John Simons

At first, I had no idea what to think about this book. Once again, I dived right in without reading the blurb (which helped avoid spoilers). From the first 30% of the story, we have three POVs: an arrogant female doctor named Indira with amnesia, another amnesiac named Aristotle who hasn't realized he woke up in the same place as Indira, and a teenager from a completely separate story named Iseulte.

This book has the differing POV curse: where the reader really wants to read the chapters from certain POVs and not the other ones. Worse, the character with the least interesting story gets the most chapters. I felt tempted with DNFing the book at the 9% point because the teenage highschool drama chapters was just not my cup of tea.

But I am glad to have given the book a chance, because the story is like entering the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland where things get increasingly weird and unpredictable as the story passes. All signs point that the three POVs are discovering the asteroid space station they are in has an ominous secret and they will encounter plenty of weirdness as they visit different sections of the enclosure. For what purpose, I have not yet found out

This is the first time I have read a book that gives me such fond memories of the disturbing levels of the Babel Tower in Senlin Ascends. Whether or not this was done on purpose by the author, I really commend them for emulating the disturbing weirdness that is so reminiscent of the Parlor and the Beer-Me-Go-round levels. Even the punishments for those that defy the local rule of law gave me haunting memories of the darker aspects of the Senlin Ascends's book series.

So, what is the verdict after delving into this rabbit hole of weirdness? Oh, it keeps that pace going on very well. A cultish AI with a hive mind named Avraham made me laugh a lot because he was seemingly everywhere. 'Now I am running, I am hungry. I am captured, trapped in a cage. Everyone in the city is laughing at me. I am being tortured. I have been murdered.' That guy was great. Blackhat also takes on a more pivotal role as the story advances. There really are a lot of very likeable supporting characters. Even the Hexbear inhabiting a twilight forest made in the station hallways is pretty cool.

If there is one huge problem with the book later on, it is the fact the interesting POV curse continues to the very end. We get introduced to the Grey Lady very late in the story and so those POV chapters were quite boring for me because I never had a true investment in them. I would have wanted her to play an active role earlier in the story. Whenever I saw it was a Grey Lady civil war chapter, I pretty much skipped to the next because it slowed the story too much and I never missed anything important.

The last 15% of the story is all over the place. I like how the book ends because it is what Iseulte was searching for in the beginning, but they get separated, then reunited, then some others are separated, and then they are in some hallways, and I had no idea what was going on. I never understood what happened to Aristotle. Steffie out of the blue now wants to learn how to speak Korean even though she never showed these desires during the whole book. And characters are hiking in hallways for days without needing food without going hungry. What happened to the 3 cladesmen that had their skulls surgically open and had cables inserted into their brains? Was it a side plot that was left abandoned in the last minute? Huh?

One thing I tend to have problems while reading books is that I innocently always assume the passage of time is measured in days and not months. So, to have characters going inside a hallway, basement, another forest, in & out, and all around, I assume they never go hungry or thirsty. Most of the book is pretty clear about days passing by, but it is the final 15% during the final arc where I never knew what was going on. I like how the book ends, but not the buildup due to the confusing writing that was all over the place.

If I was an editor, I would have reduced the character cast for clarity and word count. Pilar and Tom never do anything that is 100% critical for the plot. Carmela could have replaced their roles and the story would not be affected much at all. Sections of the story that are fights go on and on and on and on. Scenes where Steffie punches a robot and Iseulte zaps it with a plasma rifle could have been reduced to under 50 words instead of 1 1/2 pages. The book never spends 2 entire pages describing a tree, but there are certainly lots of text that doesn't advance the plot that I simply started skipping. There are plenty of very long scenes of Steffie punching robos or Iseulte sprinting over and over again all over the book that the reader can skip. I think with very good editing, the book's word count could become 150,000 words at the most. More than enough time to explore the (many) weird worlds and dual plot conflict without slowing the story to a halt.

In a nutshell, despite these issues, I had a ton of fun reading this book. It is quite original and I liked it how the characters from the separate POVs end up bumping into each other. For people that love Senlin Ascends, this book will certainly be up their alley. Brace yourselves, this book is a wild ride.… (mehr)