Review: A Memory Called Empire

A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Bloated and boring. That's what I felt throughout reading this book. It is possible I just wasn't in the mood. Future people, just look at the date of when this review was posted and you'll understand if were awake in history class. Regardless, I didn't care much for Memory or its empire. I didn't 'hate' this book. Hating it would require that it made me feel something. Everything was just grey and drab. It felt as if someone tried to rewrite Dune but left out every nuance that made it a masterpiece.

When I don't care much for a book, it's normally because of bad pacing or nothing happens. This isn't the case. In fact, I would defend it by stating it has excellent pacing. I would even state it's a cool story with cool ideas. It's just told in an insanely boring way. The prose are uninspired and I would need a nuclear reactor to generate any kind of feeling for the characters. I kept squeezing this stone for some blood but got nothing out of it.

There are some books out there I would fault people if they liked it. You know who you are. But this isn't one of them. My opinion of this book is a weird mix of knowing it's far from garbage but also wanting to cut myself while reading it just to feel something. You might like it. Which is good, because we need something to like from time to time.

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