jarshi's Reviews (189)

dark emotional sad slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

The designs for the variants of Morpheus were really cool!
challenging dark emotional mysterious sad slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
emotional funny lighthearted fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious tense fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

The colors in this series are insane!
funny lighthearted mysterious reflective fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Are we friends if I've never talked your ear off about how Tatami Galaxy kickstarted my interest in Japanese literature?

Yeah, it isn't the best thing ever written, but it's special TO ME!
lighthearted fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
adventurous lighthearted mysterious medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Plot
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated
adventurous challenging emotional funny inspiring mysterious reflective fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

NK Jemison has made it onto a very small list of published authors that have succeeded in making me cry. In the author’s note, Jemison wrote about how this series was originally planned to be a trilogy but was bumped down to a duology because she was running out of steam and real-life events were way worse than anything she could’ve possibly written. I can believe that.

The last couple of chapters felt rushed, and a lot of subplots didn’t end to the satisfaction of my personal tastes. I think the Ur gave up a bit too easily after they’d been played up as these scary, multiverse-killing beings that are beyond the scope of human understanding.

And Neek and Manny… I love them but their relationship ends on such a foreboding note that can’t help but think that they aren’t made to last.

Despite all of this, there was so much more that I enjoyed. I loved how everyone was characterized. The dialogue and interactions were so fresh and rolled through my head so easily. Like I said before, there isn’t one character that I hated. I loved everyone.

The more I read, the more I became interested in the manifestations of other US cities. As a born and raised DC native, it did my spirit a lot of good to see that the avatar of my city would be a black woman of seemingly East African descent. At the moment of reading that line, I literally screamed, “You already fucking know!”

Anyways, very good. I’m very sad that I’ve reached the end, but this series has created a very nice sandbox that I think I’ll play in for a while.