Reviews tagging 'Ableism'

Sleeping Giants by Sylvain Neuvel

9 reviews

yvo_about_books's review against another edition

4.25

 Finished reading: September 7th 2023

“I was smart enough to know it was wrong, but not brave enough to stop them.”

It's true that I don't usually read a lot of sci-fi, and especially when there are aliens involved... But there was something about Sleeping Giants that made me curious ever since it was first published back in 2016. I guess my TBR jar thought it was time I finally gave this first book of a trilogy a chance, and I'm very glad this title popped up now. Why? I have to say that I was very much impressed by Sleeping Giants! There was just something about this story that was both addictive and able to make you feel humble at the same time. The fact that you don't exactly know what is going on only adds to the suspense, and it was absolutely fascinating learning more about what was being discovered. The writing style itself stands out as it is told through interviews, diaries and other files, but somehow the story was still very readable. It makes you wonder what would happen if such a discovery would be made in real life, and how the people involved would react... The different characters involved added humanity to the story and while I could have done without the love triangle, in general I enjoyed learning more about them. And after how things ended, I also can't wait to pick up the sequel to see what will happen next! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical trauma, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, War, Toxic relationship, Car accident, Confinement, Forced institutionalization, Body horror, Medical content, Infidelity, and Death

Moderate: Kidnapping, Child death, Sexual content, Ableism, Genocide, Xenophobia, and Torture

surprisebear's review against another edition

adventurous tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content, Xenophobia, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Medical trauma, Emotional abuse, Grief, Body horror, Death, Injury/Injury detail, and War

Moderate: Ableism, Infidelity, Kidnapping, and Confinement

Minor: Pregnancy, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, and Sexual violence

mengzhenreads's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.0

Listening to this as an audiobook was super cool, it's a fun premise that is really interesting and engaging. I just really enjoyed myself.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical trauma, Death, and Medical content

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, and Violence

Minor: Gun violence and Ableism

obviousthings's review

The story really jumped the shark with the lengths the nameless interviewer character was willing to go for the project. The thing about

Vincent's legs

is just incredibly stupid, imo, and I don't want to read any more of this.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism and Injury/Injury detail

jojo_'s review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Car accident, Medical trauma, and Medical content

Moderate: Murder, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Violence, Body horror, Confinement, Death, War, and Infidelity

Minor: Racism, Ableism, Misogyny, Sexual content, Child death, Toxic relationship, and Xenophobia

feranmi's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark informative mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Minor: Ableism

mar's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious medium-paced

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

2.25

why is almost every character in this book a war criminal. this sucks but i cant put it down tf

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Car accident, Death, Grief, Medical content, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Child death, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, and Violence

Minor: Genocide, Ableism, and Torture

cold_boy's review

It started as a very cool premise, with a writing style that lent itself well to an audiobook - and I've gotta say, the audiobook narrators were fairly good. It's written almost entirely as transcripts of recorded interviews, and the dialogue is mostly pretty well written.

Part of me wanted to stick with it just in case a cool twist happened, but I honestly can't trust the author to write anything innovative or interesting after getting halfway through. My issues:

1. It pretty rapidly becomes that very specific brand of military propaganda  in which individual soldiers are glorified but the government is evil. Think Marvel movies, or Transformers.

2. The author seems to have a child's understanding of science. Which is a bit of a problem when you're writing a science fiction book where one of your main characters is a physicist. I don't think I ever see her discuss anything related to physics. I don't even think the author knows what a physicist is. This becomes even more obvious when

we get the explanation of what is written on the alien tablets. I can't suspend my disbelief when people have been studying this language for a decade and only just now realized that they're just basic math equations. The author really thought he did something when he revealed in a massive shock that it's written right to left and in base 8.

It feels like something I would have written when I was 14 and thought myself incredibly clever for doing so. Also the idea that they can magically produce enough argon-37 to spray *the entire world* was ridiculous.

3. The author clearly wants to fuck one of his main characters. Kara the helicopter pilot is such a painfully cliche and borderline misogynistic caricature. Every time male characters talk about her, it comes back to their attraction towards her. It's really uncomfortable to read.

4. The point that I stopped at,

a character is about to lose their legs after they're crushed by a car. The way the characters spoke about what life would be like for someone who has to rely on prostheses was nightmarishly ableist. He goes on a long tirade about how apparently people without legs can't take care of themselves and shit themselves constantly. It's really fucked up.

 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Ableism and Violence

Minor: Misogyny

bookcaptivated's review

challenging funny mysterious fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content, Medical trauma, Death, Car accident, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Torture

Minor: War, Xenophobia, Ableism, Blood, Child death, Kidnapping, Sexism, and Sexual content