clovetra's reviews
232 reviews

Paradise Rot by Jenny Hval

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challenging mysterious slow-paced

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

1.0

nothing happened here. nothing. not a single god damn thing.

where was my lesbian sex? where was anything interesting other than piss and sex and moldy apples?

i got nothing from the characters, nothing from the plot, nothing from the writing style. nothing.

so disappointed.

Cursebound by Saara El-Arifi

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adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

thank you to netgalley & random house publishing for a copy of this book in return for an honest review !!!!

yall. omg. i haven’t read many book series before but this is the first time ive loved the sequel more. because DAMN this ended up being scrumptious!!!

compared to the first book, the plot is more engaging, with more stakes and tension. the characters are developed a lot more, making them feel more realistic (although i’ll be real and say rayan does not fall into this category… he just feels like a placeholder if im honest). the mysteries built up in this sequel are not only more interesting, but more of a mystery, with more danger for the characters. also this book delves into the politics of not just the fae kingdom but the forever war in the elven lands, and not only was it interesting but it was engaging and not cut & dry which was great. the amount of shocking plot twists increased, and i think they were done a lot better compared to the first book. like there were certain moments i was reading and fully pulled a “😨” face. the plot with the authority was done a lot better than the first book’s overarching mystery, and although i worked out the mechanics of the mystery in this sequel just as fast, it didn’t feel as cheap. not only was it more gradually explored, but the amount of layers related to the authority plot kept me gripped even though i knew most of the facts regarding said plot.

i’m actually shocked by how much i liked this because the first book was simply ok. it was interesting but simple. but this? this has a lot more depth which was great. however, i did have a few issues, but i think these issues were generally more personal than an actual issue with the book.

for one, the book at points felt like a rehash of book 1. i don’t want to spoil what exactly happens, but it felt like the exact same plot beats was followed with lettle here. sure they were done ‘better’ in this book but it still doesn’t negate the fact that the plots of both books was the same except with the culprit & the motive(s) being different.

speaking of plots, i did think that there were a bit too many going on at once. to be fair, by the end most plots were either nicely wrapped up or explained enough yet still allowing room for book 3 in the series. but there was so much going on at times i couldn’t keep up. we have alder’s plot, then the authority plot, then the berro plot, then the forever war plot, then the grimoire plot, then the yeeran plot, then the fates plot…. i could go on. at times i almost couldn’t keep up so much was going on.

also if im honest, some plot points felt a bit… contrived? a lot of times i was reading and it felt like i was more so reading a self-insert fanfic. at times the book was giving “my name is ebony darkness raven and i am the most beautiful girl at school but also i have these two hot boys i have to choose from and also im super smart and super fast and super athletic and also im the queen of vampires”. elements at times felt forced and it kept breaking my immersion.

honestly though, what critiques i have about this book are mostly personal. but sadly they are what held this book back from being a 5-star for me. however, that isn’t to say i didn’t completely adore this book. it’s rare that after i finish a book i still go back and think about it, and yet i still keep thinking back to what happened throughout this book. it’s living in my head rent free.

Content Warnings

Milk Fed by Melissa Broder

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dark reflective medium-paced

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

3.0

um. needless to say i. have no idea how to feel about this.

the characters were…… ok. rachel was perfectly tolerable. her mummy issues were so batshit insane. freud would’ve loved this book. i think miriam was fine. i do think due to the MC’s own internal biases miriam often read as a caricature of a fat person, in where it felt like miriam had almost no identity outside of being fat (and jewish). as a plus sized person it felt wrong. not to say the author is fatphobic, just that it made me feel deeply uncomfortable.

know what else made me uncomfortable? all the food talk. ok yes i understand the crux of this book is literally about food. but cmon comparing the fat character to bread was eyebrow raising. sure i understand miriam being happy and plus sized is the heart of this book and the heart of rachel’s character development, but i can’t say reading about how MC thinks miriam is a fat piggy who scoffs down everything in sight and omg fat character haha she has food in between her tits was fun. at some point i felt the connection between the lust for the miriam and the lust for food to be off putting. i do have a feeling there is some motif or something that is trying to be conveyed through that comparison between food and miriam but i fear it never got there in the end. and neither did the theme of judaism. at first i felt icky about it because i didn’t realise the author was jewish, but once i found that out it defo didn’t feel as… fetishised? flanderised? either way i think that was the best tackled theme. but even then i say that and i don’t know what the hell the golem or the dreams were meant to symbolise on a deeper level. maybe im just dumb. and yet again i feel like that about the mummy issues too. what happened in the end i get, but what was the meaning? is it a good or bad thing? has rachel overcome her mummy issues or the complete opposite? i can’t tell if this is a me issue or the book is written like this, but either way that’s how i felt so 🤷

i don’t really know what else to say because there’s not really much to this book. most of this can be broken down into: sex, food, judaism, sex, more sex, lots of food, a little bit of disordered eating, sex sex sex, judaism, food, etc. like really it feels like there isn’t much else to comment on.

