furyofvissarion (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
furyofvissarion) wrote2011-04-17 12:11 pm
furyofvissarion) wrote2011-04-17 12:11 pm
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Frostbitten - Kelley Armstrong. Disappointing, & I generally like Armstrong's Women of the Otherworld series, & have in particular liked stories featuring Elena, the female werewolf, before. The book kind of bored me, to be honest--the oh-shit-o-meter wasn't even turned on.
And I'm uncomfortable w/how rape, & the specter of rape, is used in the book. On the one hand, in books like Patricia Briggs' Mercy Thompson series, when Mercy seems to recover really unnaturally quickly from being raped, it feels false. But on the other... I dunno. The focus on Elena's trigger around sexual abuse, & how she still fears it & will be threatened w/it as a woman probably through her whole life, is certainly realistic. At the same time... I don't know. It would be unrealistic to have books set in our world where sexual violence was just something women didn't have to worry about. But still, I hate that the book wound up being so much about whether Elena is strong enough to be the next Alpha, especially w/the possibility of sexual violence.
Our Tragic Universe - Scarlett Thomas. It took me quite a long time to get stuck into this book, which is a shame as I've loved the other books I've read by Thomas. But the protagonist is a perpetually broke writer w/a slacker boyfriend who's a jerk & you can see he's a jerk but there's so much of her putting up w/him. And I didn't think I could stand reading a whole book where she just puts up w/him, & it took a long time before the story convinced me that might change.
Possibly also the worrying about money thing & grey English landscape & being financially trapped in a place that's killing you was hitting too close to home to make me especially want to read fiction about it.
Also, too much waffle about the nature of the universe. This sort of pondering has worked well in the past for Thomas, in Popco & particularly The End of Mr. Y; I don't know whether there's something specific here that I don't like about it, or maybe it just doesn't feel fresh any more.
And the voices of her characters didn't feel very distinct, and I couldn't keep track of the various people in Meg's past that she brings up in her internal dialogue. The book felt hopeless, too; I mean, I think the other novels I've read by Thomas also feature protagonists who are jaded & unhappy to some degree, but both of those books also infuse the narrative w/the probable likelihood of change way before this one did. It did pick up after the halfway point, but still, not something I imagine I'll reread.
And I'm uncomfortable w/how rape, & the specter of rape, is used in the book. On the one hand, in books like Patricia Briggs' Mercy Thompson series, when Mercy seems to recover really unnaturally quickly from being raped, it feels false. But on the other... I dunno. The focus on Elena's trigger around sexual abuse, & how she still fears it & will be threatened w/it as a woman probably through her whole life, is certainly realistic. At the same time... I don't know. It would be unrealistic to have books set in our world where sexual violence was just something women didn't have to worry about. But still, I hate that the book wound up being so much about whether Elena is strong enough to be the next Alpha, especially w/the possibility of sexual violence.
Our Tragic Universe - Scarlett Thomas. It took me quite a long time to get stuck into this book, which is a shame as I've loved the other books I've read by Thomas. But the protagonist is a perpetually broke writer w/a slacker boyfriend who's a jerk & you can see he's a jerk but there's so much of her putting up w/him. And I didn't think I could stand reading a whole book where she just puts up w/him, & it took a long time before the story convinced me that might change.
Possibly also the worrying about money thing & grey English landscape & being financially trapped in a place that's killing you was hitting too close to home to make me especially want to read fiction about it.
Also, too much waffle about the nature of the universe. This sort of pondering has worked well in the past for Thomas, in Popco & particularly The End of Mr. Y; I don't know whether there's something specific here that I don't like about it, or maybe it just doesn't feel fresh any more.
And the voices of her characters didn't feel very distinct, and I couldn't keep track of the various people in Meg's past that she brings up in her internal dialogue. The book felt hopeless, too; I mean, I think the other novels I've read by Thomas also feature protagonists who are jaded & unhappy to some degree, but both of those books also infuse the narrative w/the probable likelihood of change way before this one did. It did pick up after the halfway point, but still, not something I imagine I'll reread.