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A review by yevolem
The Book of Etta by Meg Elison
3.0
The frame story no longer applies as this takes place in their present day. I enjoyed this one far less because of the protagonist. Most of that is because they're a confused, angsty, traumatized, and misunderstood teenager ineffectually raging against the confines of their society. Maybe I should be more understanding and empathetic about their struggles, but more often than not it was painful to read.
A lot of what I liked in the first book was absent here. The protagonist is still wandering around, but it felt much less organic, as each new community is blatantly for almost the singular purpose of presenting a different sexual arrangement of society. Sexuality is definitely the the overriding concern overall. That wouldn't be a problem for me except that it seemed to be the detriment of everything else, as happens at times with hard SF. The story did pose some interesting questions and relationships that I haven't often read. Contemporary sexualities don't map as neatly because of cultural distortions caused by the absence of women. Basically all of LGBTIAQ+ is represented in some way, though they are decidedly not in harmony with each other.
This one is arguably considerably darker than the first book, if only because in that book protagonist was careful and came out relatively unscathed. The protagonist of this book hero worships how they saw her actions, but doesn't do so well in following her teaching. Also unlike the first book, this one has a definite antagonist and hews closer to the typical dystopia story. I think it suffers for that and I can only speculate as to why it was done.
As always when I like a following book less it makes me question the first book, but I don't feel any need to change anything other than what I've already done. It seems like this is going to be a standalone+duology rather than a trilogy and for me it may have been better for it to have remained standalone. Part of the problem is comparing it to the first, which is somewhat unfair because they're rather different from each other.
A lot of what I liked in the first book was absent here. The protagonist is still wandering around, but it felt much less organic, as each new community is blatantly for almost the singular purpose of presenting a different sexual arrangement of society. Sexuality is definitely the the overriding concern overall. That wouldn't be a problem for me except that it seemed to be the detriment of everything else, as happens at times with hard SF. The story did pose some interesting questions and relationships that I haven't often read. Contemporary sexualities don't map as neatly because of cultural distortions caused by the absence of women. Basically all of LGBTIAQ+ is represented in some way, though they are decidedly not in harmony with each other.
This one is arguably considerably darker than the first book, if only because in that book protagonist was careful and came out relatively unscathed. The protagonist of this book hero worships how they saw her actions, but doesn't do so well in following her teaching. Also unlike the first book, this one has a definite antagonist and hews closer to the typical dystopia story. I think it suffers for that and I can only speculate as to why it was done.
As always when I like a following book less it makes me question the first book, but I don't feel any need to change anything other than what I've already done. It seems like this is going to be a standalone+duology rather than a trilogy and for me it may have been better for it to have remained standalone. Part of the problem is comparing it to the first, which is somewhat unfair because they're rather different from each other.