Reviews with content warning for Animal death - Borne

Reviews tagging 'Animal death'

lost_keys's review

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challenging reflective tense slow-paced

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

4.5

Vandermeer’s prose is so chewy and toothsome, and his characters are so human and strange.

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bulwark's review

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challenging dark medium-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

5.0

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nhnabass's review

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dark reflective tense medium-paced

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

5.0

Hot damn.

A dark, dystopian, gory sci fi that feels like the best and worst kind of hallucinogenic trip. Wonderfully gruesome imagery that bends the imagination around the kinds of creatures you hope aren’t lurking beneath the ocean.

A story that reflects on what it means to be.

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diana_blackmoon's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad tense slow-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? It's complicated

4.0

In this crazy story about big bear, I was amazed to find such a compelling story. About motherhood, love, hope, betrayal and what it means to be a person. It is gruesome and terrifying but also beautiful and hopefull. The narration style takes a minute to get used to but was the best possible choice for this book.

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cryosphinx's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional slow-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

4.75

I went into this knowing very little, having a friend recommend it to me. I was sold on post apocalyptic but that's quite it for my knowledge.

VanderMeer's writing style took a little bit for me to get used to, coming off a long string of romantic fantasy books so the beginning was hard for me to get into, but once I got a feel for the writing and the vivid and lush environment and characters, I was invested. His writing does so much in such an a beautiful and unique way they I felt sucked into this world, even with the mysteries such as why is there a giant bear flying around?

There's a lot of turns in this and it's been a long while since I've had a book where I read a sentence and had to put the book down to stare and mentally recover from what I just discovered. I did find the book was on the slow side, with a bulk of the book being centered around Rachel and Borne in the Balcony Cliffs (but I supposed the book IS titled Borne after all). It's very character driven with the great plot just being about survival in this strange but plausible apocalypse.

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crowcore's review

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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annemaries_shelves's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

3.0

Weird, open-ended, and a predictable plot wrapped in unpredictable imagery.

That's how I would summarize Borne.

VanderMeer's Weird dystopian eco scifi skills are on full display here - I really enjoyed the world building and all the disturbing (and often violent) imagery generated by the destruction of the City by the Company.

There's a lot of questions I have about the world and what the last 50 pages meant - questions I doubt I'll get answered. So if you're a reader who's frustrated by open and interpretable/vague endings, I wouldn't necessarily pick this up.

Much of the plot was predictable and the ending relatively anticlimactic- mostly due to the significant amount of narrative foreshadowing by our main character. (Rachel literally tells us "If I'd known X ahead of time, maybe things would be different.)
I think the novel would have been strengthened by some interludes with perspectives from other characters (notably The Magician, Wick, and Borne). Take 25 pages out from Rachel "raising" Borne and add in those additional POVs, and I think it would've been better.

I did really enjoy the writing and the relationships between Rachel, Borne, and Wick - even as they frustrated me at times. There were a lot implicit messages that VanderMeer was leaving the reader on the consequences of exploitative industries, the damage and havoc wreaked upon the population, and the long-term consequences to the environment. Contrary to a lot of books handling similar topics, I felt VanderMeer was less obvious with his messaging.

Overall, I enjoyed the reading experience and felt the buddy read aspect helped me keep on track (it's fairly slow-paced). I'll probably pick up the second in the series but it won't be for a while.

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