Reviews

Greensmith by Aliya Whiteley

Only show reviews with written explanations

mimib4's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

Whitely writes really interesting books. Her novel is sort of like a Dali, or Hieronymus Bosch come to life, weird and surreal but trying to get to ideas that are hard to express conventionally. It's a book I need to reread because i read it too fast the first time...

chrisscorkscrew's review against another edition

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challenging mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.5

This is… odd. An odd, reflective read that is not without charm or interest but is also fragmented with rapid changes in tone.

theaurochs's review

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4.0

A haunting and beautiful adventure through space and time with a handsome, oddly dressed and quirky human-looking alien; complete with ancient races and grudges, universe-altering stakes, self-reference and lots of running down corridors. Hang on is this a Doctor Who fanfic? Well it seems like it sort of is. Whitely uses the familiar structure of the human companion swept up into these grander adventures, but colours it with fantastic imagination, and uses it to comment on and deconstruct the ideas often present and persistent in Doctor Who. It's also a bittersweet and elegiac story on the beauty and fragility of nature; and a story about forging who you are. Lovingly written and thoughtfully considered, a great book.

danielwestheide's review against another edition

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2.0

I liked the premise, and the wonderful Britishness of the main character and the writing. I would have loved to learn more about the strange information war taking place on Earth. Unfortunately, this, and Earth, is quickly left behind, and things get more and more surreal in a mixture of Doctor Who, told from the perspective of the Doctor’s companion, who has almost no agency whatsoever over large parts of the story, and the weirdness of Alice in Wonderland. In the last third or so, I had to force myself to read on.

emmalouisereads's review

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dark mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

mdpenguin's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

I really had no idea what to expect from this: I picked it up randomly and it seems to have responded by being a bit random. It's kind of like a Rudy Rucker surrealist novel, only with a vague notion of psycholinguistics replacing the mathematics and a total lack of puerile horniness. It's an interesting story that I think I would have found more enjoyable if it hadn't implied a more traditional adventure towards the beginning. I also can't help but feel that the author takes advantage of the disjointed nature of the telling to avoid having to wrap scenes up coherently. Overall, though, it worked and was pretty fun to read, with a lot of interesting ideas floating through it to think about.