i mean ill say i didn’t like the relationship between miriam and rachel. it felt unrealistic and forced, where their relationship only became what it was because the book called for it. i defo felt the yearning from rachel’s side, but even then it felt so shallow and materialistic, i couldn’t fully buy into it.

the ending was meh. the last chapter was meh. the whole thing with jace was meh. i kinda didn’t give a shit because just as things started to get juicy there the book just ends. so i was left sitting there going “Oh” in disappointment.

either way, this book has fully changed how i look at those yoghurt self-serve places. for the better or worse? you decide

Content Warnings

Goodnight Punpun Omnibus, Vol. 1 by Inio Asano

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dark funny mysterious medium-paced

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

2.0

why does this manga have so much hype 🧍 i am bored. this was boring.

the only positive to this volume was pun pun. he was endearing and the art of him just doing normal things was so cute. idk he’s drawn in such a silly style i love it.

there is no plot. the other characters are boring. a lot of random shit happens with no connecting threads or a reason to it. everything felt so monotonous. Boring!

i’m defo gonna finish this series because i need to know Why people like this so much…. because from this volume the series so far is giving capital of flop city.

Content Warnings

Faebound by Saara El-Arifi

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adventurous lighthearted mysterious medium-paced

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

3.0

i’m gonna be honest and say. i’m a dumbass. i got an ARC to the sequel and hadn’t read this. so. here i am. tail in between my legs because i am stupid. and um. i dont think i would’ve picked this up otherwise. but i am defo excited to read the sequel!

i’ll be honest and say there were A Lot of elements of this i did not like. the plot twists were set up well, but they all came back to back to back i felt like i was getting whiplash from how much tea was being spilt. which is insane because before all 75 different plot twists were revealed, there was no plot. no tension. half the story is just lettle and yeeran being little horndogs, and the other half was worldbuilding. i’m not mad at the worldbuilding, lowkey learning about the elven lands & the life of the fae was FUNNNN. but idk i kind of feel like the focus was instead of the romance when a beautiful plot exploring the lives of the fae was Right There. but otherwise nothing really happens. like it took until 35% deep in this book for anything interesting to happen, and like 70% for the climax, and then that was resolved in like 4 pages 🧍

also with the plot twists… this is going to sound so fucking mean but most of them felt like something i’d read in fanfiction. something someone would write about their self-insert. like it was giving “hi im Y/N and actually im an elf and a fae and im a human and actually i am the most beautiful luxurious person and i have so many lovers because i am perfect”. do you get me?

the characters… oh the characters. i’m going to be honest and say i really only liked pila. she is my baby girl. other than that i only really cared for yeeran’s story because i knew she was a sapphic baddie. other than that she was alright, and only really pila warmed me up even the slightest towards yeeran. lettle was intriguing, but her plot annoyed me most of the time, and the same goes for rayan. i liked lettle a bit more than rayan tho cuz she is a fellow disabled baddie. furi was interesting but she felt very surface level in her depth. and everyone else is irrelevant and/or uninteresting.

so what did i like about this book? i don’t really know. i did enjoy the romance and the world building. i liked how some of the plot twists were nicely set up, even if they were cringe imo.

i think this book had a lot of potential. i think i am just a hater because i couldn’t bond to any main character and plot elements kept breaking my immersion because i found them corny.

oh well, let’s hope i like the sequel more!

Content Warnings

Baby Blue by Bim Eriksson

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

thank you netgalley & fantagraphic books for a copy of this book in return for an honest review ! <3

i have to say, i liked this a lot more that i thought i would on first glance.

“baby blue” follows betty, as she is caught crying in public, and is captured by peacekeepers and administered treatment in this dystopian society. whilst undergoing this treatment, betty meets berina, a loud, brazen, and carefree lady, who betty instantly shares a connection with. together they explore the dark truths of their society, they explore the world of the resistance, and they explore each other.

now i have to say… i really didn’t like the art style at first. the art of betty almost makes her look grotesque, and the fact berina has a bunny-head really confused me at the beginning. but the more i read the art style started to grow on me, especially due to berina. ugh she’s so cute. i just had to get the hang of eriksson’s unique and zany art style, and whoo boy was it fun to look at.

