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I appreciate the compassion bell hooks has for men in this book. She strongly emphasizes the ways in which patriarchy hurts men, too, and advocates for reaching out to them, not closing them off. I also thought she did a great job pointing out the ways in which some women prop up the patriarchy as well, with their children and with their partners.

However, I have the same complaints about this book that I have about many nonfiction books - this was organizationally odd and very repetitive. The chapter titles didn’t always seem to correspond to the contents of the chapters or were so vague as to be unhelpful. There was also a lot of overlap between chapters and similar ground covered. This book isn’t described as a collection of essays or speeches collected after the fact, but it has that feel. After the first few chapters you’ve basically gotten the message.

Not mad at the message, but received what there was to receive early on.

If you read 1984 and thought, “wow, Orwell did Julia dirty,” this book is for you. If you read 1984 and thought, “wow, I wish this was more of a story and less of a treatise,” then this book is also for you.

I reread 1984 just a few months ago not even knowing this book was coming out. I definitely think it adds to the experience to have the original fresh in your mind.

I knew that Orwell wanted me think of Julia as shallow and dumb in 1984, but I liked her anyway. When she fell asleep while Orwell read Goldstein’s book, I was like yep, girl, same. I feel like Newman kept some of that air-headed feel to Julia but basically didn’t fault her for it.

There are a few memorable icky bits of dialogue with Winston from 1984 replayed here from Julia’s perspective. Newman creates motivation for Julia to say what she says, which is mainly that she wants to placate Winston so they can get to the sex. Can he PLEASE shut up? Hahaha.

Newman explores the lives of women in this system, including pregnancy, birth control, and queerness. She also gives Julia a much more complicated role.

I enjoyed the last bit of the book a lot. It felt like it had the same spirit as the ending of 1984, which is one of the best parts of the original to me.

I’m baffled as to how this got published with Orwell’s estate’s approval, but I’ll take it!

Great read. At times it dragged a bit for me, but overall a very compelling story.

No argument from me on the creepiness of family vlogging. The theme and messaging around that is really strong. It gets too soapbox-y at times, more than it needs to in order to make the point. But it’s a fascinating family situation to explore. I think many of us have wondered how kids of family vlogging channels will feel about it all once they are older.

I saw one reviewer say the last bit goes off the rails, which set my expectations in a weird place. It just explores what might realistically happen 15 years later. It reminds me of Room by Emma Donoghue - she also explores the aftermath of a dramatic event, not just the dramatic event itself.

The mother Melanie’s POV is the most fascinating. The author did her work imagining how this behavior is rationalized.

The writing style is unique. It’s got a clinical, detached quality. But it’s still close 3rd person. It feels very thoughtful, quiet, and meditative despite the intensity of what’s happening. Definitely a literary thriller/crime novel.

Very enjoyable! Would read more from the author.

I'm on a mission to DNF or read the oldest books on my TBR - meaning the books that have been on my TBR the longest. I've DNFed a couple, and maybe should've DNFed this one, but it was okay in the end.

I found the first half more engaging than the second half, I think because the "point" such as it is had been made. You follow a nameless young woman who has just quit her job after suffering intense burnout. She tries out four new jobs over the course of this book, all supposedly "easy." Each one becomes more than she bargained for, either because of the work itself or her own attitude toward the work. It's clear she struggles not to get too invested, no matter how simple the job seems on the surface.

If the book had upped the pace, I'd have given it 4 stars. But each job drags out a bit too long. I didn't mind the very mild dramas of each place - I was entertained by how silly it all was. I waffled on DNFing because of this. I liked and disliked aspects of the story throughout.

I enjoyed the themes of burnout and work/life balance. But the book never delves too deep into any of it, so it felt a little blah in the end.

3.5 stars rounded down. Too long, but overall a fun time. I liked the ending enough to pick up book 2, I think, especially with this just being a duology.

I like the writing style of Wendel a lot. It’s not too quippy or jokey. But neither did it feel melodramatic. Great balanced tone for me.

I also enjoyed Bel and Lena as characters. Their personalities and motivations worked for me, and I was moved by some of their scenes near the end.

Problems I had:
1. Horrendously slow start. I picked this up because it’s a romantasy but it didn’t feel like one til close to halfway through. Then all of a sudden it’s nonstop attraction.
2. World building/lore issue. Why are the humans and avians at war? There’s something about gemstones mentioned, but it’s a gigantic blank for the most part.
3. Lena and Bel are remarkably cordial to each other given the war, and get over their status as enemies very quickly. I couldn’t make sense of this given all the reasons they have to hate each other. Lena has given years to the war and killed many avians (as far as I can tell), but neither she nor Bel have a problem with this…

Bel and Lena are sweet together, so I do kind of want to keep reading til they get their HEA. ☺️

Like The Justice of Kings, this was a lot of fun and at a certain point unputdownable. But I’d also say this volume was kind of harrowing because it feels like bad news after bad news.

This one has a “case” as a focus point like the first book, but that’s resolved-ish in the first half and then the book shifts focus to Claver and concerns about Vonvalt’s sickness. There’s lot of foreshadowing that things get worse (TOO much foreshadowing since it starts to get repetitive, but I’m braced for some tragedy for sure). The scope also gets bigger as the group arrives in Sova and gets involved at a higher level.

