The port city of Hainak is alive: its buildings, its fashion, even its weapons. But, after a devastating war and a sweeping biotech revolution, all its inhabitants want is peace, no one more so than Yat Jyn-Hok a reformed-thief-turned-cop who patrols the streets at night. Yat has been recently knocked down in rank after being caught at a gay bar, though her passion for her job is unabated. When she investigates the wrong murder, her fellow cops murder her; sadly for them, she wakes back up. Now in communion with mystic powers, Yat tries to save her city, despite a coming war and a strange pirate crew. The lush,corrupt Hainak has a lot in common with the Bangkok of The Windup Girl, and, like that novel, the plot of the Dawnhounds twists and turns with ecofuturism and the horror people unleash on each other. The wholly unneeded setup of a sequel diminishes the story, though, and Yat is easily the least interesting character in the book. Well worth a read, if not my favorite of the season.

I was so excited to read this book when I found it based on the cover and blurbs alone. "Fiercely queer?" Yes, please. A city built from mushrooms and other organic structures? Tell me more.

Immediately I was drawn in by the action. This plot moves quickly, and much of it is not explained right away. I am typically a character-driven reader so I really had to pay attention to keep up. The language in this book is so absorbing - almost poetic - that I decided it didn't matter and I had to keep going. Unlike in the character-focused novels to which I am accustomed, I didn't find myself getting to know Yat and Sen as much as following them along as Things Happened. And boy, did a lot of Things Happen!

The world in which Hainak exists is totally different from our own, but unfortunately with all too familiar social and political issues. Though not the best read if you're looking for escapism, this book is perfect for anyone who fantasizes about kicking homophobic butt with plant magic.

This story requires one to bring one's imagination. I experience some amount of aphantasia, so I felt I was missing out on imagining the world as vividly as the author intended (this probably won't be the case for most other readers). The world is totally original and creatively constructed. The story was told lyrically, almost rhythmically, with a writing style that will require forgiveness from more readers more strict about grammar.

I don't want to say too much more about this book. I went in knowing nothing other than the jacket summary. I recommend this for readers who enjoy setting- or language-focused books, and for anyone who requires excellent LGBTQ+ characters in their stories.

I was incredibly excited for this one, but ultimately ended up DNF’ing at page 100 because I was completely lost. I’d like to try again later, but for now I wasn’t ready for the multitudes of characters, the extensive world-building, and the fast-paced plot and timeline jumps. Again, I think it’s probably a nicely told story, but I just couldn’t figure it out and enjoy it so I decided to move on. I posted a pub day book feature on my Instagram, but will not be reviewing on my platforms.

This book was absolutely wild. I think I knew what was going on maybe a quarter of the time I was reading it. That's not to say I didn't enjoy it, because I definitely did.

This book is undoubtedly weird. It is confusing, filled to the brim with a million plot lines, and there were many times I was wondering if this was a sequel or part of a universe that I missed out on. The imagery in the writing was gorgeous, I have never pictured anything as vividly as I pictured the scenes in this novel.

If you like queer fantasy novels you'll love this, and if you like being confused during reading you'll like it even more.

Wow. I really didn't know what to expect when I started this book. I had never heard of it before when I came across it on NetGalley and thought the synopsis sounded interesting, but boy did it exceed any expectations I may have had for it. The Dawnhounds was an intriguing mixture of science fiction and fantasy with an interesting magic system and a corrupt political institution. Then add in animal gods who bring unsuspecting souls back to life to fight a war against dark and evil forces; Yat being the most recent addition to said army. Yat was shot in the head and left for dead, that is until a mystical monkey deity brought her back to life. On a mission to save her city, Hainak, Yat must learn to control her powers all the while navigating a corrupt government for which she was once a police officer for. Yat struggles to decipher friend from foe and is unable to trust herself with her newfound abilities, but is still desperate to save her home. The Dawnhounds was an interesting read, and although I did find myself confused at times with what was going on, I, overall, really enjoyed this book and look forward to the next story in the series.

Sascha Stronach is a Maori author from Wellington, New Zealand, but has also spent time in Malaysia, Indonesia, and Singapore, which are reflected some in the immensely creative The Dawnhounds. The Dawnhounds is set in a post-apocalyptic world with previous technology that seems to mirror our own, but their modern technology revolves around biomechanical plant and fungus. The story focuses on a former thief turned police officer, Yat, who has been banished to night shift due to her “delicate condition” of being bisexual. One evening she is murdered under some shady circumstances but is brought back to life by a monkey god and aided by a pirate crew; it is then her adventures truly begin. This might seem a lot going on, but I did not find the story difficult to follow and I still found Yat a sympathetic character despite the complex world building. This is Stronach’s debut novel and if you are like me you will be glad to know this is the first in a series.

3.50 Stars. This review is for the new 2022 edition. I think this book just took the lead for the ‘WTH did I just read’ award. This book is wonderfully queer, super weird, and I had no idea what was going on half the time. I don’t even know how to really classify this one. At first I thought it was more steampunk fantasy and I was getting a similar vibe to Elizabeth Watasin’s Dark Victorian series. Then there were “gifted” pirates that gave the book a more historic fantasy feel, and then the book almost turned sci-fi-ish with its mycelium sprouting city -and the only reason I even know what mycelia is is because I’m a geek and I watch 'Star Trek Discovery'. I guess in the end it was a bit of everything and if you asked me what this story was about, all I could really tell you is badass lady finds her badass lady match and together they try to save their city. Everything else that happened in-between, I’m not as sure about.

It’s always hard for me to decide if I actually like a book when I have no idea what really happened half the time. I heard a few people say that this had a similar “what is going on?’ feel that Harrow the Ninth had. I can’t speak to that as I‘m waiting for the whole series to be out before I read it, but if you enjoyed that book you might enjoy this one –so I’ve been told. What I ended up doing is I just powered through this book. The parts I could understand and the parts that were so cleverly imagined, I really enjoyed. The parts I was completely confused about, sometimes even random pages full of text that just froze my brain, I just figured that they could not have been that important and I just kept reading. On a good note, I was happy that most of the characters were pretty likeable and I loved that the main character turned into a total badass.

While I don’t really know what I just read, I think I liked it because I’ve decided I would read a sequel if one comes out. The main story is wrapped up but there are a few threads open –like the dead city and the witch’s promise – so there is plenty there for the author to work on if he wants to. This is a book I can’t really recommend, but I would not say stay away either. It is so weird, and hard to understand in parts, but also beautifully imagined with a good cast of queer characters. If you want to try something completely different and weird as hell, this might just be the book for you.

I don’t even know how to begin describing this book. It’s like mashing a noir detective novel with a queer pirate fantasy and adding in a dash of horror. It’s weird and sort of wonderful and while parts didn’t work for me, the ones that did worked really, really well. While this is the first in a series, enough is resolved to give it a very satisfactory ending.

Yat lived on the streets of Hainak after the death of her father, and joined the police force with the lofty goal of helping other kids like her. In reality, she’s been demoted for getting caught in a raid at a gay bar, feels demoralized by the corruption in the ranks, and lives paycheck to paycheck because of self-medicating with drugs to deal with her anxiety and PTSD. But after stumbling on a corpse and getting shot in the head, she mysteriously wakes up at the same place she died, with a strange new ability to sense the threads in all living things. She quickly realizes that something is wrong in Hainak. With the help of a pirate crew, her mentor on the force, and a very crooked cop, it’s up to Yat to stop a destructive force that’s been thousands of years in the making.

“Easier to just assume everybody was out to get you than assume otherwise and have them prove you wrong. If you accepted that the world would let you down, you could protect it without being surprised when it stung.”


Yat is a prickly sort of character. Scarred physically and mentally from the events of her childhood, she’s reluctant to let anyone get too close to her, whether that’s her mentor Sen or the stray cat that likes to visit her window. She’s beaten down by the various inequities of the city and the police force, but she still has a spark of trying to do the right thing. Hainak is her city, warts and all, and she loves it. A good chunk of the book revolves around the religious persecution of queer people (Yat is bi, and there are other gay and sapphic couples in the book) and how that’s affected the way she lives, the daily fear she lives with, as well as the company she eventually falls into. There’s a good collection of secondary characters as well, who all feel like their lives intersect with Yat’s but aren’t fully encompassed by the narrative. They have their own lives, needs and wants, as opposed to just existing to further Yat’s story. The chief among these is Sen, Yat’s mentor, who is the second POV character and a general world-weary cop who just wants to keep the “kids” – the new younger cops – safe. Sibbi, the pirate queen, was fun as well, and there’s several tantalizing hints about her past and the future scope of the next book.

“There is a pool at the roof of the world where the roots drink deep; the water has gone sour, and so the tree dreams in darkness. In the shadow of a mad iron god, my daughter lies dreaming.
Come here, little bird; somebody has broken you, but there is work to be done.”


