omnombailey's reviews
95 reviews

 I read this once sometime either in my senior year in high school or my freshman year of college. I read it on my own time and recalled loving it to pieces. As an adult, I didn't remember a damn thing about this book aside from younger!me loving it, so I opted for a reread.

It's truly fascinating to revisit an old favorite with more experience and wisdom than your younger self had. I resonated with The Bell Jar because it was one of those few stories which made me felt less alone. For all the books I was forced to read throughout high school and the plethora of characters I had to identify with, nothing struck as close to home as The Bell Jar had.

And it simultaneously pains and comforts me as an adult to know it still does.

There's something ephemeral about mental illness and I always felt poets captured that odd sensation better than most and with good reason - sometimes regular, structured prose fails to explain a sensation that is beyond conventional words. I'm sure plenty of people have or will read this book, who have never been depressed or anxious of manic a day in their lives, and not get it. As someone who continues to find balance with their fickle, elusive mind, I felt like I could have been Esther and Esther was me.

The prose is lovely, albeit too simple and unimaginative at times. It's great to see the subtle shifts in the narrative as Esther crumbles further into her depression. Her grandiose descriptions of everything and anything break down to barely comprehending the world around her. It's details like this that resonate with me while struggling with my own demons.

I will say that the first 25% left me wondering why I even liked this book to begin with. It takes some time to warm up to you and make sense as to what's going on, but it is a touch hard to settle into.

Sadly, this book is a culprit of "a product of its time" or whatever. I did not remember the blatant racism and fatphobia when I was younger; it freaking punched me in the face now. It was incredibly awful to read Esther describing these people as if they're not even human. Esther herself is described as a stick of a girl and when she gains twenty pounds later on, she says she looks like a pregnant woman. No you don't, sweetie. Can you just stop? If it wasn't for sections like this, I would've given this five stars.

Despite its flaws, this book remains an important book and it pains me that there haven't been many strides in the mental health community since this was published. Reading the sections about the various wards she was placed in alone reminded me that so little separated the standards from the 50s from what is in place now. A painful, yet cathartic read, but important nonetheless. 

 There's something extremely horrific and visceral and human about this book, perhaps even more so knowing it was published in the 70s and still remains plausible in this so-called modern day.

I'm not one for time travel stories, but I loved how it was used in this story. The whiplash Dana experienced with never knowing when she'd be pulled back was intense. And realized the only way she could return to the present was by extreme harm to herself was awful, yet eye-opening. This did feel less like a sci-fi story and more like a historical fiction story with a splash of fantasy.

The only thing that dampened my enjoyment while reading this was the prose itself. It was far too simple for my tastes and so many filler words and repetition got in the way of the actual narrative.

I'm not sure if this is the kind of story I'd recommend to friends because it's amazing and fun or whatever. It is, however, something I'd recommend for everyone to better understand the severity that lies within racism and violent circumstances made "normal" in our society. This isn't just a good book; it's an important book. 

 What a fantastic, refreshing read. I'm usually not one to read short stories, but this was such a treat and I loved almost every story (the few that I wasn't blown away by were mostly due to me not getting into the writing style of a few authors; their ideas still rocked nonetheless). I loved the range of queer characters and their stories along with the various time periods that were explored. It warmed my heart to see so many talented queer writers share stories that are clearly dear to their hearts. Not only has this opened my eyes to the possibilities of short story anthologies, but I've also acquired a laundry list of authors I NEED to dig into. Beautiful collection. Hands down one of my favorite things I've read this year so far. 

 So much better than vol 1. I loved the situations Carol was thrown into and the decisions she had to make because of them. And sometimes said decisions aren't always easy or simple or even good, but it's the right thing to do and that's very much Captain Marvel in a nutshell to me. Paired with some stellar art (another massive upgrade from vol 1, which was good, but not as great as this) and this made for a solid read. Can't wait to see where Carol goes from here. 

 What a refreshing, gorgeous read this was. I came into this knowing it was written by a queer author (bonus points for being nonbinary) and nothing else and I had such a hard time putting this down. Seriously the only reason it "took so long" according to my read dates was because I was at a convention for a chunk of that time and couldn't read. This took everything I'm so used to in traditional fantasy stories and shattered it. That combined with vivid, yet concise prose made for an interesting read. I love the setting, the magic, the introduction of technology in that mix. I love that it's not another copy-paste of white, medieval Europe. I love the thought that was put into how the society approaches gender (which made me tear up, because damn, why can't our society do that????).

On the downside, I didn't realize this was a novella versus a novel, so it's really short in comparison to what I'm used to. I do prefer stories where you can sit in a scene long enough to simmer in it, so to speak, and while this story didn't really do that, I still felt like I got a good sense of the setting, characters, and so forth. The pacing worked well, even for something so short. If anything, it made me super curious for more!

Reading this was like downing a cold glass of water after spending months wandering a desert. Now I never want to venture out into that desert again. I can't wait to read the rest of this series and any other books by Yang. 

