Dylan > Recent Status Updates

Broooooooooooooooooo. Kill off 1/2 main characters and then make me do a lil crying with all the emotional backlash and she milked that death HARD and then suddenly his parent marital problems are fixed…

I just watched every tenet of the Geneva conventions get violated in less than 100 pages, and then one of the main characters just bit it. Also hating that were clearly building Kaigen off of Imperial Japan… but somehow the Chinese analogue (Ranganese) are being made out as the bad guys?? I mean neither side was justified but the Japanese did a lot of fucked things. Like a lot. Just saying

AHHHHHHH. ML Wang! Girl! I’m gonna froth at the mouth again; you have to stop giving me such thematically rich worlds with such juicy conflicting themes! Commentary on imperial Japan and racial purism? Oh boy. The classic patriarchal society and women struggling against it. Some good ole fashioned dystopia values in a beautifully hybridized feudal and modern world? Yes yes yes yes yes I will write another essay

Despite the book being need after her, this Bedlam Bride ain’t doing much… oh no. Oh no, oh no, oh no I need to go knock on wood ASAP

I keep putting off th new Sisterhood series I’m supposed to be starting, so hopefully a nice, relaxing Dune reread will put me back into the Dune mindset? Who knows!

Remember when I went bananas for Blood of Bright Haven? So, yeah, I’m back at with with ML Wang… I can already tell this is another one I’m going to gush over. Barely two chapters in and we’re tackling culturally institutionalized misogyny and racism, folding into a not so subtle analysis and critique of imperial Japan, while also giving me in depth characters??? Um, yes please.

The lowkey racism has jumped to very overt racism. Yup. The fish are racist. Corporate fish nazis. Who would’ve thunk it.

Oh… I can already tell this book is likely to cap out at three stars, if that. Worrying, to say the least. Wish me luck in pushing through and not have this become a DNF

The background slaughter got so bad that the main characters are starting to drop. Theon’s left appear to be fueled solely by trauma and rage at this point…

Crown this man! My notes will be thicc so I’m dumping thoughts early. Miéville’s New Weird fusion of fantasy, sci-fi, and horror in industrial New Crobuzon is wild: magic as energy-science, brain-eating moths, extradimensional spiders, Hellkin terrified of both, jellyfish riot cops, and coincidences that somehow feel organic. (Note: this was a much larger rant brutally cut for space; await my review!)

Yes yes yes yes YES

When you receive a very strange slug, which you can’t identify, with apparent empathic powers that subsists only on a very powerfully psychoactive drug? Do. NOT. Feed. It! Like, bro, what a dumb idea he’s gonna get eaten, I swear.

And the lore drops are so INTERESTING but very, intentionally crumb-like? Like, tell me more about this genocide of the khepri no one remembers about????

Yes, yes I get that the relationships are importsnt and profound to the story — and I see the web being woven. But also? A little soapy with the romance arc? Like, yes it adds some stake and profundity and a little more oomf to what I can already assume will be a vicious murder or other catalyst. Or maybe not; who knows lol!

I… reallyyyyy like this prose! It is dense, but incredibly rich. Mieville paints the epic, vile sprawl of New Crobuzon in all five senses, and with a vocabulary that puts most modern authors to shame. Though, admittedly, palimpsest has appeared more frequently that strictly necessary…

In Dylan speak: big words good! This guy has seen some stuff, no doubt. Also story is good so haha that too

I was right. Weird vibes off the bat! Behold the khepri! Humans with a beetle for a head. Classic, definitely not the expectation I had going into thispolluted hellscape of a world. Also? The three rivers are named Tar, Gross Tar, and Canker. Healthy ecosystems all, I’m sure. Definitely going to keep reading.

“I rather doubt you can just go about knocking on doors and stumble upon some squirrely fucker with a big trunk of costumes and wigs.”

Ahhh, RJB, your dialogue strikes again.

Ok getting tired of the word ‘analogue’?? Just name and describe the alien creatures instead of “yeah it’s an alien pig thing we’re going to call a pigeons, that’s all the information you get about it too!”

The US became a Christian theocracy and then they, the Chinese, and the Brazilians nuked the world (the Brazilians actually started bombarding cities with asteroids from orbits but…) so yeah, classic humans. Who’s betting on this prediction for 2030?

He died. Rip

So it’s all very well written, but I’ll admit I was hoping for more monster stories. Most of these revolve around abuse, which is dark too, I suppose. Lotttttttt of child/domestic abuse in here

This is peak cozy. Also a lot of cute lil ideas on identity and purpose

Noooooooooooooooo not again