A review by laurareads87
The Sentient by Nadia Afifi

adventurous mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

The Sentient includes a lot of heavy themes - cloning and medical/research ethics, religious coercion and patriarchal cults, trauma, memory, class disparities, reproductive justice - within the context of a coherent plot set in a relatively believable near-future setting with an interesting protagonist POV.  In other words, I like a lot about this and I think it's a really solid debut.  I feel like the characters were mostly well developed even though there were quite a lot of them, and it felt like a fresh take on the subject matter.  What didn't quite work for me is some of the pacing toward the end; there were perhaps one or two too many things going on, and the technology got a bit convoluted and less believable.  I also felt like in a few places it skewed YA (which isn't my thing) though I wouldn't say it reads as YA overall.  Overall, though, I liked this and I'd happily read more from Nadia Afifi.
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