A review by sipping_tea_with_ghosts
Roadside Picnic by Arkady Strugatsky, Boris Strugatsky

dark mysterious slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? N/A
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

Enjoyed my read, even if it felt more like a collection of ideas than a complete story. Brief but bursting with interesting bits of worldbuilding and a great "what if" scenario that warrants uncomfortable questions about our existence and how unimportant we are on the potential journey of others.

The summary promises a much more epic adventure than what is actually presented in the book however - coming off as half a dozen vignettes exploring an aspect of the Zone, lacking a real sense of progression. The main character is also about as complicated and welcoming as a porcupine seat cushion. The second half of the book was much more entertaining to me since it focused on two men debating existence at a bar instead of following around the barbed personality protagonist and his mutated daughter with no personality besides kid_behavior.exe and wife with subserviant_doe.exe

So if you're going through the classics like I am, then I'd say its great on delivering those intriguing introspections but lacking in a compelling journey. For less than 200 pages though, you could do much, much worse.


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