now back to betty…. she was um…. a bit boring if im honest. she didn’t seem to have too much substance, especially compared to berina who was well fleshed out. i’m not too mad that betty was surface-level though as she acted as a great audience surrogate to introduce readers to the world of “baby blue”. shout out berina ugh i loved her. also shout out gay people i love gay people 🔥

the plot was pleasant. i felt like the story didn’t go anywhere at the start, and i was a bit worried, but once the resistance plot kicked off all my worries were erased. it was honestly great from that point onwards. no complaints about the plot. the only teeny tiny complaint i did have is that i wish the social commentary went deeper. topics were touched on but it didn’t feel like they were explored much deeper. but also this is a graphic novel so im not expecting mf crime and punishment or something in terms of social class. i think this is just a case of me being pedantic, but ill be honest and mention it because honestly that’s the only reason this wasn’t a 5-star for me ! if i was someone who rated on quality, easy 5-star.

lowkey this was great. this superseded my expectations, and i had a great time . it was fun, it was brutal, it was sad, it was joyous. it was a lovely experience.

Content Warnings

I Feed Her to the Beast and the Beast Is Me by Jamison Shea

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dark mysterious medium-paced

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

2.0

monkey covering eyes emoji 🙈

i’m actually so sad i didn’t like this more. this was one of my most looked forward to reads. i’ve been hanging to read this since 2023, and to not like it…. :(

i’m going to be honest — i had a lot of issues whilst reading this. i reserve 1-star ratings for books i positively despise, but honestly i can’t say what has bumped this up to 2-stars. i can’t think really of a single thing i liked. i guess i enjoyed the “female rage” type of aspect to laure? the fact she’s not a perfect MC was nice. the fact she wasn’t a shoe-in Y/N who was perfect at everything was nice to see, and the fact she didn’t really make apologies for getting what she wanted, however she did so, was also fun.

now… onto my list of grievances.

laure is so flat. she is not interesting. her only personality traits are her talking about the ballet, talking about being evil, and talking about getting revenge. she has no deeper substance. only really in the last chapters did she face any real character development.
the other characters are somehow even more flat than the MC. andor is probably the best written, but even then he feels generic. josephine, ciro, everyone at the ballet, etc…. nobody was giving me anything
the pacing was so off for most of the book. like why was the climax of the story finished with 30% left, then ANOTHER conflict arises and is dealt with in like two chapters, then the ending showing how the characters have changed was rushed. like why does one major conflict end with laure waking up. and then the rising action built up in said conflict just fizzles away as it doesnt automatically continue from when laure wakes up ! what is going on
there is no plot. the plot is for laure to do x at the ballet. and then she does. and then that is repeated like 4 times with almost verbatim dialogue, inner thoughts, resolution, etc. and then outside of that with acheron, the story has laure fucking about, then something happens, and then she fucks around a bit more, and then the resolution to all her questions is handed to her on a silver platter. like what???? why was the villain the one to tell laure their plan(s). the story focused so much on laure working out this “murder mystery”, and she did a terrible job!
everyone’s motivations in this were stupid. everyone in this story minus laure felt like they were going about the story with earplugs in and a blindfold. i get that ur characters need to be to some degree dumb, or else the plot would be over too soon, but my god, the decisions being made in this book were…. bad. unrealistic.
because the plot was unrealistic, the dialogue felt unrealistic. i could not get immersed in this at all, because i was constantly reminded of the multitude of issues plaguing this book.

sigh. i really would rather not have to point out all the issues i have with a book. i’d much rather sit here and be annoying and gush over the smallest things. but not even my immense want to love this book, i could not.

i cannot give you a good reason why i continued this. and also i cannot explain why i will read the next book. honestly i can’t even say im invested in what happens to laure. maybe its because i have hope the second book will be better? who knows. certainly i dont.

damn im annoyed i didn’t like this

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Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

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emotional reflective sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

so. what if i just. Yeah.
im so not good at writing reviews for books i actually adored. because Holy Shit. i knew storygraph's algorithm wouldnt let me down with this one /lh (i am crying over the ending Oh my God).
the opening chapters of this book were hard to understand. the worldbuilding is confusing to begin with, and honestly i had no idea what the fuck was happening. but once i worked it out.. baby it was smooth sailing. well not the actual book just the experience. the plot was fucking choppy waters for the characters but hey.
staxxx and thunwar... my baby girls. my sweetie pies. fuck. i love sapphics. i loved doomed sapphics. i am going to eat my own hand i already miss them.
also shout out to sai for being the trans nonbinary rep i didnt know i needed but i am so happy i got.
singer and craft... fuck. the sapphic story was for seeing the "positives" of the CAPE system, how bonds can grow and people can be redeemed in one way or another. but singer and craft's story? that was fucking brutal. poor craft. i know dude is a

