Scan barcode
kidalana's review against another edition
lighthearted
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.0
While I love books being in weird formats, I spent the whole time wondering why this story was presented like this. Any context I could imagine for all these files to exist under was often contradicted by the numbering or what was being recorded. Maybe it's worth it as an audio book?
The concept and lore are interesting but the story that holds them is poorly executed (I'm not dinging the author on referencing other big robot media, that's kind of how big robot media works). Things happen in a way that feels like the author just went 'hmm and what if...' before sitting down every day. Towards the first half/third (cannot remember exactly when) it was pretty good, but the arbitrarily raising stakes and seemingly random actions of b-villains in the later part was the unfun kind of hokey and ruined the rest of it for me.
Nothing to write home about in regards to characters, the main cast are very samey and bland. The narrator/view-point character is just kitschy (and not Rose btw ) and a touch annoying. Plus their morals and core motivations seem to change on a whim according to who knows what. I really thought they were gonna turn out to be an alien or related to the aliens but... they're not?? What?? Then why do they care so much????
It's a super quick read, which is a huge plus. If the library had the third volume on the shelf I'd probably read the others for completion's sake but it wasn't there so I'll spare myself (for now).
The concept and lore are interesting but the story that holds them is poorly executed (I'm not dinging the author on referencing other big robot media, that's kind of how big robot media works). Things happen in a way that feels like the author just went 'hmm and what if...' before sitting down every day. Towards the first half/third (cannot remember exactly when) it was pretty good, but the arbitrarily raising stakes and seemingly random actions of b-villains in the later part was the unfun kind of hokey and ruined the rest of it for me.
Nothing to write home about in regards to characters, the main cast are very samey and bland. The narrator/view-point character is just kitschy (
It's a super quick read, which is a huge plus. If the library had the third volume on the shelf I'd probably read the others for completion's sake but it wasn't there so I'll spare myself (for now).
Content Warnings
Moderate: Body horror and Medical trauma
Minor: Car accident and Deportation
thriftedghost's review against another edition
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
i honestly really wanted to like this, as it was marketed as some alien giant robot story and told in interview format like world war z. and while those still remain true, it felt as if the giant alien robot wasn’t even that central to the story. it read more like a political novel with sci-fi interspersed throughout, and definitely more of a prologue to the rest of the series than a good novel that stands up on its own. all of the characters, including our mysterious interviewer, just kind of fell flat for me and it read more boring than entertaining.
and don’t get me started on the romance subplot forced into here. man was that not fun to read. i will say that the premise did hold some merit, which is why it isn’t a one star read, but the author definitely fell short on execution.
will i read the next book(s)? probably because i hate an incomplete narrative. will i like them? probably not
and don’t get me started on the romance subplot forced into here. man was that not fun to read. i will say that the premise did hold some merit, which is why it isn’t a one star read, but the author definitely fell short on execution.
will i read the next book(s)? probably because i hate an incomplete narrative. will i like them? probably not
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Medical content, Medical trauma, War, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Grief and Deportation
Minor: Ableism, Sexual content, and Kidnapping
gardens_and_dragons's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
I found the concept of this very interesting; there is a discovery of giant robotics parts that predate civilization that could create it for thousands of years buried Underground. a team is assembled to find these pieces, put them together and make one of the biggest scientific discoveries of human kind.
The execution was mostly interesting. it was told via transcripts of recordings, journal, articles, news entries. But this means that they are always talking about the events as happening in the past even if it was just recent. It made some of the events later on a little hard to follow or believe.
It also suffered from not having strong characters, and the characters that were present were not very flushed out with their motivations for doing things.
I think in particular I did not love reading about one of the female main characters as written because the male author portrays her in a fairly unkind light (promiscuous because of relationship trauma) and does not have a good grip on redeeming qualities other than that she is determined and loyal.
There’s also a weird subplot towards the end that I’m not gonna get into but I’ll put in the spoilers:the two main pilots are kidnapped at the end and are taken samples from without their knowledge to potentially create clones from. it felt… odd and didn’t hit the right way.
The execution was mostly interesting. it was told via transcripts of recordings, journal, articles, news entries. But this means that they are always talking about the events as happening in the past even if it was just recent. It made some of the events later on a little hard to follow or believe.
It also suffered from not having strong characters, and the characters that were present were not very flushed out with their motivations for doing things.
I think in particular I did not love reading about one of the female main characters as written because the male author portrays her in a fairly unkind light (promiscuous because of relationship trauma) and does not have a good grip on redeeming qualities other than that she is determined and loyal.
There’s also a weird subplot towards the end that I’m not gonna get into but I’ll put in the spoilers:
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Medical trauma
Moderate: Sexism, Violence, and War
Minor: Sexual content and Sexual violence
nightstitch96's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Medical trauma
Moderate: Child death and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Violence and War
arlorees's review against another edition
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I would recommend listening to this book, I listened to the audiobook over a few long drives and it was fantastic. The characters are super engaging, the story is fascinating and I love sci-fi which focuses on the human reaction to alien things. There are a lot of serious topics touched upon in this but none are in too much depth.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Confinement, Death, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Torture, Medical trauma, Car accident, and Injury/Injury detail
maxierosalee's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Hovering around 3.75-4 stars.
This was a book where my star rating went up the more as I read the book. It started as a pretty "meh" 3 out of 5, but the score had risen by the time I reached the end.
