zilver
sixth read (2023): i said. No Comment.
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fifth read (2022): literally the best book in the world idc
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fourth read (2021): i???ve been reluctant to mark this as read even though i finished it last week because i want to find a way to write a review for it and i keep coming up short. this will have to do: these characters stick with me through everything. the impossibility of their fight, their kindness in the face of cruelty, their resistance to become what they???re expected to be, the realisation of their own worth. it pulls at all the right strings and draws me in wholly, until i am (gladly, happily) enveloped in it once again. i think i???ll stay here a while.
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third read (2019): me: really past me? five million stars?
also me, adding some more stars in my heart: did i stutter
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second read (22/01/17 - 29/01/17): five million stars
“Fight because you don't know how to die quietly. Win because you don't know how to lose.”
jfc i love all of the foxes so much?? like i would protect them forever until my dying breath and then even in the afterlife i would Find A Way??
not sure i can write a coherent review for this book because my emotions are all over the place but i am just. so proud of all my kids. so proud of kevin. so proud of andrew. So Proud of neil (basically the embodiment of the “started from the bottom now we're here”-meme). always of all of my girls & of wymack.
i love the slow burn so so so so much. it's done so well, so in character, i totally knew it was coming and i was still Shook???.
also i will literally love this series forever but also?? so few other books can live up to the high standards i have now. anyway. i can't believe it's over again?? i legit wouldn't mind just rereading it again right now. my body is still radiating pride. i think i'm just going to cry for a couple of hours. i think that might be what i really fucking need right now.
“This was everything he wanted, everything he needed, and Neil was never letting go.”
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first read (17/03/16 - 18/03/16): five stars
sixth read (2023): i said no comment.
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fourth read (2021): “my child is fine” your child is giving the raven king 5 stars while still in tears
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third read (2019): 5 mcfreakin stars
you???d think third read would be the charm and allow me to finally write a real proper review for this book but honestly i just want to scream because it???s so good and i care about these characters so much bye
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second read (13/01/17-21/01/17): 5 stars
DONT MIND ME IM JUST CRYING IN THE CLUB RN
honestly i'm!!!! such a goner for this series. i know i keep saying it but i love my foxes and their family and EVERYTHING
this is how you do trilogies. i'm so wary of trilogies these days bc so often they let me down but THIS. this is how you do character development. this is how you allow people to grow. it takes time and nora sakavic gives her characters time and space to change. it's happens, subtly, and then suddenly it hits you. hard. this series just keeps getting better with every book.
i can hardly talk about how much this book hurts me & how much i love it. i'm just. not coherent enough. but all of them mean the world to me and That One Scene still murdered me even though i was expecting it. and the ending. goddamn.
also neil has some a+ roasts again in this book 10/10 would recommend
on to the rooftop cigarette times now.
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first read (15/03/16-17/03/16): 4 stars
6th time reading: don???t comment. i know.
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4th time reading: do i even have to say it? this series has NO business being my comfort read and yet here we are.
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3rd time reading: still four point five your honour
LIST OF THINGS THAT HAPPEN IN THIS BOOK THAT ARE WAY TOO (UNINTENTIONALLY) FUNNY
* neil literally runs out of the room in the middle of his first conversation with wymack
* only for him to get hit in the stomach with an exy racket by andrew for no real reason
* kevin suddenly appears out of darkness because he has to make a dramatic entrance as well
* nicky just randomly starts talking in german to aaron and andrew as they???re showing neil around for the first time
* when at the stadium for the first time aaron acts like he???s a magician when he just says ???lights??? and then someone else turns them on
* nicky calls riko a rat bastard
* when andrew tells neil he???s being a difficult bitch neil???s response is ???thank you???
* andrew calls neil a jock to his face
* a number of completely useless but very relatable paragraphs are dedicated to neil struggling to pick his uni courses and scheduling them all
* neil picks the monsters??? lock and bursts into the room like the dramatic he is
* at some point kevin grabs neil by the fencing on his helmet and drags him halfway across the field like that
* ???is your spine the spine of the righteous???
* after the first time in columbia nicky offers neil a glass of water and neil upends it on the floor
* neil falls asleep on his books the first time he tries to do homework
* andrew uses the word ???powwow???
