Reviews tagging 'Cultural appropriation'

The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow

8 reviews

spineofthesaurus's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful reflective

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Blood, Body horror, Classism, Colonisation, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Gaslighting, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Medical trauma, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Self harm, Xenophobia, and Cultural appropriation

Moderate: Alcohol, Death, Drug use, Murder, Pregnancy, Torture, Ableism, Gun violence, Sexual harassment, Animal cruelty, Child abuse, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Slavery, Abortion, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Stalking

athryn's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious tense 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

3.5

This took a while to get to the actual adventure part, which was where it really took off for me. Before that, there's quite a bit of trauma to go through, and I will say that it made it so I had to put it down quite a bit. I thought the interspersing of the two narratives to be pretty interesting. I thought this was a good spin on a concept done by a few other people recently.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Mental illness, Animal cruelty, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Self harm, Sexism, Misogyny, Violence, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Abandonment, Child abuse, Classism, Colonisation, Kidnapping, Gaslighting, Murder, Cultural appropriation, Gun violence, Panic attacks/disorders, Racism, and Confinement

Minor: Grief, Alcohol, Pregnancy, and War

tangleroot_eli's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

Big mixed feels about this one. I like so many things about it: January herself; Ade and Yule Ian's story - actually, I found all of the characters fairly well written.

But I struggled with the pacing, especially in the first 2/3. While January is an interesting character, her story kept me less engrossed than Ade and Yule Ian's, even though she's ostensibly the main character. For me, the story really starts in the last third, when everyone's threads come together.

Ultimately, my biggest disappointment with the book is the the conventionality of Harrow's other worlds. They're "completely different from our own," but in very limited ways. Where were the worlds with people but without capitalism? Where were the worlds where people weren't "somewhere in between [men and women]" but just people? The refuges in Arcadia clearly include same-sex couples; were none of them looking for a world where that was the norm, or did the idea of such a world not occur to Harrow? It often seems like, in Harrow's mind, the best a queer and/or BIPOC character can hope for is a world where their identity is ignored or, at best, tolerated, rather than one where it's celebrated.

In 2001, astronauts carry paper notebooks because Arthur C Clarke, however vast his imagination, couldn't conceive of computers so small they fit in the palm of our hands. In The Ten Thousand Doors of January, all worlds, no matter how superficially different from our own, at core are quite similar, because Alix E Harrow, however vast her imagination, couldn't conceive of what real, fundamental difference looks like.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Animal cruelty, Colonisation, Racism, Confinement, Cultural appropriation, Death, Death of parent, Medical trauma, Grief, Forced institutionalization, Child abuse, Classism, Medical content, and Xenophobia

Moderate: Pregnancy, Gun violence, and Racial slurs

Minor: Police brutality and War

thequiltyreader's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad 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? No

4.0

I really enjoyed this story. There are a number of back stories, while slow in places they tie nicely together in the end.

I loved the occasional exploration of using particular words, capitalisations and the general importance of words.

There are fleeting references to various other lands / worlds through the Doors and I would have loved it if these had been explored in some way.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Forced institutionalization, Gore, Cultural appropriation, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Self harm, Abandonment, Animal cruelty, Blood, Classism, Bullying, Cursing, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Mental illness, Murder, Violence, and Death

nmoji's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny hopeful lighthearted mysterious 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Racism, Cultural appropriation, and Blood

Minor: Gun violence and Violence

marioosa517's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense 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? No

4.25

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Abandonment, Gaslighting, Medical trauma, Blood, Classism, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Racism, and Self harm

Minor: Death, Stalking, War, Cursing, Body horror, Alcohol, Child abuse, Gore, Grief, Animal cruelty, and Cultural appropriation

alyssasaurus's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful mysterious sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Racial slurs, Forced institutionalization, Self harm, Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Animal death, Cultural appropriation, Death, Blood, Confinement, Death of parent, Animal cruelty, Racism, Xenophobia, Body horror, and Stalking

apworden's review against another edition

adventurous hopeful inspiring mysterious sad 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? It's complicated

4.0

I loved this book overall, but the nagging irritation at how

Ade seems to naively or intentionally ignore how her actions affect people of color, first with the men who helped her carry the boat up the mountain and, even worse, her risking her young family with a caste-based society seemingly  without much preparation.It feels like Ade never has any true self realization around this. Ade seems to be presented as the one who needs to forgive Yule and not as someone who also owes a reconciliatory apology. For this reason, I can’t bump it to 5 stars, but it was sooooo close. This is one of those stories that could have best realized with a sensitivity reader or co-authorship with a POC writer. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, and Racism

Moderate: Gore