The N.K. Jemisisn hype is so real. 

I never expected to feel such a range of emotions from such a seemingly small book. The City We Became's paperback edition looks a very tame, innocent size, but the gut punch that it packs in those 448 pages is mind-blowing. 

It is a book that will make you laugh and chuckle with its humor and widen your eyes with its bizarre and unique magic and make you bristle at the uncomfortable yet realistic depiction of xenophobia in our world. 

New York City and its boroughs feel like characters in themselves (and not just because they are actual characters), but because the author talks about them with intimacy and fondness, with the awareness of their flaws and history and streets and alleys and its people. 

I won't reveal anything about the characters, since I think that would spoil the fun of discovering them as you go. We have 5 main characters, and sometimes we get to be in the head of the villain too. We get chapters from all of their third-person perspectives. You can trust me when I say that all 5 of them were incredibly unique and diverse and lovable. 

It covers a wide array of them themes- from racism to homophobia to microaggressions and capitalism. It is bold and to the point when it tackles those issues. It doesn't hold back- yet somehow manages to make its delivery very digestible. Some of the scenes there were genuinely uncomfortable to read because of racism. But that's only proving how well done it was. 

We have five main characters, and one of them in particular is very obviously xenophobic. She grew up in a very controlled and manipulative environment- and even though that doesn't necessarily excuse everything she says or what she does- her perspective is so well-done that you always carry this nickel of sympathy for her. She's supposed to be a little unlikeable and make you confront those ideas, but you somehow still find yourself rooting for her. That, I think, was a real feat. 

Then there was the magic system, which was so unique and bizarre, and interesting. You have to suspend your disbelief a little bit because it's not a typical one with spells or runes or natural elements. It's based on the multidimensional theory, where when a city is "born", a person living in that city suddenly becomes their avatar, or basically the city in human form. And since the boroughs of New Yor city have such distinct identities, there are five avatars for each borough plus one person which is all of New York as a whole. And that's not even the beginning of the unique and bizarreness. 

I'm definitely already biased towards N.K. Jemisin, but this was a fantastic work of urban fantasy and speculative fiction. I believe the first chapter of this book was first published in her book of short stories (or it was revealed to me in a dream, because somehow I recognized it) but the full experience was incredible and so well written. This is one of those books that starts with a concept that makes you groan a little at how corny it might be, but then turns out to be incredibly clever in ways that keep making you stop and reconsider. Or hits you with the magic and scaling system that just click into place so perfectly it's like okay, every new development just makes SENSE. Thank you, I'll have another.

I've always been in love with New York City so when I saw the cover for The City We Became and then read the blurb I knew instantly this was one I wanted to read. TCWB is a powerful and entertaining piece of urban speculative fiction/fantasy which takes multiple no holds barred punches at societies' issues leaving the reader with a lot to think about.

The world building and characterization are absolutely sensational. Jemisin's portrayal of each of the city's boroughs as humans with their own very unique personalities is absolutely spot on and so captivating and entertaining. It's hard not to be automatically drawn to some characters and then to take an immediate dislike to others. The people, culture and vibes of each individual borough are portrayed so well in their human form it's almost uncanny.

While I really enjoyed reading it and found it so hard to put it down, there were definitely sections where I did feel a little bit disconnected. Jemisin goes in hard repeatedly on so many issues such as prejudice, gentrification, racism, xenophobia and homophobia and while all her points raise fantastic questions for discussion at times due to the intensity and nature of her commentary it did become to feel a little preachy.

There's so much to unpack that I think maybe I would have enjoyed it more as a buddy read to have someone to bounce thoughts off of and to discuss themes with. However, overall I loved this book and its characters and I cannot to read The World We Make.

A captivating, gritty, speculative fantasy love letter to NYC with so much to discuss and ponder. 

I was intrigued by the premise but the execution was not entirely satisfying. I was mainly surprised by the conclusion of this book (the first of an upcoming trilogy), but it didn’t really delight me—I thought it was mildly clever.