rapist

so i dont have as much empathy for him as i did singer, but still.. holy fuck. Yeah.
the allusions to modern day prisons in america... the use of research only to fund the torture of the system... those who are innocent of their crimes in the CAPE program... the singer prison itself... influencers. all the references to modern-day america were bone chilling. especially the footnotes. my god. i especially loved the little tributes in the footnotes when a character died. wow.
i dont want to compare books, but this is the 2020's the hunger games. or squid games in novel form. because yet again it reminds us of how sick capitalism truly is, how sick the entertainment industry is, how sick the prison industrial system in america is, how sick racism is, how sick poverty is, how sick.
i dont think i'll be able to get this book out of my head for a while. not only was this amazingly written solely from a novel standpoint - where the characters were loveable, there were stakes, the writing was delectable, the plot was phenomenal - but it was amazingly written as a reflection of the real world.
just truly amazing. claps all around. god damn.

Content Warnings

Witchcraft: A History in Thirteen Trials by Marion Gibson

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dark informative sad slow-paced

2.0

um. this was. not a great reading experience for me.

i don’t really know what i was expecting. but i was quite bored.

the analyses felt quite surface level, the commentary on each “witch trial” became repetitive, there were numerous times where random tangents occurred such as the process of churning butter. what are we doing here.

i didn’t really enjoy the first part, as it was almost the same commentary repeated six times but slightly different. the second part was quite interesting, but idk something about the way this was written almost made everything boring.

the final part was the most interesting. hearing about modern day witchcraft in africa was incredibly fascinating yet horrifying. easily the best chapter. the final chapter talking about trump felt…… odd. the entire tone of the book changed for the final chapter and it felt completely random.

this wasn’t bad. obv it was insanely researched, and it was interesting getting to peak into the victim’s stories beyond “that’s a witch”. but this wasn’t a fun

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House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

5.0

and the crowd is overwhelmingly confused!!!!!!

ok i wrote that the minute i finished the book. i’ve let it sit, looked at some video essays (im not good at text analysis without some direction) & realised….. holy shit. Yeah. this was good. i can feel the hyperfixation brewing.

it’s been a while since a book has gripped me this much. it did take me a good while to get into this, simply because i was going into this that every word was important, that i should know what everything meant, that i should try and solve what everything meant then and there. after a while i realised “im not going to get this on my first go.” and after that i just. read. and after that point did i have a good time. i think for the first 20% of this book i had the mindset that i had to try and create theories and find patterns, etc. but after a while i realised that wasn’t happening… and ugh the experience became so much better. i think if i kept having that mindset i would’ve fuckjng hated my first read of this. i became addicted. before i would fall asleep i would think where the story had gone to, where the story could go, everything about every layer. not even trying to solve shit i was just recalling the plot as i snoozed. after a bit i fully felt like i was Consumed by this story. it’s all i could think about. i HAD to know what happened next. honestly after a while i felt like truant. (random lore dump but i promise it’ll make sense) but in 2022 i had short-term psychosis spurned from stress. i’m so serious when i say reading this book felt like i was back at that point mentally. not that i was hallucinating or paranoid in my daily life, but whilst reading the story, i felt like my emotions were mirroring truant’s descent, and honestly a book that can affect me THAT much???? props.

i adore books that play with formatting. books with mixed medias or books that really do anything out of the norm have my heart. but this? yeah this takes “playing with formatting” to a new level. to begin with i was super confused as to *why* for instance, i had to put the book up to a fucking mirror, or turn it upside down, but once i realised the formatting is mirroring what’s going on in the hallway….. same as the aircraft footnotes…. CHEFS KISS!!!!! i felt like i was a fucking genius simply reading through danielewski’s genius book. holy shit.

as you probably know because i mention it all the fucking time, but i am autistic. and holy shit is this book like crack to an autistic. it is prime for overanalysis. it is prime for conducting theories. it is prime for obsessing over to find patterns. it is prime for looking at the text for the umpteenth time and somehow finding something new every single time. i mean hell the fact there isn’t even a solid answer to the “true” fate/identity of zampano, truant, etc. is crazy to me!!! (in a good way). the ways to analyse this book are endless, and seriously that makes me so excited to read this again in the future. i’ve never been this excited to have the possibility of rereading a book. THAYS how good this book was.

i don’t think i can properly articulate just how fucking fantastic this book is. not only is the play with ergodic aspects so good, but even just the story following the navidson record is brilliant. the analyses in this book itself are brilliant. truant’s slow sanity slippage is brilliant. this book is brilliant.

i have no final comment because i don’t think i can ever have a final thought on this. there’s too many things in this book. holy shit go read this please

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clovetra's reviews 232 reviews

clovetra's reviews
232 reviews