It had an intriguing premise: a mysterious, giant hand is uncovered by a young girl in her backyard. As the years go on, the journey to find the other parts of whatever enormous robotic body it belonged to unfolds, along with the mission to find out what exactly it is and what it does. But it wasn't just the premise that caught my interest: the format did as well. Instead of traditional narrative prose, the book is told in epistolary format. It uses the form of documents and transcripts, but mostly interviews between characters to tell the story. For me, the epistolary format is a bit of a mixed bag. It can be a very intriguing way to tell a story and give it a certain kind of tone/atmosphere...but it's a common shortcoming that due to their nature, epistolary novels often suffer from a very bad case of "telling, not showing." I've read books in this format that were just exposition dump after exposition dump, and it gets to be a drag to read.
This one was a pretty engaging read. I was pretty invested in the plot. I wanted to read on as the characters worked to untangle the mystery of the giant robotic hand and see what would happen. Also, with the interview format, I found the characters decently captivating, and the author did a good job giving the main characters their voices and showcasing their personality through their words only, which I consider pretty hard to do since you can't use described action to show what these characters are like. Certain developments in the plot got me hooked enough to want to keep going and events happening to characters took me for a surprise.
I have some complaints with the book: it does sort of fall into the exposition dump from time to time, but it is by no means bad, in my viewpoint. It also suffers from a common epistolary problem in that sometimes, characters say things in supposed "interviews" that don't sound natural, since you're supposed to believe that the characters are saying this out loud in a conversation (I cannot imagine anyone saying with any kind of natural tone a sentence like "he had leathery-esque skin" out loud to someone else). A big plot complaint is, without any spoilers, how we get the "explanation" for the giant robot body parts. It seemed to come absolutely out of nowhere with no build-up, no foreshadowing, just dump a random exposition character in there.
On that last note...to be fair, this is the first in a trilogy of books, and it may be meant to be explored in the later books. The book ends on a cliffhanger, and a pretty intriguing one...
All in all, a pretty good book that's held back by some flaws, but an enjoyable read with a unique format!
This was a book where my star rating went up the more as I read the book. It started as a pretty "meh" 3 out of 5, but the score had risen by the time I reached the end.
It had an intriguing premise: a mysterious, giant hand is uncovered by a young girl in her backyard. As the years go on, the journey to find the other parts of whatever enormous robotic body it belonged to unfolds, along with the mission to find out what exactly it is and what it does. But it wasn't just the premise that caught my interest: the format did as well. Instead of traditional narrative prose, the book is told in epistolary format. It uses the form of documents and transcripts, but mostly interviews between characters to tell the story. For me, the epistolary format is a bit of a mixed bag. It can be a very intriguing way to tell a story and give it a certain kind of tone/atmosphere...but it's a common shortcoming that due to their nature, epistolary novels often suffer from a very bad case of "telling, not showing." I've read books in this format that were just exposition dump after exposition dump, and it gets to be a drag to read.
This one was a pretty engaging read. I was pretty invested in the plot. I wanted to read on as the characters worked to untangle the mystery of the giant robotic hand and see what would happen. Also, with the interview format, I found the characters decently captivating, and the author did a good job giving the main characters their voices and showcasing their personality through their words only, which I consider pretty hard to do since you can't use described action to show what these characters are like. Certain developments in the plot got me hooked enough to want to keep going and events happening to characters took me for a surprise.
I have some complaints with the book: it does sort of fall into the exposition dump from time to time, but it is by no means bad, in my viewpoint. It also suffers from a common epistolary problem in that sometimes, characters say things in supposed "interviews" that don't sound natural, since you're supposed to believe that the characters are saying this out loud in a conversation (I cannot imagine anyone saying with any kind of natural tone a sentence like "he had leathery-esque skin" out loud to someone else). A big plot complaint is, without any spoilers, how we get the "explanation" for the giant robot body parts. It seemed to come absolutely out of nowhere with no build-up, no foreshadowing, just dump a random exposition character in there.
On that last note...to be fair, this is the first in a trilogy of books, and it may be meant to be explored in the later books. The book ends on a cliffhanger, and a pretty intriguing one...
All in all, a pretty good book that's held back by some flaws, but an enjoyable read with a unique format!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Body horror, Medical trauma, and War
Minor: Deportation
The body horror might seem like a weird one, but there's honestly a part that counts as body horror to me and gave me the slightest feeling of squick. One of the charactersdogearedbooks's review against another edition
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? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Medical trauma
garbagebarge69's review against another edition
adventurous
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Content Warnings
Minor: Torture, Violence, Medical trauma, and War
yvo_about_books's review against another edition
4.25
Finished reading: September 7th 2023
“I was smart enough to know it was wrong, but not brave enough to stop them.”
It's true that I don't usually read a lot of sci-fi, and especially when there are aliens involved... But there was something about Sleeping Giants that made me curious ever since it was first published back in 2016. I guess my TBR jar thought it was time I finally gave this first book of a trilogy a chance, and I'm very glad this title popped up now. Why? I have to say that I was very much impressed by Sleeping Giants! There was just something about this story that was both addictive and able to make you feel humble at the same time. The fact that you don't exactly know what is going on only adds to the suspense, and it was absolutely fascinating learning more about what was being discovered. The writing style itself stands out as it is told through interviews, diaries and other files, but somehow the story was still very readable. It makes you wonder what would happen if such a discovery would be made in real life, and how the people involved would react... The different characters involved added humanity to the story and while I could have done without the love triangle, in general I enjoyed learning more about them. And after how things ended, I also can't wait to pick up the sequel to see what will happen next!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Confinement, Death, Infidelity, Toxic relationship, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Car accident, War, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Ableism, Child death, Genocide, Sexual content, Torture, Xenophobia, and Kidnapping
jasminechocklettslee's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Medical content, Medical trauma, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Death
Minor: War