I could sense a lot of research and creative license went into writing this, and the concept must make it hard to really flesh out the characters, but ultimately the writing voice rubbed me the wrong way with almost all of the characterizations. Especially when

trying to speak to some very particular identities, I felt the author was not handling every characters’ background to the degree of sensitivity that I hoped for. There were many times that the description of East Asian characters, especially, fell short of what I feel is a culturally nuanced understanding of being from East Asian. That’s all I really can articulate about it for now, but ultimately there was a buildup of instances throughout the novel that gave me an overarching feeling of distrust in the author’s ability to inhabit characters of other cultures.

Also, I felt really unbalanced by the amount of “screen time” given to each character, as some did not get many POV chapters and it left me hyperfocused on why. Even if they get more focus in future installments, I wish they had all been developed to the same degrees in the first. Additionally, the ordering and pacing of how information is revealed felt really off to me, there were times where even how a scene was established rattled my immersion in the characters’ point of view.

Slight ramble ahead. On the premise itself, what I started labeling it in my head early on was

weird fanfic about New York City. I’ve lived near and visited New York my whole life, and only after reading this did I realize I don’t really need “New York fanfic” in my life. Sure it’s an homage and all, but I don’t know that I can get behind the metaphor for white supremacy and colonization being a literal extraterrestrial entity. Maybe it’s because I feel sensitive to this subject, and I had hoped it might be somewhat cathartic to see it play out in a fantasy setting, but after reading this I want to say say that it actually feels kind of disrespectful to people facing actual prejudice, displacement, and hate crimes. Like when the Enemy is vanquished, the implication of how this book ends is that this alien source of white supremacy and therefore the magnitude of injustice in the world is significantly diminished. I just can’t vibe with that after all. Or maybe this is the point, for me to get uncomfortable about how racism and gentrification are still out there. Idk, it just ended up too far removed from a productive or interesting take on society that I would have appreciated.

Anyway. Being someone from New Jersey who has lived close to New York City all my life, perhaps a contemporary fantasy story with this setting wasn’t the right book for me to pick up. Even though I’ve enjoyed the Broken earth trilogy in the past. Hard for me to say!

I can say overall this is somewhat worth reading if you want to explore the base concept of living cities a little, but because of the reasons above, I ultimately didn’t get too much pleasure or satisfaction out of the story.

Ok, this is a hot take, and I need you to hear me out, but this book would’ve been better as a tv show or movie. I know, a borderline blasphemous opinion, but I just think this would’ve worked better as a visual medium - still a good book but not my favourite of Jemisin’s works.

This book follows five New Yorkers as they transform into human manifestations of the boroughs of New York. The city of New York is being born - like thousands of cities before it- but something is different this time, and it’s not just the five avatars to the average city’s one. The Enemy is more powerful, the people are more problematic, and the rag-tag group of New Yorkers need to work together, despite their biases against one another, etc. Now, I love a rag-tag group forced together because of a common goal, this goal was just really confusing, and none of the group members were particularly loveable.

Everything was a bit too on the nose for me, and I found a typo. Please, put your books through several rounds of editing before publishing them without a necessary quotation mark. I will admit that one typo does not make a book drop several stars, but it made me wonder how thoroughly this book was vetted before publishing.

Jemisin is a great writer, but this book didn’t quite hit the spot for me. Maybe that’s because I’m from New Zealand and have literally no connections to New York City (let alone any influential city). Maybe, the world just wasn’t built out enough for me. A lot of the lore was confusing and wishy-washy, and I think Jemisin tried to add that to the story (having the characters not know wanting alongside the readers). However, even once a character got info dumped on, I still struggled to understand some of the history and lore. It’s a wonderful idea and has the potential to be a great world, but I think it just needed some refining.

Also, not a fan of the Uncensored Use of Slurs that Jemisin cannot reclaim (ch*nk).

((As an aside, maybe the bar for Magical Avatars of New York City has just been placed really high due to my love of The Unsleeping City, everyone go watch that.))