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snowbenton's reviews
3300 reviews
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling
2.0
Repeat after me: There is no such thing as a love potion. Those are rape potions. Yet this entire book acts like they are no big deal. Even Hermione says they aren't dark magic. What. The. Fuck.
It is wild to me that six books in we have so many classroom scenes and every teacher is like "here is a complicated task I haven't explained. Go do it." It's a wonder any of these kids have survived this school. None of the adults in this book should be allowed near children. (Especially Hagrid. It gets creepier every book the way they are always in his house. I'm sorry. I used to like him too. But it's creepy.)
I definitely had some nostalgia pangs reading this one. I remember going to the midnight release at Borders and having a sleepover at my friend Julie's house with two other friends who totally passed out, and she and I stayed up all night just so we could finish it, but I was so tired I barely remembered what I read and had to read it all again. Ah, to be newly fifteen again.
But once again the internal inconsistencies pull me out of the story (Hagrid would absolutely have known who Slughorn is because he was the potions teacher when Hagrid was at Hogwarts, Slughorn shows up on the first day of class with Felix Felicis only for it to be revealed later that it takes six months to make (and he was on the run so he definitely wasn't storing it in his house)) and the sheer volume of useless text is a drag. Rowling was so popular when this was published that they just let her write as much as she wanted, which failed for two reasons. One, she is absolutely shit at world-building, and two, half the scenes in this book are reiterations of previous books that do nothing for the plot (Draco is mean, we can't lose the Quidditch match, the trio are fighting with each other, detention, etc).
No lovely quote from Dumbledore to wrap up this review. You know why.
It is wild to me that six books in we have so many classroom scenes and every teacher is like "here is a complicated task I haven't explained. Go do it." It's a wonder any of these kids have survived this school. None of the adults in this book should be allowed near children. (Especially Hagrid. It gets creepier every book the way they are always in his house. I'm sorry. I used to like him too. But it's creepy.)
I definitely had some nostalgia pangs reading this one. I remember going to the midnight release at Borders and having a sleepover at my friend Julie's house with two other friends who totally passed out, and she and I stayed up all night just so we could finish it, but I was so tired I barely remembered what I read and had to read it all again. Ah, to be newly fifteen again.
But once again the internal inconsistencies pull me out of the story (Hagrid would absolutely have known who Slughorn is because he was the potions teacher when Hagrid was at Hogwarts, Slughorn shows up on the first day of class with Felix Felicis only for it to be revealed later that it takes six months to make (and he was on the run so he definitely wasn't storing it in his house)) and the sheer volume of useless text is a drag. Rowling was so popular when this was published that they just let her write as much as she wanted, which failed for two reasons. One, she is absolutely shit at world-building, and two, half the scenes in this book are reiterations of previous books that do nothing for the plot (Draco is mean, we can't lose the Quidditch match, the trio are fighting with each other, detention, etc).
No lovely quote from Dumbledore to wrap up this review. You know why.
The Color Purple by Alice Walker
4.0
A heartfelt and tender story that I was entirely not sold on, but once Celie meets Shug, I was hooked. I loved their romance and how real the interactions and conversations felt between everyone. I did struggle with the timeline; I never knew how much time was passing or how old anyone was or anything, which was really frustrating, but the story was captivating.
Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow
3.0
This was published in 1987 and it shows. The casual bigotry, racism, and sexism are painful to read. For example, the main character is cheating on his wife and it literally never occurs to him to use a condom. Someone asks him what method of birth control they used and he apologizes for not being a gentleman enough to concern himself with what she was doing. S I R. TAKE CARE OF YOUR HEALTH. . Insane.
If you can get past this, the mystery is solid and I enjoyed the reveal. I knew his wife did it pretty early on because the clues were well-placed, but I loved it. I also liked at the end when he is talking it over with his friend and he really still isn't sure of all of her motivations for doing it.
If you can get past this, the mystery is solid and I enjoyed the reveal.
A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
5.0
I was crying before I even realized my heart was hurting.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling
1.0
Easily the worst one so far. Harry is an emotional baby for the entire book, with not sentence of these 870 dragging pages devoted to self-reflection. He picks fights with everyone and all the fighting took the fun out of this book. Goblet of Fire was also too long, but at least you had the wizard tournament and that kept the pages turning because there was another adventure coming. This book had no plot beyond Harry failing to even try to keep Voldemort out of his head, and it fell very flat.
It hardly bears repeating at this point, but Hagrid is an absolutely terrible person who has no business interacting with children. Dumbledore is at best an idiot, at worst, possessed of a flagrant disregard for children's lives. Molly Weasley is a shrew and Arthur Weasley is an airhead and all the Weasley children deserved better.
Reading this as an adult was a chore.
It hardly bears repeating at this point, but Hagrid is an absolutely terrible person who has no business interacting with children. Dumbledore is at best an idiot, at worst, possessed of a flagrant disregard for children's lives. Molly Weasley is a shrew and Arthur Weasley is an airhead and all the Weasley children deserved better.
Reading this as an adult was a chore.
The Yamas & Niyamas: Exploring Yoga's Ethical Practice by Deborah Adele
5.0
This changed the way I think about myself and my life.
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling
3.0
As an adult I have to suspend so much disbelief to get through these. The world-building is a fucking crime. It's so frustrating. And Harry and Ron and Hermione spend huge swathes of the book mad at each other for dumb reasons and you don't even get much out of the side characters to make up for it. This was much too long for the amount of story it contained, but I can't say I wouldn't have written this much if I had such rabid fans, so I'll let it slide.
Hagrid is the fucking worst. Dumbledore fails Harry again, 4/4, good job. I liked learning more about the Death Eaters. The death at the end was simple and painful and still a gut punch even when you know it's coming.
Thanks again to Dumbledore for the nice summation: "Remember, if the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy, remember what happened to a boy who was good, and kind, and brave, because he strayed across the path of Lord Voldemort. Remember Cedric Diggory."
Hagrid is the fucking worst. Dumbledore fails Harry again, 4/4, good job. I liked learning more about the Death Eaters. The death at the end was simple and painful and still a gut punch even when you know it's coming.
Thanks again to Dumbledore for the nice summation: "Remember, if the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy, remember what happened to a boy who was good, and kind, and brave, because he strayed across the path of Lord Voldemort. Remember Cedric Diggory."
The Atlas Complex by Olivie Blake
0.25
I didn't think it was possible but this was actually worse than I expected.
Upright Women Wanted by Sarah Gailey
2.0
I love a western themed book with a tough female protagonist (True Grit, Vengeance Road) and I generally put up with apocalyptic ones even though if I read one more water-rationing book my eye might twitch right out of my head. So I had high hopes for this one: librarians! lesbians! l'adventure! But it was just dull and predictable and the characters bored me.