* neil stabs himself with a pen to stay awake during class
* wymack makes kevin run up and down the bus to keep him awake
* neil ???can???t go around fighting people??? josten bitching at riko on national tv the first chance he gets
* neil and kevin sit in complete silence for HALF AN HOUR as they wait for the rest to get back with their drinks
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2nd time reading (06/01/17-11/01/17): 4.5!!!!
listen. i love this book a lot. neil “i'm fine” josten is my son and he deserves all good things in life.
it's actually really nice rereading this already knowing what's going to happen, because the first time around i felt like i was so full of adrenaline ALL THE TIME i probably missed a lot of detail (kevin is half irish???)
anyway i love my foxes and i would give my life for most of them. now time for the raven king aka time to Die???
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1st time reading (14/03/16-16/03/16): 4.5
pretty enjoyable! but the problem with characterising your main characters as writing prodigies is that it immediately requires a lot of suspension of disbelief when their writing then proceeds to sound like that of angsty 14 yr olds.
also why did they have to * *****!
btw i???m wholly prepared to chalk my issues with this up to actually this sort of book just not being for me anymore. but i am sad about it!
really wanted to enjoy this more than i did. i think maybe my main gripe with it, and the reason i had a hard time really getting into it, isn???t even the story itself but the way it was told.
the reasoning behind the story being made up out of fragments pulled from different characters??? experiences/stories is that this is all being penned up by a scientist who became themselves slightly obsessed with the story and attempting to piece the events of this one night together. i hate to pull a ???this isn???t realistic??? in a sci-fi retelling of a shakespeare play, but the way this account is made up is just. NOT REALISTIC. bad journalism. bad science. the way it???s being framed as if this is a serious article/book (in universe) that???s being published??? really frustrating because i???m willing to suspend my disbelief a lot!! esp for shakespeare!! but somehow this was too much for me.
i honestly think that had liu just chosen to lose the frame narrative entirely i would have gone along with it much more.
honestly might have to reread at a later point knowing what i???m getting into to see if i can decide to focus more on the actual story.
i generally really like metafiction as a technique and this is a great example of it. it feels like a fantastic book to teach young people about unreliable narration, ethics in journalism and critical reading. what is okay to write about? what is okay to read about? because of its fiction-framed-as-non-fiction identity, the book allows for a relatively easier engagement with heavy and complicated subject matter, which in turn gives easy entrance to questions related to those subjects. it doesn???t spell out too much or gives the reader any easy answers
my main (and possibly only) gripe with the book as a whole then also comes from the last couple of pages, because it felt like they (unnecessarily) took away some of the ambiguity that the novel plays with (and to be completely honest i felt that the interview it describes was some poor and unrealistic writing in an overall strong book).
very interested to read eliza clark???s debut now!
i usually struggle listening to audiobooks because i am ~easily distracted, but all the familiar voices in this one really helped (david tennant<3 michael sheen<3 arthur darvill<3). i also often find the narration quite distant and unnatural, but rebecca front did a wonderful job and was so fitting as the Narrator. (probably also helped that i knew the story from the show and so didn???t have to spend as much brain power keeping track of the various storylines). overall great fun and honestly just really made me want to 1) read more neil gaiman and terry pratchett and 2) rewatch the show
this is not a good review i???m just writing down some things to clear my head. there were def also good parts of this book, i???m unfortunately just not left with those thoughts upon finishing it.
for its length this novel lacked specificity for me - i think i really missed learning more about the relationship between the sisters before the tragedies started. learning more about iris and her life after everything. the back of the book seems to imply that this will be a story of neglected sisters trying to find their independence in a world that makes it hard for them, it felt like it remained very surface level on its conclusions (marriage bad + men bad = women die).
it doesn???t help that there???s very little progression in the events. while their circumstances differ slightly almost every sister dies a similar way, the people around her react a similar way, and nothing changes. statement? maybe. but also quite tedious to read for 350 pages. i didn???t expect to have an explanation for the mystery when i started the book and was quite content with that, but as it went on i started craving learning something> that would give me something to cling to. and it feels like there are all these hooks - the particularity of the death of each sister, the way they all match. tell me more!! what does it mean!! there???s a supposed plot line of a character being haunted by the ghosts of people that were killed with guns from the family???s gun empire - so creepy, so interesting! why do we never hear of it again!!! also not sure i agree with the blurbs of this being a ???witty, delicious, demented joyride??? genuinely don???t see how it???s supposed to be witty- it doesn???t try to be as far as i understood (but maybe i have a bad sense of humour). and demented HOW. i was expecting some jane eyre shit but found it lacking in ladies in the attic. idk what i???m saying i don???t think i???m explaining myself very well. just felt a little disappointed by this because i def saw the potential. anyway! moving on.