 A great view of Carol's life and struggles post-civil war II. While it does a decent job with recapping and easing in new readers, it reads more like a continuation than a completely new storyline. Carol was the no-filter, "bitches get shit done" heroine I came here for. She's just trying to do what's right, even if it doesn't align with the rules. Really solid with a good hook into the next volume. Art is lovely too. The bold colors work well and I love seeing Carol depicted as a total badass. 

 What an abysmal book.

Before even diving into the narrative, the prose makes me wonder if an editor even made an attempt at looking this over. So much repetition. Did you know it's hot? Well guess what, you're going to find out every other paragraph, because that is quite literally how often things like that are brought up. This reads more like someone's first attempt at sci-fi without bothering to clean up the mess that was their first draft. And while I didn't mind the pacing, there were moments when the characters would keep talking and talking... and talking... and never get to the point. Really made it difficult to read.

Then there were the characters. The only one I remotely cared about died halfway through the book. It made sense for the plot, but yeah, I didn't care for anyone else. I more or less kept reading to see who else would die or be miserable in general. I don't expect there to be knights in shining armor in a dystopian book, but even the morally grey characters were meh. Did not care for Anderson. At all. I wanted Hock Seng to die two pages into his first POV chapter.

And then there's Emiko.... Sigh. I'm more furious with the author for taking a massive dump on all the female characters in this book, especially with Emiko. She could have been interesting. Instead she's first introduced via a rape scene and spends most of the book being miserable, clueless, and generally unlikeable.

Don't even get me started on the forced attraction between Anderson and Emiko. Gag me with a spoon.

There was some semblance of a story in here. I guess. You have to dig through all the worldbuilding overload to find something that makes sense and even then it isn't all that interesting. The only interesting part was literally the second to last chapter, which had me going, "OH SHIT" out loud, but that was it. I couldn't really tell you what it was actually about, but I could tell you that Bangkok is super hot. Like all the time. And everything is powered by springs. Also cheshire cats. And windups being unnatural and should die, but hot damn, they're super attractive.

To be fair, the world was interesting. There were some good ideas sprinkled throughout the story. That was it. Nothing to hold on its own, let alone with a threadbare narrative. Everything else was drivel pretending to be profound. 

 Let me preface this with that I am by no means the intended audience for this book. I read this for a book club for writers. I'm not into purely romance novels, let alone gay male-centric ones. I am, however, into mysteries and paranormal stories, but even that struggled to hold my interest throughout reading this.

What did I actually enjoy? The dialogue was great. Very witty and natural. I snickered a bunch thanks to Cicero's one-liners. The premise of the mystery is also interesting. Same with the witch and familiar elements.

Sadly, that was kind of it.

While the premise of the mystery was interesting, it was good, but predictable. As for the paranormal elements, it wasn't nearly as developed in terms of worldbuilding as most paranormal stories I have read. It almost came across like an afterthought during the editing phases, like Hawk decided during the third draft to make it about witches and familiars. Yes, it's a romance story, but there wasn't enough melding amongst the elements, thus making it come across like a poorly made grilled cheese with half of the cheese melted and the rest... well, not.

If this was a stage play, there'd be minimal to no stage design, because that's how the setting came across. For something as iconic as New York City in the late 1800s, you'd think there'd be a little bit more effort to make it feel like New York City with a dash of magic, but nope. I honestly forgot it took place in New York City half of the time.

Speaking of lacking, I was extremely disappointed in the lack of female characters. If the MWP is "swarming" with ladies, then why are two only introduced ever? One of which has less than five lines and the other one barely passes the sexy lamp test. And then there's Leona, who was so much more interesting than all of Cicero's friends and she only shows up twice with speaking lines? Three times if you don't include lines. And the last lady reveal - which I won't go into details, because spoilers - just made me so angry I almost threw my phone across the room. Yes, I get it, this a gay romance book and it should be about the gay romance, but I expect this kind of backhanded, lazy behavior towards female characters in fanfiction instead of an original, published novel. Come on now.

I didn't care for either Cicero or Tom, thus I didn't care about their romance. Cicero came across like a walking gay stereotype while Tom held my interest initially, then gradually became less and less interesting until he pissed me off with some things 2/3 into the book. I did like Cicero a bit more towards the end of the book, but not enough to forget the first impressions he left for the reader.

Even with all that said, it's not a horrible book. The prose wasn't stellar, but it was good enough. The plot was extremely rigid, but it held together enough. The pacing was almost too quick, but the chapters were sectioned off in reasonable bite-sizes. Nothing piqued my interest to read the rest of the series. I'm sure this appeals to some people - I'm just not even remotely close to being that person. 

 Such a refreshing read! Excellent characters with lovely art. A good balance of wit and emotions. Worldbuilding is something I love in graphic novels and this didn't disappoint; the blend of magic with science and technology in a medieval world was really fun to get lost in. I wish it was longer, especially with how fast the pacing is, but the story it told was amazing nonetheless. I also wish the physical book was formatted better. There's not enough room in the margins towards the spine and I had to really flatten the book to read it at times. Really enjoyed this. Not as memorable as I thought it was going to be, but it left me smiling and beyond content.