cassia wrote a review...
Arboreality is such a wonderful read with surprising depth given its length. It's a series of short stories tied together at the end - a format that works really well with getting that payoff, but also left some holes in my opinion.
This book is about catastrophe, humanity, resilience, and community. It uses its fantastic scientific premise - an imagining of the limits of botany - to explore how we find meaning in minutia, as each of the characters in turn prioritises what's important to them to try to keep things good for generations to come.
These characters were excellent - I found myself wishing that the entire book was about each of the short stories. This did end up proving to be a double-edged sword - it often felt like I just got connected to a character, only for them to be gone.
Loved this book!
cassia finished a book

Arboreality
Rebecca Campbell
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Night Roll
Michael J. DeLuca
Post from the Arboreality forum
cassia commented on a post
Iām trying to frame this Novella as a story of the trees because I canāt seem to connect to any of the characters (and honestly have trouble holding them all in my mind as separate people. I think Iām blending them because theyāre all essentially in the same emotional state).
I can tell itās good writing. I know it won awards. Itās clearly short. Yet, itās not touching my feelings or feeling like beautiful writing to my personal taste.
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Islandia
Austin Tappan Wright
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Arboreality
Rebecca Campbell
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A Parade of Horribles
Matt Dinniman
cassia wrote a review...
I've reviewed so many of these in such a short time that they're kind of blending together but this is best one of the series so far imo. The pacing is good, the twists are fun, the characters shine and they make you care. I cried like 6 times reading this somehow, in between my fun fast-paced seat-of-your-pants wild ride. Loving this series.
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This Inevitable Ruin
Matt Dinniman
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Snow Crash
Neal Stephenson
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cassia commented on cassia's review of Ghost Cities
I was debating over whether or not to give this 5 stars - the first half of the book is incredible, but I felt it maybe left part 2 with a lot of heavy lifting to do to wrap things up.
For a magical realism book, it's SO funny. This is a book that's about art and creation and culture. I loved the interwoven narratives, though I think some people will find the "ancient" timeline hard to follow.
There is an element in the romance here that could feel a bit unearned - but I also think that's kind of the point. A major theme in this book is how culture assigns us roles to play, and our main characters need to play theirs. The love interest is also based on the author's wife, which is very sweet.
Anyway where I'm getting with this is: the satire is on point, the characters were vivid, the prose was excellent - I just loved this book. There's so much care for art, history, and culture. I think some people will struggle with it, but I need more people to read it to discuss it with!