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sheyri's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I do not want to see a visual adaptation of that book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexism and Colonisation
Moderate: Slavery, War, Classism, and Pandemic/Epidemic
black_cat_iiix's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
hopeful
medium-paced
- 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
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Colonisation and Classism
Moderate: Death, Gun violence, Violence, Blood, and Kidnapping
Minor: Animal death, Confinement, and Genocide
Many sentient spiders and descriptions of spider anatomykirtreads's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.75
I could not put this book down. It is one of those books that I will be thinking about for a long time. The book takes the human life is on the brink of collapse idea and turns it into something unique. This book, while playing on a lot of classic sci-fi tropes, really does something new and exciting. I really enjoyed the plot of this book, the themes that it explored and the ideas and conclusions that the novel came to.
I don't think that this book is for everyone. There is a lot of time jumping, there are some things that are left vague for the sake of time that you just kind of need to accept, and the way that characters are handled in the time skipping is confusing at first. You need to really be okay with not knowing what is going on for the first 25% of the book, but it is worth it. If you like Asimov's Foundations series you will really enjoy this. It felt like classic sci-fi without as many problematic elements.
It was confusing at first trying to keep track of all the characters. A lot are introduced quickly, and then you might not come back to that character for a good chunk of the book, but they are all important. I did struggle to keep them all straight at some points, but I generally struggle with that.
My only other critique would be that I wanted a little bit more from the ending. We spend so much time (literal centuries) getting to the conclusion that it felt a little rushed. I wanted to sit with the conclusion a little more. I know that this was originally written as a stand alone but is now the first in a trilogy so I am hoping that some of that will be resolved in the next book.
Overall, I really loved this book. It felt unique, fun, thoughtful and well written. It is hard to bring something new to the genre of sci-fi but I think that this novel did just that!
I don't think that this book is for everyone. There is a lot of time jumping, there are some things that are left vague for the sake of time that you just kind of need to accept, and the way that characters are handled in the time skipping is confusing at first. You need to really be okay with not knowing what is going on for the first 25% of the book, but it is worth it. If you like Asimov's Foundations series you will really enjoy this. It felt like classic sci-fi without as many problematic elements.
It was confusing at first trying to keep track of all the characters. A lot are introduced quickly, and then you might not come back to that character for a good chunk of the book, but they are all important. I did struggle to keep them all straight at some points, but I generally struggle with that.
My only other critique would be that I wanted a little bit more from the ending. We spend so much time (literal centuries) getting to the conclusion that it felt a little rushed. I wanted to sit with the conclusion a little more. I know that this was originally written as a stand alone but is now the first in a trilogy so I am hoping that some of that will be resolved in the next book.
Overall, I really loved this book. It felt unique, fun, thoughtful and well written. It is hard to bring something new to the genre of sci-fi but I think that this novel did just that!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Religious bigotry, Colonisation, and War
chelsea_nailpolishlover's review against another edition
challenging
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.0
Dnf’d at page 350.
Listen I tried.. I really did. What sucks for me the most is I didn’t listen to my gut when I read the sample of this book before outright buying it and wasting my money of this trivial piece of work.
The actions against humans and animals and the way they are thought about in this book is quite frankly racists, ablest and annoyingly ageist. Ageist is the least of its problems though.
At first when the mfc was thinking disgusting thoughts and hints of racist thoughts about people, calling them animals and monkeys (and no I don’t mean the actual monkeys, saying they were less than etc. Incredibly speciesist, even against their own species. The egoistical aspersions of the person etc I thought I could look past it as a villain origin story, of a sociopathic individual and that it wouldn’t be a huge continuing aspect in the writing. Boy was I wrong.
Even the god damn spiders had the same thinking. The author (a man) really loved to pound out the grossest most stereotypical feminist propaganda imaginable. (And I’m a feminist). It was like they wanted to make a joke of women.
The crew part was the most interesting part of this book. But the writing was all over the place. You had no idea half the time of how much time had passed. Where they were currently. What they were actually doing. And it would jump from different POV’s almost every chapter. And then you would get back and generations had passed?!?!? How the fuck is anyone supposed to keep up with the story, the timeline, or learn about literally anything when we get 5 minute snippets of bullshit plot.
Let’s not even get to the impossibilities of the science fiction aspects of this book. Clearly the author has no idea how science works. Infecting a whole planet instead of injecting the monkeys? Let’s not forget the crystal 💀 and sending signals plz. I just couldn’t fkin do it anymore.
One of my last straws honestly was one of the characters calling people ret^rded. Along with the spiders becoming religious and basically becoming a cult for this god and wanting to destroy others if they didn’t believe the same. 👎🏻🙅🏻♀️
Listen I tried.. I really did. What sucks for me the most is I didn’t listen to my gut when I read the sample of this book before outright buying it and wasting my money of this trivial piece of work.
The actions against humans and animals and the way they are thought about in this book is quite frankly racists, ablest and annoyingly ageist. Ageist is the least of its problems though.
