A review by night_owl
The Stud Book by Monica Drake
5.0
Drake is fucking amazing. I'm just sad that I don't have any more books of hers left to read now.
In this book she has an uncanny ability to shift from darkly brooding, to absurd slapstick comedy, to touching and tender moments. It does start a bit slow, at least in terms of things actually happening, but the payoff is absolutely worth it because she does a careful job of crafting an interlocking set of characters that you come to appreciate from a variety of different angles. Every character is unique and fully realized, and you come to understand them in one way or another, whether you can truly empathize with them or not.
When things start to come together in the final third of the book it feels like the story unfolds in the only way it could, and I sometimes pleasantly thought to myself, "of course that just happened." But that's not to say that the anything comes off as overly-contrived or dependent on ridiculous coincidences, when their stories overlap it feels like they *should*.
As someone who has never felt the slightest desire to procreate, I never really thought I'd feel so strongly about a book so obsessed with maternity, matrimony, and the biological side of reproduction. Despite being a bit too deeply entangled in the motherly emotions of middle-aged women whose entire lives revolve the concept of producing offspring, I still managed to feel a connection with these characters, even the male ones who seem to be so one-dimensional at first but manage to develop some life in the end.
If I have any complaint, is that the end comes rather abruptly and too soon, with some threads left hanging. I don't always demand closure and a story that ties up in a neat and tidy bow, I really felt like I needed more—but maybe that was the point after all.
In this book she has an uncanny ability to shift from darkly brooding, to absurd slapstick comedy, to touching and tender moments. It does start a bit slow, at least in terms of things actually happening, but the payoff is absolutely worth it because she does a careful job of crafting an interlocking set of characters that you come to appreciate from a variety of different angles. Every character is unique and fully realized, and you come to understand them in one way or another, whether you can truly empathize with them or not.
When things start to come together in the final third of the book it feels like the story unfolds in the only way it could, and I sometimes pleasantly thought to myself, "of course that just happened." But that's not to say that the anything comes off as overly-contrived or dependent on ridiculous coincidences, when their stories overlap it feels like they *should*.
As someone who has never felt the slightest desire to procreate, I never really thought I'd feel so strongly about a book so obsessed with maternity, matrimony, and the biological side of reproduction. Despite being a bit too deeply entangled in the motherly emotions of middle-aged women whose entire lives revolve the concept of producing offspring, I still managed to feel a connection with these characters, even the male ones who seem to be so one-dimensional at first but manage to develop some life in the end.
If I have any complaint, is that the end comes rather abruptly and too soon, with some threads left hanging. I don't always demand closure and a story that ties up in a neat and tidy bow, I really felt like I needed more—but maybe that was the point after all.