not a bad fantasy-suspense-romance but i think in hindsight, this would have been a good one for me to dnf. i was lured in by the historical queerness of the summary, which was present, but the focus of the book was very much more on the murderous island than i was expecting.

it also massively struggled with pacing; the action would reach a peak and then the author would slam the doors on it by throwing in several chapters of flashbacks or dreams or something. it felt like this happened almost every time the action was ramping up, and i got really tired of it. plus after about 50%, it's non-stop, break-neck action until the very end, giving the characters almost no time to process their trauma or have a full conversation.

then there was the repetition. there's one section of the plot where the characters escape from a clay tomb into a tunnel, from the tunnel into a pit, from a pit into a cavern, from a cavern into cave, from a cave into another cave, before making their way out again. it was like seeing the same exact jumpscare six times in a row.

i will also say that this is almost strictly a romance and not anything spicier, if that makes a difference to you. the characters almost exclusively think and talk about kissing and/or being together romantically, and there might be like one or two vague sentences where they consider anything more spicy than that. the real graphic content was body horror of the surgical/medical variety.

teenager-led revolutions are not generally my thing, and i'm of two minds about how i feel about this one. on one hand, i did not like the MC for the majority of the novel; for at least the first 50%, she's borderline sociopathic and outright xenophobic and obsessed with competition to the point where her only friend is her brother. there were a LOT of high stakes situations involving things like mass genocide, suicide, homicide, institutionally-supported rape and sexual assault and misogyny, etc. and there was a lot of air-time given to the obscenely fascist/eugenicist ideals at the foundation of gaea station, which sucked to read.

but on the other hand, this is a story about deconstructing those ideals and coming to terms with the harm that you've done by merely believing them. the MC does have an arc toward empathy and sensitivity and deep compassion for the people she'd blindly been taught to hate. on the whole, i think this book is really hopeful about those who are caught up in the manipulation and greed of their leaders. all it takes is caring more about someone other than yourself.

the queer awakenings and mental health conversations were also very sweet, once kyr got her head out of her ass for two seconds. no matter what happens between her and yiso, (a)romantically or platonically or (a)sexually, i am ROOTING for them. now that's a slow burn that i can get behind. mags, on the other hand, needs to find another man STAT.

incredible character work, as always. incredible mystery and crime drama details as well, there were some things i saw coming and some things that had me punching the air. the tension was SO good, the wit and banter, i just loved it. 

one thing about kjc is that she's gonna write an uptight police/soldier-type and then slowly have them descend into huge ACAB territory by the end, and i really fw that.