3.5 feels like i should've taken a physics course before i started this. really a case where i had to try and stay concentrated on every single sentence (hard) or try to dodge and weave myself through technical explanations to see if i could understand without understanding (also hard). with my dad sitting next to me to explain in terms that even zilvers can understand it becomes a lot easier. feels like actually a great book club book, if your book club enjoys hard-hitting historical books about the technical revolution. there's a lot here and dyson is very good at finding clever metaphors that help the reader grasp the enormity, almost other worldliness of some of the concepts and ideas he's getting across here. but without some pretty solid prior knowledge it's still a tough nut to crack. personally i would've liked a bit more hand holding throughout. the parts i could get through on vibes alone were my favourite, specifically the middle section which ties in dyson's own parents, his own growing up at princeton (!!), and the years that followed where he lived in a TREEHOUSE (what kind of boyish dream) and built kayaks. these chapters feel really grounded in their more personal nature, and because dyson's own history is so closely tied to the subject he's writing about throughout this book, it doesn't feel disconnected but more like a nice reprieve. i also love a book with pictures, especially if those pictures include both interior and exterior shots of tree houses.
Jonathan Abernathy is unhappy. He is lonely and broke and lacking in any particular skill and tired of life (even though he sleeps 10 hours a night). He is presented with a very specific job opportunity. This does not happen the way job opportunities normally present themselves. No, Jonathan Abernathy is visited in a dream, not by God but by serious looking people in suits. And he is offered a way out of his misery.
While not in any direct way a horror novel, the almost post-apocalyptic capitalism that forms the basic framework for Earth anno Jonathan Abernathy You Are Kind is quite the horror. Abernathy's new job is to audit people's dreams, and suggest ways to improve them - to make them happier in order to improve their work performance. Actively unhappy people don't make as much money as people who are okay.
The entire book feels a little like a dream. Time passes slowly, sometimes, and then months will pass. The story itself takes quite a while to pick up pace, to start to grasp the way everything ties together in the end. Even though I really like how intentively stylised the writing was - and it fits the themes and settings of the book really well - it also kept me at a slight distance at all times. Jonathan Abernathy's head is not a kind place to be - it's heavy and sad and filled with as much longing as inertia. Jonathan Abernathy is kind. Or at least he tries to be.
I received a free ARC from Netgalley & the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
So this is what people mean when the talk about a tour de force. I???m writing this review fresh off of finishing the book so it???s likely not as encompassing as it could be, but here we go.
Robin Swift is taken from his home in Canton by the British professor Lovell, and gets dropped in a life that will prepare him to become a translator at Babel, the Oxfordian translation institute, where masters of language use their words to inscribe silver bars with magic. Magic used to help run the country smoothly, to guide its machinery and strengthen its roads and safeguard its people. So they are told. So they believe. Until Robin becomes involved with an underground group of ex-students, among which Lovell???s former ward, who are trying to expose and unmake Babel???s full influence on the country and the world.
“Translation, from time immemorial, has been the
facilitator of peace. Translation makes possible
communication, which in turn makes possible the
kind of diplomacy, trade, and cooperation between foreign peoples that brings wealth and prosperity to all.”
It took me a while to get into this one. It???s a big book. It unfolds slowly. But over the course of its 500+ pages it becomes clear how masterfully Kuang broadens the scope - or shows you how big it???s always been - shifting from intimate to earth-shattering (and back).
The shape this took is wonderfully executed too. It is a history of a period that did not actually happen, but completely woven into the world that did so the two blend easily and without question. The use of (translator???s) footnotes works well and never takes you out of the story, instead becomes an integrated part of the narrative. I love etymology and translation and the puzzles it presents, so naturally the heavy focus on both the depth and the width of languages were a delight.
“Betrayal. Translation means doing violence upon the original, means warping and distorting it for foreign, unintended eyes. So then where does that leave us? How can we conclude, except by acknowledging that an act of translation is then necessarily always an act of betrayal?”
And this book is difficult to read. It is dark academia turned inside out, exposing its innards to you. It deals with (among others) colonialism, abuse, grief, revolution, violence, and the cost of knowledge, and does so in detail and with the weight these things demand. It makes this a book to dig your teeth into. It deserves your full attention.
A high recommendation. An immediate favourite of 2022.
I was lucky enough to receive an ARC of this book after wishing for it on Netgalley. All opinions are my own.