i am literally obsessed i cant say much about why without spoiling but i love the idea that every city is living and breathing and the primary's pov was cool

The City We Became is magical realism at its finest. One day, New York City is born. Born as a living City, with a living avatar and 5 sub-avatars. But as it's being born, something straight out of Lovecraft attacks it, trying to kill it. The avatar fights it off, and collapses, just as the sub-avatars awaken. And it gets better and more confusing from there. 

The City We Became doesn't have the exposition or information dump that a lot of magical realism books have. The reader learns what is happening as the characters learn. I'm very interested to see where she goes with the trilogy, given what happens during the climatic scenes. 

The avatars of New York and its boroughs find themselves awakened all at once. Yesterday, they weren't New York, just New Yorkers, and today they're facing an uncertain future, racism, gentrification, and an interdimensional being that wants them dead, all while figuring out how to be a city filled with millions of people. I absolutely loved this book, and it quickly slid onto my favorites list. 

This book was incredible. N. K. Jemisin has woven a distinct fantasy love letter to NYC. 
I wouldn't trust any other author to nail characterization perfectly for people representing each borough. I'm (regrettably) from Staten Island, and my parents from Brooklyn, so I loved the nods throughout this work. I'd die for Bronca. I knew this would be wonderful from the moment I saw the Brooklyn neighborhood shout outs on the map.
The concept of diverse people fighting fascist entities from another universe preying on folks already leaning into gentrification and racism is genius. Moments when the borough avatars break down barriers amongst themselves to work together are immensely satisfying.

The twist near the conclusion was perfectly executed, and the family oriented beach scene made me sob.

I'm so excited for the next book in this series. 

This ended up being my first Jemisin novel, and to say I understand the hype is an understatement! I don't even know how to explain how much I loved this immersive fantasy novel. Jemisin's writing is so lyrical and cutting, and I was immediately drawn into the narratives of each of her characters. As you probably know, I'm very much over books that are set in New York (we get it, you moved to NYC to work in publishing), but Jemisin's portrayal of five people who personify its boroughs both honored and poked fun at the famous metropolis. Moreover, NYC is more than a setting, she is her own character, one that nurtures her residents and punishes any interlopers.

Who are these interlopers? I don't want to spoil anything for you, as I think part of the enjoyment of this one comes from the gradually unfolding storyline. We meet different characters and put more and more pieces together as they encounter this evil and team up with their fellow boroughs. (The way the boroughs fight with constructs is my favorite thing about the book, but that won't make sense to you until you read it.) I will say that Jemisin's diverse cast has to deal with racism, gentrification, xenophobia, and a whole host of squiggly white tentacles. If you enjoy Lovecraft's creepy world-building but hate his overt racism, then this is the book for you! Feel free to message me if you've read this one and we can cry together about how the sequel doesn't even have a release date yet.

I've never not loved a Jemisin book, but this is a new height of craft for her. I've been to New York all of once, but you still feel the place in your bones even as a despised tourist. The ramping of tension, the unfolding of worldbuilding, and the balance of fright are all masterful.

 Overall Thoughts:
⁕ Like a lot of her other books, you don’t really understand what’s going on at first. Jemisin slowly feeds you info and keeps you hooked on the mystery of it.

⁕ It seems like SO much research went into this book in regards to the Burroughs of NYC and their distinct cultures and institutions. It was such an interesting read from the perspective of someone who’s never been there.

⁕ Jemisin flawlessly stitches together multiple perspectives in the third person; which is super impressive on its own, but even more so given the complex topics discussed and the varying identities of her characters.

⁕ A lot of the magic/superpower elements in this book are based in metaphysical and conceptual realms. It’s probably just cuz I’m new to Sci-Fi, but I had trouble envisioning these things sometimes.

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Overall, I enjoyed the book. The concept of concepts being personified is something I'll always love and feel should be explored more often. This book was an adventure from the start to finish, and even made me feel for characters who you're supposed to dislike.

As for negatives: sometimes this book got a little too preachy. I will say, I think this may be because the characters of the books are more or less personified concepts, but I don't think that entirely fixes my issue. The issue being that it feels like each character has to preach to the audience about what is good or bad. How calling a woman a "bitch" is sexist, how cutting off a woman is sexist, that racism is bad, that cops are scary, etc. I'm a black trans-masc person and will always appreciate representation, but when the only transgender man in the book is brought in for a few pages, gives some speech about the transphobia he's faced (and later has a small panic that someone found out he's trans), it gets tiring. Sometimes I just want to read a book about diverse characters without needing to be reminded that the world at large hates you.

Secondly, which I can't go into as much detail with, it feels like character development wasn't that focused on in the book. The one who got the most development in my opinion was Staten Island, and unless the sequels expand more on her, she got done the dirtiest. This isn't helped by how sudden the ending is. Everything moves so fast. Conflict sky-rockets, we're thrown into the middle of it, a few pages later, it's over and everything is happy and nice. I suspect this is so the drama the next book brings hits hard, but currently? It's just unsatisfying. I believe a book in a series, or at least the first book of a series, should be strong on its own. It's not fun to read a story, get invested, then be thrown into a brick wall until the author's finishing painting the door, leading into the next story. At least slow me down a little?