Reviews

This is my second Celeste Ng book and I continue to find her books to be deep, serious and kind of sad. I always feel heart heavy after her books. I feel like this book was written in the opposite way it should have been. It was hard to make sense of it until it changed perspectives. They live in a future time where Chinese Americans are hated and a boy loses his mom to the cause. I hate racism so this book was just too heavy for me, but thought provoking!

erynmarieliz's review against another edition

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3.0

Not super into the dystopian genre but I am a sucker for Ng’s writing style. Aside from that this story discussed topics that are unfortunately very relevant in today’s society.

drubinstein's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad 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? No

4.25

Another work of fiction that hits hard because it's too easy to believe it could happen. In a post "crisis" America, (the crisis was a really bad economic downturn), the government has made Chinese/Asian people (and pretty much anyone who is different) scapegoats. Because of this, an asian American mom leaves her husband and young son to keep them safe, and goes into hiding collecting stories from people who have had their children taken from them by the government. It's a pretty bleak story, and it's really horrible but all too easy to see how it could happen in real life.

yycreading's review against another edition

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emotional inspiring medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix

4.5

ljhind's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative reflective 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

4.0

mangocats's review against another edition

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2.0

underwhelming execution. i think the character relationships were a bit weak and it hurt the book’s conversations about poc solidarity. regardless i think the book touches upon important (and very relevant) discussions ab racial inequality and im glad to see so many young readers reading it!

stewfurkey's review against another edition

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dark emotional informative medium-paced

4.0

Strong influences of The Handmaid’s Tale. I felt a lot of early stage pandemic feelings come through in this book. The description of NYC at the beginning of the crisis really felt like March/April 2020.

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