Gillian’s Reviews > The Monster Baru Cormorant > Status Update

You know what it is? She (Christine Marshall) sounds exactly like the woman on (TikTok?) who makes those baby name parody videos—fish names, bird names, anatomy names etc. Just some very goofy inflections and overemphasis on odd words.

Miranda Mars is her name. It works great for her comedy videos! Baru is not that sort of comedy.

I wanted to listen to the audiobook instead because I want to close my eyes, but my goodness the narrator makes some strange choices! She sounds like the wife on The Truman Show. I do not think of Baru as someone with a chipper cloying voice 😂

Oh well. I can keep my eyes open I guess

Is this, at its core (not THE core, but A core, one of its many cores), the same story as The Night Circus?

I like it so far, but there is a bit of a tonal change from the first book, and I can't tell if that is character work, showing how Baru had been changed, or just an evolution in the author's style. The first book had 6 "fucks" total, this one is already at 38. And there are 157 total. I like the new style, it's more... relaxed? conversational? even a bit silly at times? but I'm not sure what I should take from it.