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The Object: A Hard Sci-Fi Novel
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Thank you NetGalley, publisher Podium Entertainment, and author Joshua T. Calvert for providing an eARC for review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
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DNF at 4%. I should be the perfect target audience for this. I'm a woman, who loves female-led hard sci fi books, and loved the titles The Object is being compared to. Sometimes I wonder if I should review ARCs I DNF'd, and largely it depends on the reason. If the book simply wasn't for me, I often just don't leave feedback, or will just say that it wasn't for me but other readers will enjoy it. However, in the case of The Object by Joshua T. Calvert, I have feedback that other readers should be aware of before they decide to read this book.
Calvert has zero business writing a female protagonist. That's it, that's my feedback.
My first clue came the very first time FMC Melody comes into contact with another character, and he begins mansplaining her job to her. Immediately we're told that Melody is a capable programmer, scientist, software engineer, Navy veteran, pilot, etc etc etc. She's the amazingest, and this pesky man is critiquing her because he wants to go on a date with her. OK... cringe. A woman can be intelligent and capable without having to list her resume out in the first few pages, but whatever. But still, red flag.
The next red flag came when the next character she interacted with was some kind of boss/authority figure and she sleeps with him on the regular. I'm a believer that grown women can do whatever they want with their bodies with whoever, but I guess the only people Melody knows are coworkers, and they both want her bad.
The third red flag though was when Melody checks herself out in a mirror (ew, cliche!), notes her "too red" lips and "dark almond eyes" and laments that she, and I fucking quote, "had to fight for recognition for her flying accomplishments because she'd been too pretty." I am going to vomit. The paragraph continues on to say that she was effectively sabotaged in performance evals by male pilots while in the Navy because they wanted to date her and she turned them down. I don't know how many pages into this book this is, because the digital ARC doesn't have page numbers, but suffice to say, given that this was at the 3% mark and there are 344 pages, this is somewhere around page 10-12. Literally everyone wants to fuck Melody, I am disgusted.
At this point I wanted to call it quits but for tickles and grins decided to see what horrors would greet me next. I was rewarded with a brief interaction between a "beautician" and Melody, as she works on getting camera-ready to deliver her discovery in a press conference. First of all, anyone in 2023 (the year the book takes place) under the age of about 60 won't use that word; the profession is known as makeup artists. Secondly, the makeup artist says "It looks good. No more shiny spots." "It" here refers to... the makeup application? Melody's face? I'm not sure, but a MUA wouldn't talk like that. She'd say "You're ready," or "You look good," not "it". Ew. Melody, and the skin on her face, is not an object. The object is what we're about to have a press conference about. Ha, I've got jokes...
Melody and the MUA, Carina, have a brief exchange about whether Melody is ever afraid- and she responds that of course she gets afraid sometimes. Melody then asks Carina if she'll "save her" if "this", referring to the makeup, gets messed up from sweat. In this exchange, Melody points to her "powdered forehead" which again tells me that the person writing this book has never spoken to a woman before, or bothered to learn what the word *foundation* is. I'm also convinced this exchange exists purely to check a box (or three) so that two named women (who introduce themselves in the clunkiest, most inorganic way) have a discussion about something other than men, and Calvert can claim his book passes the Bechdel Test.
Look: if you can't even be assed to learn basic shit about your female protag and what it's like to be a woman, I don't trust you to write hard sci fi, either. The joke about Pluto being salty for it's demotion to dwarf planet status got a chuckle out of this millennial, but the remaining 96% of this book can go right out the airlock.
.
.
.
DNF at 4%. I should be the perfect target audience for this. I'm a woman, who loves female-led hard sci fi books, and loved the titles The Object is being compared to. Sometimes I wonder if I should review ARCs I DNF'd, and largely it depends on the reason. If the book simply wasn't for me, I often just don't leave feedback, or will just say that it wasn't for me but other readers will enjoy it. However, in the case of The Object by Joshua T. Calvert, I have feedback that other readers should be aware of before they decide to read this book.
Calvert has zero business writing a female protagonist. That's it, that's my feedback.
