Lesley Barklay > Recent Status Updates

I read this when I was in year 12 as part of a unit called: Utopias and Anti-Utopias (dystopia was not a commonly used term in 1999). I wasn't expecting to enjoy it (but I have to read it, because I'm teaching it, but I have to say, it is kinda hilarious!

I don't know. I found the premise of this book interesting at the beginning, but I don't feel connected to the characters or their relationships with each other at all. I've been reading this on and off for two weeks now, and I'm not sure if I'm going to finish it (although maybe I should, since I'm so far through it).
One thing I can say, it's a pretty quick read while you're in it. Just don't want to pick it up.

Not going to lie, the stylistic choice to not use speech marks is making it difficult to read. The author starts a new paragraph for a new speaker, but you read the sentence, get to the speech tag, and think, "Oh, was she talking?" and when there's a sentence after the speech tag, it's not alway clear if that is a continuation of the speech, or narrative.

I wonder what the purpose was behind the choice?

I'm 8% in and I sill don't know the names or ages of 2 out of 3 of the MCs. The sisters have left their mum working at a hotel (the mother is filling in for her sick sister—the girls' aunt—so she doesn't lose her job), and are travelling with a male called Leif. So far it is unclear to me what their relationship is to Leif, but there was a line suggesting he shared a bed with their mother, so maybe a step father?

This is a sentence I just read: My sister and I, last summer, had seen something that happened to the place where people who travel up and down the country all year round and live in their vehicles usually parked and stayed for a while.

Reading this is hurting my brain. The sentences are so wordy and non-specific. I will persevere.

There is a problem when you give your character god-like powers.
It makes the book boring to read.

This book had the potential to be really powerful and interesting. At the end of book 2, Rhen had defeated the invading army. The city had been under attack, and was partially destroyed. Many people were dead and injured on both sides. In the opening chapters, Jinji moves through the city, hand waving the damage away.

Atlas is speculating that Hyacinth told her mum something that her mum already knew—because he told her himself, more than once not that many chapters ago.

If Atlas knew he was going to leave the Naturalists, why wouldn't he just pack his stuff and go? Ayesha has already threatened to hold him against his will; every time he goes back, he risks being trapped.

Him not recognising this makes him seem stupid, and if he's the love interest, I don't want him to be dumb.

Now we're retconning the moment Samara fell in love with Renata. Apparently it was when they were dissecting the cow. Only problem is, we were in Samara head at the time, and she wasn't falling in love, she was struggling not to vomit.

End of chapter 28: "Hector. He's dead."
Start of chapter 29: Phoebe was bored.

How's that for emotional whiplash?

Okay, now we have proof that Ayesha is inseminating her baby brides. I'm confused why Phoebe doesn't figure this out.

Why hasn't Ayesha blocked Atlas's door yet? I can see her maybe letting him get away with it (maybe!) early on, but when he's telling Hyacinth he's in love with someone else, why not make him stay where you can control him? Why risk him running off with Phoebe?

A power hungry fanatic like Ayesha is not the type to leave things to chance.

Not going to lie. I thought we would spend more time with the Hyperionites. Phoebe's been to see them once to hang out, and once for an emergency situation. They seem a little like an after thought at this point.

Also, also, why aren't there more babies? They are trying to repopulate the human race. Last book they were stressing about people's fertility window closing, why isn't the colony knee deep in kids from zero to fourteen? Why did Renata wait 19 years to have a second pregnancy? Also, is her pregnancy going to result in a baby, or did the authors forget about that too?

Oh. So it's not just "what in the child bride" it's also what in the "sister wife."

So, it's called being spiritually married when it's just about the sex? And what's going to happen when all these genetically blessed half-siblings grow up and want to marry too? What about genetic diversity?

Also, how many people in the two settlements? There were 80 couples to start with.

I'm wondering when they're going to realise it's the mosquitos.

Leila was apparently trained by Hector since she was 19. She started training with him at the end of book 1, after she had been on the planet for at least a year and a half. According to this timeline, she would have to have been 17-18 when she arrived on DaVince, married, and already a couple of months pregnant (having already had another miscarriage on Earth). What in the child bride am I reading?

Apparently all Naturalists fall pregnant on their wedding night (which I have my suspicions about)—what weddings? Everyone came to DaVinci in couples. We learned from Leila that she and Justin had to be married to get a place on the ship, and Samara said she and Lucas were the only singles. I can maybe see a marriage between Justin and Briar, but who else was single? All the kids should be around 14 and under.

This story expects me to believe that Atlas is in love with Phoebe after one meeting.

According to the blurb, Phoebe's just drifting from job to job with no purpose in her life. But she's literally a teenager, who still attends school every day.

Apparently the Schism happened before Phoebe was born.
Except it didn't.

She was a toddler when Ayesha staged her coup. Don't the authors remember the whole kidnapping/ rescued by Hyperionites plot?

How old is Atlas? He had to have been born, at the earliest, two and a half years after Phoebe, and that's only if Briar and Justin fell pregnant immediately, when they didn't have any immunosuppressants to stop her from losing the baby. If Phoebe's 17, that means he's 14.5, and that's really grossing me out. I wouldn't mind the age difference if they were both in their twenties.

I'm wondering if the authors read their previous reviews, because Phoebe is talking about having two mums—Renate and Samara—and Marcus as an adoptive dad. Also, Samara says Renata is carrying her baby. They were besties in book 1, now they're in a three-way relationship?

Ayesha says "Your people rely on what we give you too..." I'm wondering if this is ever going to be brought up again.

Also, Phoebe is the only one with off-target effects? Samara did the same gene splicing on all the pregnancies, so all the kids should be experiencing the head aches. They keep talking about "finding a cure for the Bloom" but they didn't cure it, they just adapted their genes not to fight it.

I'm so confused. This book reads like the authors have little to no memory of what they wrote in bk 1.

How are the Naturalist effectively living in a bubble? If they had the resources to make such a thing, why didn't they do that in book 1 when everyone got sick?

Also, where are the immunosuppressants coming from? Apparently the Naturalists take them daily, but they were all used in bk 1, and unable to make more.

And... they're in!

In an unrelated note, Jesper has to have ADHD, right?

Still loving pretty much everything about this book, except the ages of the characters (which I find totally unbelievable—with the possible exception of Wylan. He can stay 15 in my mind,).

After hearing so many good things about Six of Crows (and purchasing the paperbacks about two years ago), I have finally picked it up.

So far, I'm really enjoying the characters and the world. The only thing that has me shaking my head a little bit is the age of the characters. 17? Really? I love everyone I've met so far. They are so real they leap off the page, but I have to constantly pretend they're at least 24.

Okay, so Emma gave Hugo the locket, so that confirms my theory that Marchand is Hugo, and that Maggie is Emma's mother.

It's an interesting narrative choice to tell the story this way. I'm not sure how I feel about it, although if we'd done it chronologically we wouldn't have all of Emma's questions drawing us along through the narrative. Maggie's story is much slower paced, so this was probably the right way to go.

Another prediction. I think Hugo might be Captain Marchand. At first I thought he might be Emma's father, then it was said that her father was a dangerous man, so now I'm wondering if Mags was maybe forced to marry someone else, and that man is Emma's dad.

But I'm not sure from the blurb, since it makes it seem like the two girls meet up. I guess, perhaps, that might refer to Emma meeting her adult mother?