Book #140 of 2018: The Power by Naomi Alderman This globe-spanning novel about young women developing deadly electrical powers that ultimately rattle the established world order asks some sharp questions about gender, culture, and violence. It’s one part apocalyptic thriller a la Stephen King’s The Stand, and one part semi-satirical critique of our own patriarchal …
Tag Archives: dystopian
Book Review: Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
Book #112 of 2018: Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury I like to revisit this 1953 dystopian classic at least once a decade or so, and I inevitably find it richer and deeper whenever I do. Author Ray Bradbury has packed an incredible amount of ideas into such a slim volume, and although the overall thrust …
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Book Review: Blindness by José Saramago
Book #94 of 2018: Blindness by José Saramago This novel about an epidemic of sudden contagious blindness has a strong start of creeping desperation and a ruthless military quarantine, but it loses me in the back half of the story when society has effectively crumbled due to everyone losing their sight. There’s so much ableism …
Book Review: The Fireman by Joe Hill
Book #75 of 2018: The Fireman by Joe Hill This Joe Hill novel about a widespread plague of spontaneous combustion has a promising start, but it loses steam as it goes along, especially once it becomes clear that the author is largely just retelling his father’s post-apocalyptic classic The Stand. There are major plot points …
Book Review: The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken
Book #64 of 2018: The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken (The Darkest Minds #1) This dystopian YA novel struck me as a very capable early draft that was unfortunately rushed to print before its full potential could be unlocked. From the narrator not really seeming like a teenager who’s spent the past six years of …
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Book Review: Golden Son by Pierce Brown
Book #5 of 2018: Golden Son by Pierce Brown (Red Rising #2) This is my second time reading this novel — although the first time as an audiobook — and I think my original review from 2016 mostly stands: “Given their common themes of dystopian wargames and rebellion against a corrupt government, The Hunger Games …
Book Review: The History of Bees by Maja Lunde
Book #227 of 2017: The History of Bees by Maja Lunde Taken individually, I suppose I like the three different strands that make up this novel, although the stories set in 2098 China and 1852 England are far more compelling than the one set in 2007 America. (Respectively: a woman trying to track down her …
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Book Review: Underground Airlines by Ben H. Winters
Book #215 of 2017: Underground Airlines by Ben H. Winters I have to admit, I had some doubts that a white author like Ben H. Winters would be able to bring the necessary sensitivity for this alternate-history novel of a modern America that never fully abolished slavery. Ultimately, though, I decided to trust Winters on …
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Book Review: The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau
Book #157 of 2017: The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau (Book of Ember #1) I had a really hard time suspending my disbelief for this novel, which admittedly may be less of an issue for the younger readers in its intended audience. But so many aspects of Ember’s civilization just didn’t ring true for …
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Book Review: A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller Jr.
Book #54 of 2017: A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller Jr. (St. Leibowitz #1) A slow-paced but intriguing vision of the Catholic church in the centuries after the fall of western civilization and the loss of most earthly knowledge, where monks painstakingly copy manuscripts of electronic blueprints out of faith that one day …
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