My first clue came the very first time FMC Melody comes into contact with another character, and he begins mansplaining her job to her. Immediately we're told that Melody is a capable programmer, scientist, software engineer, Navy veteran, pilot, etc etc etc. She's the amazingest, and this pesky man is critiquing her because he wants to go on a date with her. OK... cringe. A woman can be intelligent and capable without having to list her resume out in the first few pages, but whatever. But still, red flag.
The next red flag came when the next character she interacted with was some kind of boss/authority figure and she sleeps with him on the regular. I'm a believer that grown women can do whatever they want with their bodies with whoever, but I guess the only people Melody knows are coworkers, and they both want her bad.
The third red flag though was when Melody checks herself out in a mirror (ew, cliche!), notes her "too red" lips and "dark almond eyes" and laments that she, and I fucking quote, "had to fight for recognition for her flying accomplishments because she'd been too pretty." I am going to vomit. The paragraph continues on to say that she was effectively sabotaged in performance evals by male pilots while in the Navy because they wanted to date her and she turned them down. I don't know how many pages into this book this is, because the digital ARC doesn't have page numbers, but suffice to say, given that this was at the 3% mark and there are 344 pages, this is somewhere around page 10-12. Literally everyone wants to fuck Melody, I am disgusted.
At this point I wanted to call it quits but for tickles and grins decided to see what horrors would greet me next. I was rewarded with a brief interaction between a "beautician" and Melody, as she works on getting camera-ready to deliver her discovery in a press conference. First of all, anyone in 2023 (the year the book takes place) under the age of about 60 won't use that word; the profession is known as makeup artists. Secondly, the makeup artist says "It looks good. No more shiny spots." "It" here refers to... the makeup application? Melody's face? I'm not sure, but a MUA wouldn't talk like that. She'd say "You're ready," or "You look good," not "it". Ew. Melody, and the skin on her face, is not an object. The object is what we're about to have a press conference about. Ha, I've got jokes...
Melody and the MUA, Carina, have a brief exchange about whether Melody is ever afraid- and she responds that of course she gets afraid sometimes. Melody then asks Carina if she'll "save her" if "this", referring to the makeup, gets messed up from sweat. In this exchange, Melody points to her "powdered forehead" which again tells me that the person writing this book has never spoken to a woman before, or bothered to learn what the word *foundation* is. I'm also convinced this exchange exists purely to check a box (or three) so that two named women (who introduce themselves in the clunkiest, most inorganic way) have a discussion about something other than men, and Calvert can claim his book passes the Bechdel Test.
Look: if you can't even be assed to learn basic shit about your female protag and what it's like to be a woman, I don't trust you to write hard sci fi, either. The joke about Pluto being salty for it's demotion to dwarf planet status got a chuckle out of this millennial, but the remaining 96% of this book can go right out the airlock.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
There's a certain group of people who are going to LOVE this book and I'm in that group. If you're already an expert on space/astrophysics/etc, this may not be for you - not because this book doesn't HAVE all that, but because boy does it go into detail explaining everything. And if you already know it, that might rub you the wrong way. The characters do a lot of explaining to each other which seems weird as they're all experts in their fields, but part of it is explained away as "the mission is being livestreamed to Earth and the common watcher needs to know what's going on." And honestly, that aspect of the story lends its own problems to the overall plot.
I love reading books about space travel/first contact/stuff going wrong in space, and this book delivers. Equal parts exciting and tense (with a dash of horrifying), The Object scratched all my space travel sci fi itches.
I love reading books about space travel/first contact/stuff going wrong in space, and this book delivers. Equal parts exciting and tense (with a dash of horrifying), The Object scratched all my space travel sci fi itches.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
I want to thank NetGalley for the ARC of this book. It’s a truly fantastic premise reminiscent of Project Hail Mary. The characters are likable, but not always given the most depth to truly be moved by them. It has moments of hard sci-fi which get lost toward the end. The pacing is good as it covers many years, however the separation between time periods is occasionally jarring as you didn’t realize how much time had passed between sections. Overall, I enjoyed the book and can’t wait to try more by this author.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews