Reviews with content warning for Gun violence - Gearbreakers

Great book. But it doesn't actually have an ending. It just stops in a cliffhanger to force you to buy the second book. Which feels like such a scarcity mentality that the author won't have new good ideas for the next book. Or not trusting the readers to care enough about the characters and world to read a sequel. The time and heart that does into reading a novel should be honored with an ending. This kind of marketing ploy feels like a breaking of the fundamental agreement about how novels work. And now I don't trust the storyteller (really, the publisher, I assume) to take me safely to the end of the journey, and so I don't want to read any more of their stuff.

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lotten4's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny tense fast-paced

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

3.0

Different from other dystopian ya novels.

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yvonne_cl's review against another edition

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adventurous medium-paced

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

4.0

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paperbrownies's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad tense 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

5.0

am just,,,, v speechless
let me process it alright??

- lgbtqiap+, ya fantasy, scifi, sff, dystopian, found family, sapphic, romance, enemies to lovers, giant bots, angry girls, AM OBSESSED, 'a sapphic cyberpunk story, renegade kids w/ god complexes, korean/wasian rep '
- w|w
- asian-coded lesbian mc, asian-coded bi mc and other diverse characters

imagine the society of the anime no. 6 nestled in the world of pacific rim minus the kaijus, let nezumi have a family of misfits and an unhinged mentor + old sister, then make it sapphic, make it queer and put in large amounts of amazing and that pretty much sums up the book!!

i'll start with how i want eris shindani to adopt me into her family of gearbreakers even though ik for sure that i would not last long in that world.
gearbreakers is Everything you wanted a sapphic scifi to be: it is dark and brutal and vicious and had me in its grip the entire time i was reading it and when i was not, i was still thinking about it which is why when i tell you that that ending made me gasp in a six-of-crows ending way,,,, y'all better believe me!!! this story is beautiful still bc it manages to be tender under all its harshness and pull at one's heartstrings with its tender moments not just the ones between the MCs but also also the ones that involved the crew. id say that the author did the found family trope justice in this one.

as for the romance,,,,,, it had me on my knees.
i never knew that i needed to read about two girls so utterly smitten dance on a table with the steady warmth of the fireplace blanketing them both, i did not know how much i craved for this angsty-idiots-pining-for-each-other romance in my life until i read this book, and i sure as fuck wasnt prepared for this line:
" where is she?” i say, again, because we save each other, and i need to be saved."
their is nothing soft about their lives, it is uncertain and dangerous so they love, live and protect each other fiercely and just,,,, wow this book really did it, huh?
and after all of that,,,
zoe hana mikuta you are cruel /lh and this book makes me want to scream in pain, and want to protect these people i have come to care about more than anything else so even tho am terrified of what you are going to do in the sequel am excited nevertheless!!

tw: blood, death, guns, violence, murder, war, torture, off page death of parents, brief mention of the death of a loved one, grief, loss

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