Earwen
Hazel and daisys relationship remains the crux of this series I love how Hazel comes into her own in this, and seeing Daisy as the one being the odd one out. I wish we saw more of Hazel's sisters as one of them is the lead of the sequel series I believe.
i was really hoping this would be a new favorite middle grade series, I read about half and it was alright, but I'm not loving it. I ended up putting it down because life got in the way and never got the motivation to pick it back up.
dnf at about ~%50
Good start but as it went on the main character annoyed me more and more. The way her moral dilemma was written was very shallow and describing her “evil” side as something that's almost like a possession or a curse felt really cheap. Unnecessary too, because her “good” side is selfish and uncaring enough to conceivably becoming more and more cruel as time went on. But at some point it starts to feel like that's not how the author intended it to read. For example I had assumed her constant harping about how she has no girl friends because other girls are jealous of her good looks was supposed to come across as shallow and prejudiced. But reading on it's clear she's supposed to be justified in believing that. Another example: despite constantly assuring herself/the reader that she loves Wei she never acts like she finds him anything more than a tool, once they're separated she doesn't think about him again. This would be good if she really is supposed to feel that way, but looking back I think the author intended that she really did love him. So it's really confusing for me that what I thought was good writing turned out to be my misunderstanding. Really should have stopped once the book beats you over the head with how she has an eeeevil inside her (as if it wasn't obvious!) complete with subtle symbolism of half her face being covered in shadow in her water reflection.
(Also one point that REALLY annoyed me, there is a little person character whose wife in an arranged marriage killed herself because she didn't want to be with him. This is written as the wife being shallow for not wanting to be with him. But seriously? The woman was forcibly married to someone she didn't want to be married to to the point she killed herself and I'm supposed to feel sorry for the husband?)
That said the book isn't terrible, I probably would have ended up giving it 2 stars (“it was okay” is not bad). Though it's hard for me to discern what it really deserves considering my earlier enjoyment seems to be borne out of my own misunderstanding of the authors intent. I also liked that the setting was east asian, though it wasn't explored much (and I can't imagine it will be in the rest of the book as I presume it's set in court) it's part of a series so there is plenty of opportunity to change that.
So this is a f/f novella in a longass m/m series, which I haven't read. That said I thought it was pretty easy to get to gist of it, and I wasn't particularly confused as to what was happening. The novella could have used to be a little longer, I felt the plot was rushed (I would say the relationship also, but I don't know how it might have developed prior to the novella so I can't really judge). The characters and setting were interesting, though understandably not terribly well developed. I really liked Persephone and the ketoi people. I would consider reading the rest of the series were it not so long and still ongoing, or if the novella wasn't set so late in the series it might have encouraged me to read in hopes to see more of them as a pair.
there is a limited number of doctor who references I can handle and it turns out that number is 2
I really enjoyed this but I think it suffered a bit from being YA as it would be better if it could get a bit more gritty and grey with the stepmother character.
I have nothing much to say about it. It's decent, wanted more from that premise. I just closed the book and never thought about it again until I'm writing this review.
too many stories unrelated to the yellow mythos, and are in fact just slice of life, towards the end. Without them I'd give it a 4. I'm not sure why these wee all compiled together.
This is a lesbian supernatural gothic horror book, yes but this is a power fantasy more than anything else. Not something I'd usually go for mostly because I find them often to be too...cutesy? try hard? Whatever the right word for it is, it doesn't apply to insexts. It's gritty and it doesn't shy away from showing the worst what the world has to offer to women. Of course, as said it's a power fantasy so our heroines do prevail. The satisfaction I felt in the scenes where one (or both) of them turn into fucked up bug monsters to ruin some guy -who deeply deserves it- life are paralleled with little else I read. Looking forward to the next volume.
(To note there are really weird sex scenes and I could have done without them - But whatever both the writer and illustrator are women at least)
My enjoyment of the previous book of the author [b:Confessions 19161835 Confessions Kanae Minato https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1401076501l/19161835.SX50.jpg 4371200] was curbed by it's misinformative fearmongering about HIV, although it was competently written and an engrossing thriller. Anytime I thought about it afterwards it left a bad feeling in my mouth so I was hesitant to try this, though I can safely say it's a much better experience. I really enjoyed the format and the way individual stories were connecting and with each story you'd get another piece of the picture. Unlike in her previous book I think all characters were handled with sympathy. It'd be easy for the characters to blend into each other but they each not only dealt with the trauma in a completely different way but also had different voices. The ending was also surprisingly satisfying. 3.5 rolled up cw: very mild spoilers as it happens early on csa among other things. Not as graphic as in [b:Earthlings 50269327 Earthlings Sayaka Murata https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1580144195l/50269327.SY75.jpg 64972303] but still something I wish I knew going into.
