odunayo_y's reviews
245 reviews

A Vicious Circle #3 by Mattson Tomlin

4.0

The art was phenomenal but the writing or rather the ultimatum message of “humanity is fvcked we’re all violent assholes hurtling towards our own annihilation” and other pessimistic nihilistic guff was just belch. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Gun violence, Violence, and Murder

Moderate: Body horror

The Splinter in the Sky by Kemi Ashing-Giwa
Did not finish book. Stopped at 52%.

Too amateurish and unpolished the concepts are sound but the execution lacking. I blam this on the the youth of the author ,  if she revisits this story in 10 years I’m sure it would be truly great. 

The Empress of Salt and Fortune by Nghi Vo

4.5

It Took Luke: Overworked & Underpaid by Mark Bouchard, Bayleigh Underwood

3.75

It’s aight

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body shaming, Cursing, Gore, Gun violence, and Blood

The Bone Ships by RJ Barker

4.75

Alien and weird just how I like my fantasy! Peak!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Alcoholism, Body horror, Death, Violence, Blood, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Child death

Damn Them All by Simon Spurrier

3.0

Interesting setting completely ruined by the black hole of boredom that’s the main character. Oh~ another alcoholic hard smoking promiscuous nihilistic asshole but this time it’s a a WOMAN so groundbreaking and transgressive…boring AF. Also all the swearing made the characters look like edgy 13 year olds that just discovered curse words.

Fullmetal Alchemist (3-In-1 Edition), Vol. 1 by Hiromu Arakawa

4.5

Leech by Hiron Ennes

dark mysterious

4.75

Would’ve been PEAK if not for the the imo weaker last 15%. Which was excellent for the horror aspect but narratively it was not as strong as The rest of the book. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Death, Gore, Violence, Blood, Medical content, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Child death, Infidelity, Miscarriage, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Toxic relationship

Murder Falcon by Daniel Warren Johnson

4.75

Damn it DJW making me cry with the ending AGAIN. 

Peak fiction right here heavy metal infused monster punches all wrapped in a message about the power of music and love

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gore, Terminal illness, Violence, Blood, and Murder

The Blighted Stars by Megan E. O'Keefe

3.75

The juvenile romance despite the characters being 35+ really soured this book. At least it was trans man/cis woman romance, I would’ve legit b*med an orphanage if I was forced to sit through a cishet romantic relationship. Bleh

Speaking on the trans representation it was done well very subtly. But I feel the subtlety was also a detriment to the point a lot of (mainly cis) reviewers/readers didn’t catch it and are erasing Tarquin’s trans identity, which sucks because his bisexuality gets about the same focus but most reviewers/reviewers have no problem catching he’s bi but completely gloss over him being trans??? Lmao if I speak. I get as a cis author O’Keefe didn’t want to get down in the weeds with trans issues as that’s not really her place. And she wasn’t a coward and actually included   the trans aspect of body-hopping tech that so much science fiction shies away from. But I feel there could’ve been a better balance between so subtle it’s missed by people who aren’t looking and full on trans centric storyline

The cool scifi and body horror was excellently done. 

Another issue is Tarquin was just so passive? Naive? He’s 35 yet acts like a 25 year old. It would’ve been more interesting if he was more duplicitous/sinister have him be a full on MERIT sociopath then slowly deprogram  

All in all not bad but certain character writing and relationships dragged this book down. It’s just not hitting the way her previous space opera trilogy hit. 
Hopefully the sequels will be better. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gun violence, Blood, and Murder

Moderate: Classism

Minor: Dysphoria