The world building is original and fascinating, from the mushroom-based living houses to the magic system to the way the gods interfere and interact with the characters. It also takes bioterrorism to a whole new level. Building with metals is seen as unpatriotic, and alchemy, as it’s called, can be used to grow entire buildings or new limbs – or weapons like bullets that can literally burrow into your skin. However, it also caused some issues for me, as you’re dropped straight into the world without much reference. It took me about a third of the book before I finally felt like I had an idea of what was going on and was actually interested in the plot. The author is from New Zealand and there’s bits of Maori sprinkled throughout, so perhaps being more familiar with Kiwi geography and culture would’ve helped there.

“Funny how it’s monstrous to protect what’s yours, but only if a hero decides they want it. Funny who gets to call themselves a hero, too.”


There’s a lot of interesting big ideas in the book, enough that some aren’t as well developed as they should be. One of the ones I particularly liked was how the narrative plays with the idea of heroes, especially as it relates to law enforcement. It doesn’t hesitate to show the systemic corruption, how the characters themselves are complicit, and even has a creepy analogue to prison labor. But it also shows how the actions of a few, even those that society sweeps aside as being not enough or beneath notice, can make a difference.

Overall, this is a hard book to rate. It’s unique and engrossing in some ways, but it’s also uneven and hard to get into. So 3.5 stars, mostly because I’ll definitely be checking out the next book in the series.

I received an advance review copy of this book from NetGalley. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

The beginning of this book is a little slow, and it took until about the first third of the book was over before I really saw the world building. I really enjoyed the biotech inclusion in this world: the mycelium houses, nanos in the weapons, ships that come alive. The characters as well are more fleshed-out the farther you go and then more that are added in the better it gets.

My favorite part of all is just how many queer characters there are. It's mentioned pretty early on that the main character Yat is interested in both men and women, and that leads to a demotion of sorts. We go from a queer underground in the beginning (places for those with "delicate issues") to a diverse cast of our characters in no time at all. She gets to feel normal and accepted for the first time, and finds a safe place to grow into newfound powers.

The way the story was told was a little flat at times, but the story as a whole is a queer homecoming. I know what it is to be ostracized for who you are, only to fall in with a ragtag group and find who you were all along. I truly enjoyed Yat's journey.

I received a copy of this from NetGalley in return for an honest review.

There were some great things in this book that I enjoyed quite a lot. The author put a lot of work into the worldbuilding, to a point where the actual plot seemed to take a backseat. But the actual world was quite unique and fascinating. I don't think I have read a book that included tech, magic, and biology like this did. The mushrooms were really cool but I do wish we got more of them. The characters were also very well done. I loved the LGBTQ rep and the characters themselves felt fully fleshed out. However, that is where my enjoyment ended.

There was a fantastic prologue that gripped me right from the start. But I am so confused as to how this fit in with the rest of the book. I think this book suffered in the fact that there were too many ideas and none of them seemed to be fully explored. The ideas were there but the execution created a confusing mix of unfinished plotlines and hard to follow narrative. When I first finished the book, I thought that I may not have understood the plot or that I had accidentally skipped a chapter or two, but after reading other reviews, it seems like I am not the only one who was confused.

Overall, this was not a bad book by any means, I just think it felt a bit incomplete. It was short, while at the same time it was a slog since it was difficult to follow at times. I do wish that some of the ideas, like the immortality aspect as well as the gods attempting to cleanse the world. Both of those things, which felt like they should have been the main plot, were not explored nearly as much as I felt they needed to be. Many people have enjoyed this book, so perhaps this is just a case of a book that didn't work well for me.

The world created in Dawnhounds was definitely interesting and unique, and I liked the characters, yet I find myself with a bit of The Mixed Feelings™ about this one. So I shall tell you what worked for me, and what didn't quite hit as I had hoped. Let's begin!

What I Liked:

►As mentioned, the world was certainly unique! I mean, the houses were alive for goodness sake! I liked that the book addressed a lot of the failings in the story world that are also present in our world. For example, Yat being seen as "damaged" because of her sexuality, the corruption of the police, church, and government. I was definitely interested in the world, but I don't think I necessarily got all the answers I'd hoped for.

►I did like the characters, though I did feel a little distanced from them (more on that later). Yat was a really good character, at least during the parts I was able to figure out. I certainly rooted for her, and I appreciated that she knew how corrupt and unfair the police system was.