I really enjoy how Swan writes some of the quieter, character focused dialogue. There are conversations between Helena, Bressinger, and Radomir (sometimes all together, sometimes one on one with Helena) that highlight their friendship and struggles in really lovely ways. It doesn’t go to extremes as books often do, leaning too safe and precious or too argumentative and angry, but instead finds a middle ground. For me that makes it feel more authentic. I’m just sad we don’t get more of it. It's also disappointing that Vonvalt doesn’t get more of that type of dialogue, but he’s kind of at a distance in this volume.

Speaking of Vonvalt, it was harder to ship him and Helena in this one because of his behavior. I’m not sure what to think of them or what to expect for them because the story isn’t quite fitting familiar patterns or tropes for a romance. That’s kind of refreshing, but it’s also making me lose my footing. I can’t get a read on whether I should root for it or not, honestly. I kind of still do because it’s fun, but in reality I feel like I’d be warning Helena away from Vonvalt.

My 3 star rating mainly comes from my interest fading in and out depending on the topic covered or point being made in this book. If I were 100% interested I think I’d give it 4 stars because it’s pretty accessible (at least for someone raised Christian) and well organized. I’d still dock a star for a couple complaints I have.

Thought provoking stuff/highlights:
1. Overall this is the first time I’ve read something that comes at Jesus’ life from a completely agnostic perspective. I was introduced to many new ways to view what did or didn’t happen and why this gospel says one thing and this one another. Examples: the idea that later writers felt the need to explain Jesus’ baptism, the potential competition between John the Baptist and Jesus, and the idea that Jesus was speaking of an earthly kingdom.
2. Jesus put in the context of the time was helpful. Millenarianism was a broadly popular view, especially among peasants at the time. Jesus was part of a Jewish insurrectionist history that also continued after him. I wish we got more information (it’s unclear if there just isn’t any) about what the expected supernatural intervention would look like in the minds of Jesus and his followers.
3. The unique part of Jesus’ movement was the strategic nonviolence which was connected to the also unique “mission to the rich” pillar of the movement.

Bothersome stuff:
1. Sometimes the authors said that a position they held was “clearly” the case when it was not clear to me. I needed more evidence than they gave me. I might still agree with them, but I just felt they didn’t do enough to make the case. One example is the importance of maintaining the image of masculinity even though their movement was nonviolent.
2. The thread of “class conflict” did not feel consistently present. There were chapters that felt tangentially connected to that theme if at all, which is odd when it’s the subtitle of the book. Sometimes the authors were more wrapped up in expounding on what did or didn’t really happen in Jesus’ life.

After multiple disappointing fantasy books, this one came through for me. ☺️ At first I thought it might be too lighthearted, but that tone only really existed in the banter between Dara and Nahri at the beginning. It got quite a bit darker by the end.

I like the world a lot, though I have to admit to being quite muddled about the history even now. It’s explained, but it’s complex (at least for my little brain), and involves some shifting alliances that are hard to track. I didn’t want to google anything for fear of accidentally reading spoilers! But the focus is political/court shenanigans which is a favorite for me in fantasy.

The last 100-ish pages are intense. I was surprised by how much happened and where it all went plot-wise. I was stressed. I also enjoy the characters - Nahri, Ali, Dara, Muntadhir. I like how Chakraborty achieved writing characters who I had mixed feelings about (I am a fan of unlikable, truly flawed characters), but whose motivations I generally understood, and who had a lot of conflict with each other.

Reasons why it’s not a 5 star:
1. There are a couple of deaths early on in the book that felt like they should matter far more than they did. If I’m supposed to believe this character and the dead person were close, the character should have feelings of grief beyond the one time immediately after the death.
2. I enjoyed the romance between Dara and Nahri, but I didn’t quite believe how fast it happened given the interactions I saw. I wish there had been more vulnerable scenes on their journey and a little less banter.
3. Zaynab is introduced but little is done with her. Maybe she does more in the later books. Initially I thought the book was going to judge her for being manipulative and conniving, which always annoys me if the world is such that women don’t have any other way to hold power. But by the end, sympathy for her situation is on the page, so I was satisfied. I just wish she got more page time.

Overall, I had a fun time with this one! It’s got its problems, but I was able to be swept up in the story.

This was aggressively fine. Short, entertaining enough, pretty well paced. The thematic content is very important. As an exvangelical, I found a lot of it relatable.

For a story told in first person, however, there’s remarkably little introspection. The story is more a tale of “I did this and then I did this” with minimal reflection. I was also hoping for some kind of epilogue to wrap up the story of Rose and her parents, but that doesn’t happen.

I like how Saul and Rose have different responses to the situation in terms of their faith, and the book doesn’t judge either of them for where they land. They also don’t judge each other which was refreshing.

Overall the book was just too surface level and honestly didn’t get as horrific or as dark as I thought it would. I wasn’t as moved as I wanted to be as a result. I think it’d work well as a movie, though, and I might enjoy that version of it a lot more.