At first when the mfc was thinking disgusting thoughts and hints of racist thoughts about people, calling them animals and monkeys (and no I don’t mean the actual monkeys, saying they were less than etc. Incredibly speciesist, even against their own species. The egoistical aspersions of the person etc I thought I could look past it as a villain origin story, of a sociopathic individual and that it wouldn’t be a huge continuing aspect in the writing. Boy was I wrong.
Even the god damn spiders had the same thinking. The author (a man) really loved to pound out the grossest most stereotypical feminist propaganda imaginable. (And I’m a feminist). It was like they wanted to make a joke of women.
The crew part was the most interesting part of this book. But the writing was all over the place. You had no idea half the time of how much time had passed. Where they were currently. What they were actually doing. And it would jump from different POV’s almost every chapter. And then you would get back and generations had passed?!?!? How the fuck is anyone supposed to keep up with the story, the timeline, or learn about literally anything when we get 5 minute snippets of bullshit plot.
Let’s not even get to the impossibilities of the science fiction aspects of this book. Clearly the author has no idea how science works. Infecting a whole planet instead of injecting the monkeys? Let’s not forget the crystal 💀 and sending signals plz. I just couldn’t fkin do it anymore.
One of my last straws honestly was one of the characters calling people ret^rded. Along with the spiders becoming religious and basically becoming a cult for this god and wanting to destroy others if they didn’t believe the same. 👎🏻🙅🏻♀️
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Genocide, Physical abuse, Racism, Slavery, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Kidnapping, Murder, Abandonment, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism
Moderate: Ableism and Racism
talonsontypewriters's review against another edition
adventurous
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
maybe just the mood I'm in but it never quite clicked for me :( the spiders were cool though
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Genocide, Colonisation, War, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Animal death, Confinement, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Sexism, Terminal illness, Violence, Xenophobia, Cannibalism, Murder, and Fire/Fire injury
Minor: Ableism
Spiders, insects. Passing use of cr*pple/d, single use of the R slur.euphemiajo's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
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? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Ableism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Gun violence, Mental illness, Violence, Xenophobia, Medical content, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Abandonment, Colonisation, and War
marsh_mall0w's review against another edition
adventurous
hopeful
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Confinement, Sexism, Slavery, Religious bigotry, Colonisation, War, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Animal death, Genocide, Mental illness, Violence, Xenophobia, and Abortion
Minor: Suicidal thoughts and Torture
iono's review against another edition
adventurous
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
tense
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
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexism and Cannibalism
Moderate: Confinement, Death, Slavery, Violence, Xenophobia, Murder, Abandonment, and Colonisation
Minor: Cursing, Genocide, and War
micheala's review against another edition
This book has a really cool premise, in terms of post apocalyptic SciFi. The set up is that humans had started terraforming the galaxy before a nuclear war destroyed all humans living off planet, and threw Earth into an ice age.
We then get a ship with a few thousand of the remaining humans centuries later, travelling through space (in stais) in the hopes of finding a new home.
The planet they do eventually arrive at was supposed to be an experiment to "speed run" evolution and create new humans from monkeys + an engineered virus. However, those monkeys died being sent to the planet, and giant senteant insects evolve instead.
Cool right? I had a few quibbles with the spider sections (they don't know what humans/earth is, and they don't know about the virus let alone how it functions, so stop talking about it in the narrative portions of their sections; and I was kinda disappointed that their society also was fundamentally sexist and pretty much a 1:1 of humans in the medial ages in terms of society)
The humans finally get onto the planet, and we get drop kicked into full on horror, specifically graphic body horror. So I noped out of a story I was otherwise enjoying at 37%
If you're cool with horror, I'm guessing this book is going to continue to play with some really interesting ideas, however as someone who cannot deal with horror, it's a DNF for me.
We then get a ship with a few thousand of the remaining humans centuries later, travelling through space (in stais) in the hopes of finding a new home.
The planet they do eventually arrive at was supposed to be an experiment to "speed run" evolution and create new humans from monkeys + an engineered virus. However, those monkeys died being sent to the planet, and giant senteant insects evolve instead.
Cool right? I had a few quibbles with the spider sections (they don't know what humans/earth is, and they don't know about the virus let alone how it functions, so stop talking about it in the narrative portions of their sections; and I was kinda disappointed that their society also was fundamentally sexist and pretty much a 1:1 of humans in the medial ages in terms of society)
The humans finally get onto the planet, and we get drop kicked into full on horror, specifically graphic body horror. So I noped out of a story I was otherwise enjoying at 37%
If you're cool with horror, I'm guessing this book is going to continue to play with some really interesting ideas, however as someone who cannot deal with horror, it's a DNF for me.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Death, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Misogyny, Sexism, Slavery, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Murder, Colonisation, War, and Injury/Injury detail
nodogsonthemoon's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal death, Death, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Violence, Cannibalism, Fire/Fire injury, Colonisation, and War