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the_virginian's review
3.0
Interesting concept - insects for magicians; wars between countries based on their view of the prophet Mohammed. Well written overall; some rather abrupt passage changes. It took a chapter before I was able to immerse myself in the author's world. Very good read.
gsatori's review
4.0
On a world where war seems never ending, a bounty hunter is sent after someone who holds the power of ending it.
Kameron Hurley is a fine writer and I'm sorry I missed an opportunity to meet her when she was in town recently for a convention.
The narrative is muscular, without waste. Few info dumps here. Instead the reader is tossed into the world and given just enough to start figuring things out on her own.
Kameron Hurley is a fine writer and I'm sorry I missed an opportunity to meet her when she was in town recently for a convention.
The narrative is muscular, without waste. Few info dumps here. Instead the reader is tossed into the world and given just enough to start figuring things out on her own.
rocketiza's review against another edition
4.0
Took a little bit to get into the world, but FUCK YEAH once I was in.
samstrong's review
3.0
Lots of nice world building and it was all very gritty and stuff, but ultimately I didn't actually care about any of the characters. They were all just so dour.
kadomi's review against another edition
4.0
I immensely enjoyed this super-gritty, kinda gruesome SF novel by Kameron Hurley. Comes with a big caveat, you need to be able to dig her distinctive style of providing zero exposition, throwing complicated worldbuilding elements at you, and tying them all together to a fascinating read.
Our protagonist is Nyxnissa, a bounty hunter who drinks, fucks, kills, takes drugs, all the bad stuff. She used to be a bel dame in Nasheen, an elusive female faction who bring in boys who run away from the war front. Nasheen is matriarchal, and a long holy war is fought against the neighboring country of Chenja. The religion is islam-based, basically the colonists brought islamism with them, but interpret it very differently on both sides of the fence.
Nyx receives a bounty note to bring in an alien visitor to this world, but a rival bounty hunter plus the bel dames are also hunting her, and Nyx and her team. There's also magic based on insects, and seriously, it's too complex to explain more. But it's fascinating, and really gruesome. The characters are all deeply flawed, and it's hard to like any of the bunch, but they kinda really grew on me, particularly Nyx and her strange relationship with Rhys.
It's also queer af, and plays with gender reversal that's sometimes a bit shocking. Hurley doesn't go into detail, but the trials and tribulations of Rhys in particular as a male foreigner in Nasheen were almost a bit shocking.
I really really enjoyed it. It's not for everyone, for sure, though.
Our protagonist is Nyxnissa, a bounty hunter who drinks, fucks, kills, takes drugs, all the bad stuff. She used to be a bel dame in Nasheen, an elusive female faction who bring in boys who run away from the war front. Nasheen is matriarchal, and a long holy war is fought against the neighboring country of Chenja. The religion is islam-based, basically the colonists brought islamism with them, but interpret it very differently on both sides of the fence.
Nyx receives a bounty note to bring in an alien visitor to this world, but a rival bounty hunter plus the bel dames are also hunting her, and Nyx and her team. There's also magic based on insects, and seriously, it's too complex to explain more. But it's fascinating, and really gruesome. The characters are all deeply flawed, and it's hard to like any of the bunch, but they kinda really grew on me, particularly Nyx and her strange relationship with Rhys.
It's also queer af, and plays with gender reversal that's sometimes a bit shocking. Hurley doesn't go into detail, but the trials and tribulations of Rhys in particular as a male foreigner in Nasheen were almost a bit shocking.
I really really enjoyed it. It's not for everyone, for sure, though.
mxcaswell's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
laden_bookshelf's review
5.0
This novel is big and intense, albeit slow going at the beginning. When I read Kameron Hurley’s Big Idea post at Whatever, this was the part that grabbed me:
"Thing was, Nyx isn’t the sort who likes to be used. So when the inevitable bounty hunter story starts, we are not dealing with bounty hunters as we know them anymore. We’re not in a world we can immediately recognize. The day is nearly thirty hours long. The suns give everybody cancer. Nobody can remember a time without war. Bugs power the world’s technology and make up the primary food source. Magicians build weapons of war. The world is a contaminated ruin, and most folks die young.
But it’s a world of intensely passionate and powerful people, the kind of people we imagine could be great heroes, avengers. Or monsters.
That’s what God’s War is about. A world at war. The people who police it. The joy and terror and fear and awe of living on after the end of the apocalypse, when everybody says the world has ended… when the war has just begun."
I dug the idea of it being based on Assyrian law and generations-long wars and their impact on a society that’s so far removed (and yet at the same time, not so far) from our own. Hurley does a great job of establishing atmosphere and dropping you into wholesale (bumps, bruises and disorientation) into her planet. As I said before, it starts slow and part of that is getting your bearings but once you’re oriented it takes off. You get pulled in to the cultural conflict and character backstory and complicated political agendas – not to mention casual, not-so-casual violence.
Part of the reason I found it so engrossing is that it’s not so entirely foreign that you can’t imagine how a society gets there. The violence and consequence are nothing less than biblical and if, like me, you grew up trying to sort out the contradiction of the Old vs. New Testament this makes a compelling read. Other than the bug tech and casual interaction with aliens, there are parts of the world where this kind of violence and generational war/hatred goes on today. It’s a look at violence and the impact on how people function that you don’t always see in fiction and makes you re-evaluate the news you’re watching. Smart, engaging fiction. Hard to beat.
"Thing was, Nyx isn’t the sort who likes to be used. So when the inevitable bounty hunter story starts, we are not dealing with bounty hunters as we know them anymore. We’re not in a world we can immediately recognize. The day is nearly thirty hours long. The suns give everybody cancer. Nobody can remember a time without war. Bugs power the world’s technology and make up the primary food source. Magicians build weapons of war. The world is a contaminated ruin, and most folks die young.
But it’s a world of intensely passionate and powerful people, the kind of people we imagine could be great heroes, avengers. Or monsters.
That’s what God’s War is about. A world at war. The people who police it. The joy and terror and fear and awe of living on after the end of the apocalypse, when everybody says the world has ended… when the war has just begun."
I dug the idea of it being based on Assyrian law and generations-long wars and their impact on a society that’s so far removed (and yet at the same time, not so far) from our own. Hurley does a great job of establishing atmosphere and dropping you into wholesale (bumps, bruises and disorientation) into her planet. As I said before, it starts slow and part of that is getting your bearings but once you’re oriented it takes off. You get pulled in to the cultural conflict and character backstory and complicated political agendas – not to mention casual, not-so-casual violence.
Part of the reason I found it so engrossing is that it’s not so entirely foreign that you can’t imagine how a society gets there. The violence and consequence are nothing less than biblical and if, like me, you grew up trying to sort out the contradiction of the Old vs. New Testament this makes a compelling read. Other than the bug tech and casual interaction with aliens, there are parts of the world where this kind of violence and generational war/hatred goes on today. It’s a look at violence and the impact on how people function that you don’t always see in fiction and makes you re-evaluate the news you’re watching. Smart, engaging fiction. Hard to beat.
mateyy's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
tense
fast-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
4.25
jesster642's review
3.0
Different take on a desolate world, with middle Eastern themes and technology and magic based around bugs