--Alex falling in love with the monster he creates, realizing he's the monster and has been all along, Elisha realizing that he's never the monster and relearning how to be human... it's a subtle and delectable tangle of character knots, and I loved watching it unfold.
Content warnings for rape, dubcon, kinks of all kinds--what you'd normally find in any good slave/dubcon fanfic. Tumblr is going to have a field day with this book, but listen: it's well-written. It's so well-written. Szpara good at words. That's all I got.
And the writing was quality. The character work was exquisite, and the gradual changes in both Alex's and Elisha's personalities as they affected each other were subtle and beautiful and horrifying. It's a creeping, unsettling, tender, lovely sort of horror that had me reading until 4am two nights in a row. It's almost a Frankenstein--Alex falling in love with the monster he creates, realizing he's the monster and has been all along, Elisha realizing that he's never the monster and relearning how to be human... it's a subtle and delectable tangle of character knots, and I loved watching it unfold.
Content warnings for rape, dubcon, kinks of all kinds--what you'd normally find in any good slave/dubcon fanfic. Tumblr is going to have a field day with this book, but listen: it's well-written. It's so well-written. Szpara good at words. That's all I got.
zen's review
I'm completely torn, here.
On one hand, the writing is just damn good. I read this in two sittings, and only because at 4am yesterday I decided it was maybe time to go to sleep. So I guess the story was entertaining.
On the other hand, I think I hit the emotional climax at the middle of the book and afterwards something just didn't feel completely right, not on a narrative level, but because I became confused about what I should take away from the book.
I guess my problem was that the tagline is, There is no consent under capitalism. That shit has implications on how this book reflects on real life and viceversa, and I simply didn't feel that from the book?
More specifically:
1) I don't know what to think of Alex. Spoilers to follow but, while I did like the character per se,
2) Not exactly vibing with the fact that the book seems to be set not too far away from the present (three generations in the future at most?) but there's no connection with the actual, historical slavery that happened in the U.S., the consequences of which are still here in the present, this year more obviously than ever. And again, I wouldn't have minded it too much if the tagline wasn't explicitly making a commentary on the current state of society, you know? I'm not even American but that silence doesn't go easily unnoticed.
I did like the queerness in the book, it felt so natural and so normal, and I like how the author managed to create a dysfunctional society where sexuality and queerness are not part of what makes it bad. But I don't know, the ending now doesn't sit well with me.
On one hand, the writing is just damn good. I read this in two sittings, and only because at 4am yesterday I decided it was maybe time to go to sleep. So I guess the story was entertaining.
On the other hand, I think I hit the emotional climax at the middle of the book and afterwards something just didn't feel completely right, not on a narrative level, but because I became confused about what I should take away from the book.
I guess my problem was that the tagline is, There is no consent under capitalism. That shit has implications on how this book reflects on real life and viceversa, and I simply didn't feel that from the book?
More specifically:
1) I don't know what to think of Alex. Spoilers to follow but, while I did like the character per se,
Spoiler
I think he didn't suffer the consequences of what he did. I liked him at first because of how he's been shown—since the start of the book, he's never completely on board with his parents' way of thinking, and we did see him doubt some of the things he should've been sure about. The fact that he gets angry when Elisha talks badly about Dociline, or even how Alex treats other Dociles and his friends who were former Dociles are pretty self-explainatory. And I think that a character like that resonates a lot with real life. There are people with good intention who are simply programmed by society to do bad things and regret it later in life, and I'm pretty fond of the idea that even villains can be victims. But... that's not an excuse, you know? Alex did abuse Elisha. He did rape him and allow many other Dociles to suffer under similar circumstances. And he just didn't get punished for that. At the end of the book, he's unscathed. Sure, he lost his family, his money and status, but that really cannot be compared to people losing their lives, parts of their bodies, their freedom, and their mental stability. That's simply not how it works. The fact that in the last page Elisha convinces him to go through with his idea of creating a solution (for a problem he created in the first place!) wasn't enough. Solving an issue isn't enough if you're not held accountable as much as you should, I think.2) Not exactly vibing with the fact that the book seems to be set not too far away from the present (three generations in the future at most?) but there's no connection with the actual, historical slavery that happened in the U.S., the consequences of which are still here in the present, this year more obviously than ever. And again, I wouldn't have minded it too much if the tagline wasn't explicitly making a commentary on the current state of society, you know? I'm not even American but that silence doesn't go easily unnoticed.
I did like the queerness in the book, it felt so natural and so normal, and I like how the author managed to create a dysfunctional society where sexuality and queerness are not part of what makes it bad. But I don't know, the ending now doesn't sit well with me.
caresays's review
3.0
Ultimately a three-star review. I think the world was less full than I wanted it to be, and while some aspects were interesting and sketched out in complex ways, other aspects were not. Still, it was thoughtful and explored consent in many ways. It was, however, unexpectedly explicit — which did not affect how I thought about the book, but just to warn anyone who may read this on their very public commute home.