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juushikaTitle: Join
Author: Steve Toutonghi
Published: Soho Press, 2016
Rating: 2 of 5
Page Count: 335
Total Page Count: 331,475
Text Number: 1165
Read Because: recommended by Kalanadi, ebook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: Join technology allows multiple individuals to fuse into a single personality embodied through multiple human drives. The plot doesn't skimp on worldbuilding its tech, its limits, its changes and permutations, its social impact. But the emphasis on plot and hard-SF worldbuilding come to override the lived experience of being joined. Characterization and internal PoVs are weak, too little is felt; the opening questions of what it means to survive one's death (intriguing!) or how disabled embodiment informs consciousness (equally relevant to my interests!) don't amount to much; later issues of join vs. solo psychology are explained through authoritative statements rather than the characters's personalities. This is the least interesting take on a fascinating concept. I like that concept enough to be glad I read it, but I wouldn't recommend it.
(Good racial diversity, some diversity of ability, but that this world of multiple people joined into single identities still manages to be weirdly hetero and normative, which feels indicative, somehow, of how poorly it tackles the messy intimacy of share identity.)
Title: Axiom's End
Author: Lindsay Ellis
Published: St. Martin's Press, 2020
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 385
Total Page Count: 331,860
Text Number: 1166
Read Because: fan of the author in non-authorial capacity, ebook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: A young woman's contact with an alien places her in the position of his interpreter in a precarious political and galactic situation. It takes a solid 25% to get to that premise, and I wish the opening were trimmed down and turned into the backstory that it rightly is. But I stuck with it because I was promised "Lindsay Ellis wrote this" vibes, and boy howdy does it deliver: the >monster boyfriend element is strong. It reminds me, in premise and in relationship dynamic*, of a sanitized Octavia Butler. This has a humor and even some distance, in the 2007 pseudo-nostalgia, that doesn't vibe for me—it's not the tone I want for this content. But the way id-driven interpersonal dynamic twines around thorny issues of ethics, power, and first contact does vibe. It's an engaged, aware take on the trope, capitalizing on the tensions between the personal and political in a way that benefits both elements of the narrative, well paced within the plot reveals; it's indulgent but never frothy, which is hard to achieve but so rewarding. I loved this, despite my quibbles; I imagine I'll love it even more (opening aside) upon reread.
* And in a neatly summarized and confrontational central conflict—"the more powerful will always try to reshape the less powerful in its own image"—which nonetheless feels simplified.
Title: Into the Forest
Author: Jean Hegland
Published: Dial Press, 2009 (1996)
Rating: 2.5 of 5
Page Count: 250
Total Page Count: 332,110
Text Number: 1167
Read Because: probably found this while looking for books with consensual incest but tbh I'm not sure, ebook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: 2.5 stars. The end of society leaves two sisters stranded in their family home at the edge of the woods. It's weird to read post-apocalyptic/dystopian fiction during an actual pandemic; unlike many character-driven/atmospheric examples of this genre, this provides extensive and often preachy detail about how society ends, and manages to feel too real while also being ridiculously wrong. It's the post-society which is more interesting: living in the shadow of society, beholden to its memory; stepping out of that shadow to forge new expectations and means of survival.
But it's cluttered with inspirations and too many YA and post-apocalyptic tropes, and while the power fantasy of survivalist fiction reads differently for two sisters than it does for the average male protagonist, the overall vibe of "burn it down; don't rebuild it" still rankles. I wish the journal-style narrative were amped up to reflect on, rather than merely report, events—really selling the protagonist's PoV would bring out the more nuanced, personal elements and make the larger flaws less obvious.
Author: Steve Toutonghi
Published: Soho Press, 2016
Rating: 2 of 5
Page Count: 335
Total Page Count: 331,475
Text Number: 1165
Read Because: recommended by Kalanadi, ebook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: Join technology allows multiple individuals to fuse into a single personality embodied through multiple human drives. The plot doesn't skimp on worldbuilding its tech, its limits, its changes and permutations, its social impact. But the emphasis on plot and hard-SF worldbuilding come to override the lived experience of being joined. Characterization and internal PoVs are weak, too little is felt; the opening questions of what it means to survive one's death (intriguing!) or how disabled embodiment informs consciousness (equally relevant to my interests!) don't amount to much; later issues of join vs. solo psychology are explained through authoritative statements rather than the characters's personalities. This is the least interesting take on a fascinating concept. I like that concept enough to be glad I read it, but I wouldn't recommend it.
(Good racial diversity, some diversity of ability, but that this world of multiple people joined into single identities still manages to be weirdly hetero and normative, which feels indicative, somehow, of how poorly it tackles the messy intimacy of share identity.)
Title: Axiom's End
Author: Lindsay Ellis
Published: St. Martin's Press, 2020
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 385
Total Page Count: 331,860
Text Number: 1166
Read Because: fan of the author in non-authorial capacity, ebook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: A young woman's contact with an alien places her in the position of his interpreter in a precarious political and galactic situation. It takes a solid 25% to get to that premise, and I wish the opening were trimmed down and turned into the backstory that it rightly is. But I stuck with it because I was promised "Lindsay Ellis wrote this" vibes, and boy howdy does it deliver: the >monster boyfriend element is strong. It reminds me, in premise and in relationship dynamic*, of a sanitized Octavia Butler. This has a humor and even some distance, in the 2007 pseudo-nostalgia, that doesn't vibe for me—it's not the tone I want for this content. But the way id-driven interpersonal dynamic twines around thorny issues of ethics, power, and first contact does vibe. It's an engaged, aware take on the trope, capitalizing on the tensions between the personal and political in a way that benefits both elements of the narrative, well paced within the plot reveals; it's indulgent but never frothy, which is hard to achieve but so rewarding. I loved this, despite my quibbles; I imagine I'll love it even more (opening aside) upon reread.
* And in a neatly summarized and confrontational central conflict—"the more powerful will always try to reshape the less powerful in its own image"—which nonetheless feels simplified.
Title: Into the Forest
Author: Jean Hegland
Published: Dial Press, 2009 (1996)
Rating: 2.5 of 5
Page Count: 250
Total Page Count: 332,110
Text Number: 1167
Read Because: probably found this while looking for books with consensual incest but tbh I'm not sure, ebook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: 2.5 stars. The end of society leaves two sisters stranded in their family home at the edge of the woods. It's weird to read post-apocalyptic/dystopian fiction during an actual pandemic; unlike many character-driven/atmospheric examples of this genre, this provides extensive and often preachy detail about how society ends, and manages to feel too real while also being ridiculously wrong. It's the post-society which is more interesting: living in the shadow of society, beholden to its memory; stepping out of that shadow to forge new expectations and means of survival.
But it's cluttered with inspirations and too many YA and post-apocalyptic tropes, and while the power fantasy of survivalist fiction reads differently for two sisters than it does for the average male protagonist, the overall vibe of "burn it down; don't rebuild it" still rankles. I wish the journal-style narrative were amped up to reflect on, rather than merely report, events—really selling the protagonist's PoV would bring out the more nuanced, personal elements and make the larger flaws less obvious.