What I Had Trouble With:

►Confusion. Look, maybe it's me (though based on other reviews, I suspect not), but I was lost for huge chunks of this book. The book started off pretty exciting, but then took a big turn, and I think that is kind of where my confusion began. I rolled with it though, and sort of understood the beginning. But when the main character is resurrected (which we know is coming based on the synopsis), I didn't fully understand the workings behind it. I think since I was so lost on the plot, I became a little disconnected to the characters too. Not purposely, but when you can't really figure out why something is happening, obviously it's harder to feel connected to what the character is doing.

Bottom Line: I enjoyed the world and the characters and the messages, and this likely would have been a huge win had I been able to figure out what the heck was happening.

DNF 71%

This book is fascinating and confusing and amazing and intriguing. It’s sometimes hard to follow exactly what is going on because so much is secrets and unclear to the protagonists and the world building revelations are done in a way that doesn’t lend to complete comprehension of what’s going on. I can absolutely see the comp to Gideon the Ninth for that reason alone. And I was really enjoying this book when not completely befuddled. But it gets more graphic with body horror and creepy elements as the story progresses and the situation worsens, and it’s a little rough for me to continue. I think this story has a lot of potential and will absolutely work for people more drawn to horror than I am, but it’s hitting a rough spot for me so I’m having to set it aside despite wanting to know what’s going on and being drawn into these characters’ lives. There’s a good chance I’ll pick this back up at a later date because it is such a fascinating world that I strongly recommend to folks who enjoy creepy dread feelings in their reading experiences!

First and foremost thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.

Second, this book was a hundred percent up my street on paper; I was expecting so much out of it, but it fell kind of flat for me. Or perhaps it fell kind of all over the place. That's not to say it isn't GOOD; it's still great. I just expected a little more or maybe something a little different than what it was. The writing was great, I loved the characters, I loved the story, but parts of the plot seems like they've been mashed together in a way that felt jarring at times.

That being said, I really, really enjoyed the world itself and all the facets of the worldbuilding incorporated throughout. Will I read it again? I think so, yes. Perhaps after some time away and some time to chew things over will benefit my next reading experience. I mean, I did enjoy it overall!

4/5

HIGHLIGHTS
~a ship of magic-wielding pirates
~bin-chicken priests
~the houses are mushrooms
~fuck the police
~what would you do if you couldn’t die?

If I had to pitch The Dawnhounds to someone, it would probably go something like this: queer fungi-punk where dead gods and their unkillable paladins are going up against the cops, the church, and capitalism in general.

It is very fucking cool, and very fucking weird, and seriously, seriously awesome.

Yat is an ex-street kid, now a cop who was just busted down for being caught at a queer club. The world she lives in is extremely strange; Hainak, her city, is made up of living mushroom houses; the scariest guns shoot man-eating grubs instead of bullets; and tattoos have been supplanted (hah) by living greenery that’s merged into human bodies as self-expression. Yat herself is much easier to understand; she’s genuinely out to help people, and truly believes enforcing the rules will do that…but of course, it isn’t so, and dying and resurrection is nothing compared to having those scales fall from your eyes.

Sometimes doing what she could meant following the letter of the law and not one letter more.

Between the Maori influences and Stronach’s creative brilliance, The Dawnhounds has a ton going for it: magic-wielding pirates, sword-canes, sorceress-queens, drugs that make you telepathic, all the queerness you could possibly ask for. There are dead gods and mad gods and at least one god in hiding somewhere. There are conflicting histories, mysterious backstories, and a wonderful, enormous middle-finger to the police as an institution. I’ve seen this book described as noir a lot, and that’s not inaccurate, but I think by the end Dawnhounds has twisted into an entirely different shape and become hopepunk instead. I’m pretty sure the point of Dawnhounds is hopepunk, even if it doesn’t start out looking that way; there’s very much a message of, yep, the world’s fucked up – now what are you gonna do about it? Whereas my understanding of noir is that it’s cynical to the bitter end, and Dawnhounds just isn’t.

“A hero,” she said, “is a young man–and it is usually a man, though not always–who wishes to die loudly. They want everybody to look and say, ‘What a hero!’ and to be remembered. They read too many stories and get this idea in their heads that death is noble and beautiful and glorious. A hero is impatient to die, and in their impatience, they have a habit of taking ordinary folk down with them–after all, death is glorious, and that means killing is, too. Whether they succeed or fail, a hero is defined by death, that’s why I don’t let heroes on my ship. I’d rather teach my people how to live.”