3.5 Unsure about my feelings on the ending but it was beautifully written. The supernatural might have been woven into the story a bit better.
What an exciting book. I had very little knowledge CRISPR, or genetics as a whole going into this book. I felt a little lost at times -more so in the first part of the book detailing the history - but never enough to lose interest. I really appreciate that Doudna herself took the time to write this book and lead the conversation. Especially because I read this right after [b:Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup 37976541 Bad Blood Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup John Carreyrou https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1525180824s/37976541.jpg 59699437] I needed seeing someone who is so obviously conscious of the work she does and so interested in actually helping people.
its not bad or anything, but it wasn't as funny as I thought it'd be... I knew going into it that it had an all male cast of main characters, but I'm more interested in the sequel Bloody Rose which seems to have more female characters. Maybe I'll check that one out when it's out and come back to this later..
This is more of a family drama than a thriller in my opinion. Though as either genre it is rather average. I really liked the idea of following a family subject of a podcast and those part of the narrative - the inherent dehumanization of it - were the best parts. The story itself however was weak. The ending was also extremely...convenient. Average book.
This isn't a thriller, and barely a mystery. It is a family drama. You know the big secret of the family less than halfway in, and the culprit of the main mystery considering the number of characters is more than obvious from the start.
also cw for incest and pedophilia. besides the obvious the protags main love interest as a teen is also much older than her and this is never called attention to even when they reunite when older. Found that strange in a book with such themes. Almost as it's going "hey this dude might have been taken advantage of a teen but at least they're not blood related!"
reread this while reading [b:A Spectre, Haunting: On the Communist Manifesto 61279009 A Spectre, Haunting On the Communist Manifesto China Miéville https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1660079932l/61279009.SY75.jpg 58440526] and also read the turkish translation and original german. the original german was surprisingly... less dramatic than the english version. The wording is just more straightforward and the evocative passages kind of fall flat in the original. Although granted, this could be just me not being as good as german as I think I am. The turkish version is barely readable, it feels so needlessly complicated. If I wasn't familiar with the original I'd have put it down. Was interesting to see how much translation changes the experience. Feels weird to rate this but I don't like leaving stuff unrated so 5 stars as a commie
love the concept but the writing is giving me a headache so disjointed and strange. I think Joyce Carol Oates is not for me I didn't like the short story collection I read from her either.
i enjoyed what i read of this but i completely lost track of it at some point. i intend to return to it at some point but who knows.
4 is still my favorite by far but I enjoyed this one a lot. I like how Hazel and Daisy's relationship feels more stable, like they really learnt from the events of last book. The other side characters were fine, I still prefer the Deepdean girls as supporting cast. The mystery was alright. Nothing much to say, a solid entry in the series.
Considering the main plot of this book this spent way too much time on unimportant matters and rushed through the actual meat of it. This volume in itself could be multiple books and it makes no sense within the fiction that this is a memoir that so much time would be just glazed over. All the buildup to the main “twist” (for the lack of a better word) was done very well across all books but then it's just....handwaved away. Disappointing in that regard but enjoyable nonetheless.
Still, good series would recommend.
too many stories in the first half with the twist of “what if soviets were, like, regular people man”. The others were alright but nothing too remarkable. The titular story is the best one.
Near the end of the book I was annoyed. Everyone was always talking about the shocking twist in it when it was something so straightforward and predictable. I don't think a book needs to be shocking or unpredictable to be good but when it's hyped up this much it's hard not to be disappointed. The rest of the book that element aside while not a slog wasn't anything I was terribly enjoying either. I still think the bulk of it was kind of boring and that the various relationships could have been build up better.
However the very end of the book is in fact truly surprising (though not unpredictable or not foreshadowed- I definitely let my guard down after the first twist) and also made sense looking back. The other thing about it is that it partially resolved a major annoyance I was having with the book that far which is the crazy jilted woman trope with the all signs point to abusive man innocent all along and how the mc kept beating herself over the head with not trusting MEN enough because of her ex. The new ending though does have it's own uncomfortable implications but I'll leave unpacking that to someone else I enjoyed how disturbing it was for what it's worth.
One last thing I want to comment upon is certain controversial element in a thriller story which is that there is a supernatural element to the core fo the story. I cannot believe people actually complained about this considering how early on this comes in. Well not blatantly but it's obvious where it's headed. No idea why anyone would continue reading that is so bothered by this. criticizing this book for the supernatural elements is like criticizing lotr for having rings. The stories existence requires it.
Overall...readable thriller, varying degrees mediocre throughout (depending on your tolerance of straight drama nonsense) but strong last few pages. It really is the kind of book you read for the ending.
mai is super ooc and (spoiler characters) motivations make zero sense. Art is nice as always but none of the beautiful full pages the last one in the series had.