inskuuh's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
medium-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
4.5
hehkhatea's review against another edition
5.0
I'm not going to say that I loved this books just because I know Emily personally, but it helps. I seriously loved this book! It reminded me of Maggie Stiefvater's The Scorpio Races mixed with Pacific Rim, but with giant sea monsters and lesbians.
twirl's review against another edition
5.0
Cas is the trainer for genetically modified beasts who defend ships attacked by pirates, until she is captured by pirates.
In the first chapter, you are introduced to Cas and by the end, the reader is already able to understand her motives and goal. As the story progresses, these change realistically as she battles bigger questions such as, what is truly worth fighting for? This character is in no way perfect, nor is any of the other characters we meet. The author shows how they are human and why they all make the choices they make, and it feels like one of the first books I have been unable to find a character to hate.
It is perfectly paced throughout, never feeling too slow or rushed. The romance is built in a subtle way that feels very natural. The author has no need to use direct language to communicate that there is something growing between them, since the characters actions speak for themselves.
I truly could have not asked for a better way to end this year than with this good book. It has everything I want in a book, will be an inspiration for my writing and also something I know I will want to return to read again.
Thank you very much to my friends who recommended it to me.
In the first chapter, you are introduced to Cas and by the end, the reader is already able to understand her motives and goal. As the story progresses, these change realistically as she battles bigger questions such as, what is truly worth fighting for? This character is in no way perfect, nor is any of the other characters we meet. The author shows how they are human and why they all make the choices they make, and it feels like one of the first books I have been unable to find a character to hate.
It is perfectly paced throughout, never feeling too slow or rushed. The romance is built in a subtle way that feels very natural. The author has no need to use direct language to communicate that there is something growing between them, since the characters actions speak for themselves.
I truly could have not asked for a better way to end this year than with this good book. It has everything I want in a book, will be an inspiration for my writing and also something I know I will want to return to read again.
Thank you very much to my friends who recommended it to me.
anywiebs's review against another edition
2.0
I got this book because a friend loved it and it had pirates and sea monsters and a great lesbian romance, according to her.
Unfortunately I struggled with the exacution of almost all of the things. The ideas in the book are interesting, but the execution isn't. If I hadn't trusted in my friend, I wouldn't have made it through the first pages, where a clumsy setting of a background and world is happening.
After a while I got used to the writing more, but every now and again there were jumps in the main character's attitudes and thinking that were just not well introduced.
The promised romance didn't really get started, so it might just bloom into its full potential in the second book - which I am not keen on reading any time soon. Sadly.
It was a fast read, with seamonsters and pirates, so if you can look past the writing, you might like it a lot more than I did.
Unfortunately I struggled with the exacution of almost all of the things. The ideas in the book are interesting, but the execution isn't. If I hadn't trusted in my friend, I wouldn't have made it through the first pages, where a clumsy setting of a background and world is happening.
After a while I got used to the writing more, but every now and again there were jumps in the main character's attitudes and thinking that were just not well introduced.
The promised romance didn't really get started, so it might just bloom into its full potential in the second book - which I am not keen on reading any time soon. Sadly.
It was a fast read, with seamonsters and pirates, so if you can look past the writing, you might like it a lot more than I did.
sapphicreads_'s review against another edition
5.0
This book captured my attention from the start and never let it go. I so impressed with how much this book was able to pack in under 300 pages including an enemies to lovers slow burn f/f relationship. An automatic all time favorite!
atargatis's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
stitchwitch_the_bookworm's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
inspiring
mysterious
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
I read it, and its hard to describe. A little Percy Jackson, a little Doctor Who (in a strange way) and a little Harry Potter. I love it. Its adventurous, its fun, and it shows character growth.
nuevecuervos's review against another edition
3.0
I have so many thoughts about this book. First, I picked it up on audiobook because I had just seen the description of it and thought it might be something my kid might want to listen to on a relatively long drive we had ahead of us (don't look at me like that-- the hubs ended up playing a Harry Dresden book for her instead; I'm not the only one contributing to her literary delinquency). Unfortunately, as advanced a plothound as my kid can be, she cannot handle the idea of animals being injured, so we only made it about forty minutes in before she asked that we switch to something else pretty much immediately. Fair, it was distressing. So I listened to the rest alone, and though I enjoyed this tale of Stockholm syndrome a lot, I walked away feeling like I wasn't entirely in our protagonist's corner all the time.
It's interesting--I was talking through the dilemma in which Cass finds herself embroiled, and I as a grown-ass adult couldn't find a more morally acceptable way out aside from killing herself, either, but somehow I'm still out here judging her 17-year-old ass, lol. At least, this feeling held until the point at which Cass begins making decisions on her own and suddenly sees the pirate ship as something that needs to be protected, actively seeking to do so by killing others in the process. Certainly, we have to chalk it up to her changed mentality, and her reasoning behind seeing much of the pirate crew as innocents that need to be protected is worked through really well. So maybe it's just that Skrutskie is expertly tapping into an ethical Kobyashi Maru with which there is no winning. Hard questions plague Cass, too, though it's maddening that by the end, she should think herself Seventeen, amirite? (Insert Jeanie Bueller 'kids' gif here :D ) (yes, I went looking; no i couldn't find the right one, but yes, you old bastards like me know exactly what I'm talking about)
Of interest, should a reader spend time considering Cass' moral predicament (as one no doubt must in the wake of her decisions), there's room to be left spinning into questions of, how ethical is it to steal bread when you're starving? Eggs? A whole goat? A whole hot dog cart? A cruise ship's worth of spoils? Shouldn't we be focusing on the ethics of a society that lets its members get so hungry they have to steal or die? Or do we chalk it up to maybe there will always be fringe elements of a mostly-functioning society? We do get hints that the smaller, more ostensibly improved governments aren't all they're cracked up to be, but maybe we need more; maybe we'll get it in a sequel. Anyway. More than popcorn book, though it doesn't feel like it at the time.
Spoiler
the scene where Cass's original Reckoner meets a gruesome end andIt's interesting--I was talking through the dilemma in which Cass finds herself embroiled, and I as a grown-ass adult couldn't find a more morally acceptable way out aside from killing herself, either, but somehow I'm still out here judging her 17-year-old ass, lol. At least, this feeling held until the point at which Cass begins making decisions on her own and suddenly sees the pirate ship as something that needs to be protected, actively seeking to do so by killing others in the process. Certainly, we have to chalk it up to her changed mentality, and her reasoning behind seeing much of the pirate crew as innocents that need to be protected is worked through really well. So maybe it's just that Skrutskie is expertly tapping into an ethical Kobyashi Maru with which there is no winning. Hard questions plague Cass, too, though it's maddening that by the end, she should think herself
Spoiler
a monster, but then be so judgily angry at Swift for having also been a monster doing monster shit that Cass herself *just fucking did* in killing Reckoners who are just doing their job. And! That in the process of thinking it out, she should decide that piracy is the way to figure out what is rotten about her society.Of interest, should a reader spend time considering Cass' moral predicament (as one no doubt must in the wake of her decisions), there's room to be left spinning into questions of, how ethical is it to steal bread when you're starving? Eggs? A whole goat? A whole hot dog cart? A cruise ship's worth of spoils? Shouldn't we be focusing on the ethics of a society that lets its members get so hungry they have to steal or die? Or do we chalk it up to maybe there will always be fringe elements of a mostly-functioning society? We do get hints that the smaller, more ostensibly improved governments aren't all they're cracked up to be, but maybe we need more; maybe we'll get it in a sequel. Anyway. More than popcorn book, though it doesn't feel like it at the time.