“I am a boy and a girl and a witch all wrapped into one very strange, flimsy, indecisive body. Do you think my body couldn't decide what it wanted to be?”

This book is SO GOOD!!! An incredibly enjoyable science fiction book about Aster, a black, autistic, queer scientist living as a low-deck passenger on a spaceship organised like the antebellum south, carrying the remainder of humanity to a mythical Promised Land.

MASSIVE content warning because this book has a lot of racist and queerphobic language and violence, but it contributes to the overall worldbuilding.

Speaking of which, the worldbuilding in this book is absolutely fantastic. Each deck on the ship has their own culture, their own language, and their own understanding of things such as gender, science and medicine. The world of the HSS Matilda is very clearly modelled on the antebellum south, while also being its own thing entirely.

The low-deck passengers are forced to work in the field decks, and treated with violence and brutality by the white upper-deck passengers. Solomon doesn't shy away from how the low-deck passengers are treated under slavery, and the effect this has on all of them.

The way this book explores the intersection between gender, sexuality, and race is incredibly impactful. On some decks, the norm is for everyone to use they/them pronouns, and on Aster's deck the norm is for everyone to use she/her, but the white upper-deckers live in a very heteronormative, cisnormative society, which is often projected onto the low-deck passengers, sort of mirroring how a lot of cultures had western cisheteronormativity forced onto them during colonialism.

Aster is a delightfully autistic character, and the way her autism impacts how she sees the world and navigates it is incredibly authentic and realistic.

I listened to the audiobook and the narration is absolutely spectacular. Each character has an incredibly distinct and recognisable voice, and it makes for an incredible experience.

The reason I haven't rated this five stars is because I felt that the ending sort of fell flat. There wasn't really much resolution and the ending felt very abrupt.

Overall, it was great though, and I would 100% recommend to any fans of sci fi! 

 (woahhh alex writing an actual review??? this NEVER happens!)

"Seraph is a monster of fangs, feathers, and flesh. I have believed liars and brought suffering upon my people. I will wash away my past as an Angel and the future they planned for me, and then I will bring this cult down with the fury of a wrathful God."

I loved this book. I'm a trans, autistic horror fan so I'd be a little shocked if I didn't love it, but I'm still very happy that I did.

In a lot of traditional horror, we see this monstrous outside force coming in and interrupting the heterosexual paradise of the protagonists. And one thing I love about queer horror, especially more modern queer horror, is we get to see the monstrous character being human and being queer, and monstrosity and humanity not being mutually exclusive, and I think this really comes across with Benji as a character.

In this book, we get to see Benji figuring himself out and figuring out how to navigate the world, and he is so incredibly human, and that's so wonderful to see, especially with him being trans. I feel like a lot of the time, trans people are held to a much higher standard than cis people. We aren't seen as people, we're seen as examples or role models. So I think it's so lovely that Benji - and the other trans people in this book - is allowed to be messy and flawed and human.

Also... NICK!!!! My autistic king!!! Reading about him honestly made me so much more comfortable being visibly autistic and stimming. I don't think I've ever seen a depiction of autism that actually resonated with me like he did, and I love him so much.

The only reason I didn't rate this five stars is because there's a few things I wanted more of. I wanted more details about the nature and the intricacies of the virus, and I found it a little weird that Sister Kipling got so little time on the page considering she's the one who gave Benji said virus. I feel like she would've been such an interesting character to explore, but we didn't really see her much at all.

But overall, fantastic book!