simonator's reviews
159 reviews

Fantastic. Improvements in bringing the sensory and emotional impact of the monumental events in the plot closer to the reader. 

Masterful in technique, structure, and emotional punch. 

Really disliked the book's first three chapters. Its biggest weakness it its treatment of characters; instead of using the plot to illustrate the protagonist by her choices, words, and attitude, the writer is constantly spelling out the character analysis for the reader. The interpretation follows in step to the description. It's like the writer wanted to avoid at all costs that the readers might misinterpret her deep message by explaining it all right away - the (often on-the-nose) symbology, the narrative parallels to other works of literature, and the recurring themes. The great irony is that the central character concept, one should say, is actually not that interesting. For the first three chapters, she remains what is essentially the daydream product of a bored urbanist who envisions an inexplicably intelligent, whimsical, ultimately unremarkable, "totally-not-like-the-other-girls" girl. Infuriatingly, while the book's narrative (quite entertainingly) switches between a dinner party in 2016 and the protagonist's uni years in Oxford (where else) with the protagonist's personality fundamentally changed between the two temporal settings, it never actually becomes clear how exactly the central character became who she became. Thus, the character study, spelt out and dissected by the writer herself, fails. 

Other issues pertain to the book's central themes of certainty and uncertainty in the face of the divine (ironic, given how little uncertainty the writer allows for regarding her character concepts). The book wants to explore the liminal spaces of sceptical belief, faithful atheism, and the mystics of poetry and spirituality. Unfortunately, for most parts, the result is merely a vague, un-defined, superficial mélange of esotericism, providing no answers and little emotional echo. There are some discussions that touch upon some interesting aspects of the meeting of beliefs in modern Europe and Turkey, which go to the book's credit, but they don't save it from its mass of triviality. 
Other themes concern Istanbul and its relation to Europe, modernity, Islamism, the Middle East, and secularism. The writer's experience enables her to comment here competently, but I learned little new, and frankly, other Turkish writers have explored these themes at great length, too, and with some greater depth. 

The book's final fourth chapter carries some significant merit, though. While the unfortunate trend of over-explaining themes and characters continues, some expectations of the plot's conclusion are subverted, the ending is unexpected, and the parallel drawn (and explained in detail) between loving someone and believing in God is actually somewhat touching and reconciled me somewhat with the time invested in reading this kind-of-too-long book. 

All in all, this read like a writer's first novel (it isn't though), and, I regret to say, like written for Western fans of esotericism, Istanbul's "exotic" flair and Oxford's privileged classiness, and the study of womanhood, but from a psychological surgeon's perspective.

Nice refresher, but for it's brevity, it leaves out some information that I would deem essential, especially in the years preceding 1948. Spends great care at maintaining objective, "neutral" language, but records history factually and truthfully - so the facts speak a clear story of oppressive occupation. 

Exceptionally clear explanation of Marxian economics. Still reads very well. 

A challenging and sweeping genealogy of the political conceptualisations of money. Especially the first few chapters took ages to dig through. But the depth of thought and research behind this is impressive.

Trotz des pentratenten Denglisch mit all dem korrekten Wokejargon hats jetzt keine grossen Gedanken angeregt. Ja, Weisse mit Dreads sind scheisse und Fusion ist cringe. Und jetzt? 

Stunning installment in an already excellent series. The writers understand two writing rules very well: One, 'intricate personalities do not make for engaging characters - their decisions do'. And this story was entirely driven by a set of characters making understandable, human choices faced with asymmetrical information, warped perceptions, and a hostile environment. The "villains", too, did what they did in the same framework as the more sympathetic characters and were thus entirely believable. Two, 'never let a coincidence be a good thing for your cast - only a bad thing'. The way the characters' choices and increasingly dangerous set environment cascaded together into an unpredictable, breathtaking and fast-paced plot was masterful. I couldn't put it down. 

There is one weakness persisting from the previous books that is keeping this from a perfect score. The plot deals with the profoundly unnerving and eldritch experience of alien life and touching down on an unknown planet. While there was some improvement over the previous book, the feeling of otherworldliness and strangeness just doesn't quite manifest.  I believe this is due to the writers' focus on dialogue and blockbuster-action. The plus side of this is that the writers got much better at crafting truly snappy and funny dialogue that feels less hollywood-y than in the first few books.