There’s so much incredible imagination here, so many brilliant ideas and concepts that are like nothing I’ve ever seen before. It’s equal parts exciting and beautiful and strange, in the best way.

But it’s majorly frustrating, then, that most of those ideas and concepts are only glimpsed, not fully explored. Things are mentioned then never brought up again; hinted at but not explained. I wish The Dawnhounds had been twice as long so there’d been room to do more than just mention in passing that one character is a living repository for her people’s cultural knowledge, or explain what the hell the pirate captain’s sidequest was all about. Yes, this is the start of a series, so presumably lots of our questions will be answered later, but this feels more like the first half of a first book in a series, not the whole first book.

I read the first edition of The Dawnhounds way back when it was first published by a micropress, and I was excited when I learned it was going to be traditionally published – and expanded. Unfortunately, most of the ridiculously cool things that were cut from the first edition and put back in for this edition aren’t given the room they deserve. So what we get is incredibly tantalising and exciting, but it’s also more annoying than not getting them at all. Although the paperback is allegedly 352 pages, on my Kindle it was closer to 250. The Dawnhounds has been expanded, but not expanded nearly enough, in my opinion.

It occurred to her as she watched him that she did not find men beautiful by default, with women as a defect, nor did she move between men and women; the contours of the body mattered less than the way it moved, how gentle its arms looked, how it made her heartbeat quicken. She loved men and women, not men or women.

None of this stops me from really, really loving this book, and wanting absolutely everyone to read it. The Dawnhounds is both forerunner and game changer, ahead of the pack in so many ways and altering the literary landscape before said pack catch up. It feels ancient and brand new, coming out of left field and simultaneously inevitable, like something we’ve all been waiting for.

Stronach is one to watch, and The Dawnhounds is one not to miss.

**I was provided with an electronic ARC from the publisher (Saga Press) through NetGalley in exchange for honest review.**

Actual rating: 2.5

Sascha Stronach's award-winning novel The Dawnhounds comes to US markets with a new edit. Readers follow Yat, a constable who was recently demoted for being caught in a gay club. Old enemies threaten Yat's city, and with her reputation damaged, she must find a way to save the city she cares so deeply for. Even if that means teaming up with a pirate crew.

While the novel is marketed as fantasy, I found that there is a very heavy scifi influence and that, for once, the comp titles (Gideon the Ninth and Black Sun) were incredibly valid. The incredibly multi-layered narrative style accompanied by altering perspectives and a heavy basis in Maori mythology and legends form the basis of The Dawnhounds. Fortunately or unfortunately, this narrative style has the potential to either lose readers or lock them in very quickly. I can absolutely see this novel being one that produces a love-it-or-hate-it response, much in the way the comp titles did and do.

Where Gideon the Ninth tempers the confusion of the multi-layered narrative with humor and Black Sun has a beauty to the writing that carries a distinctive flow through the various perspectives, The Dawnhounds comes across as disjointed and has somewhat clunky transitions. However, the botanical/thread magic established seems incredibly cool, despite the limitations of the magic being somewhat soft and mutable. I would have wished for a more defined system for my personal tastes. I also really enjoyed the mythology as it was introduced, but again, felt that everything was a little more fast and loose than truly dialed in and deliberate.

I think, overall, this style just didn't mesh well with my preferences, but can absolutely see where others might have the potential to love it. I can also see where the series has room to grow, but after the mismatch of style to reader with this book, I do not anticipate continuing in the series.

I hope this novel finds its niche, as I do think it has good things that just need to take root.

It is a lot-characters, mythologies, technologies, themes, beings, bugs, and fungi. It's been compared to <em> Gideon the Ninth </em> but I disagree.. Gideon could be confusing regarding who was who and who did what, but as many have said before, I just found this confusing by being incohesive. I also 100% did not like the body horror. Had to skip all of those parts!
I did enjoy the worldbuilding-a weird and wonderful mix of mushrooms, metal, and wood and what they represented in this world. I also liked the good guys and the grace of second chances.

Thank you to Gallery Books and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

The Dawnhounds by Sascha Stronach is an #ownvoices Maori-inspired fantasy and police procedural. The story revolves around Yat Jyn-Hok, a cop in the futuristic port city of Hainak. One night, she comes across a cover-up and is subsequently murdered by fellow officers. Then, an ancient power resurrects her and gives her a magical ability. Can Yat use this power to protect Hainak from a growing evil?

Here is an enchanting excerpt from Chapter 2, which introduces us to Yat:

"Jyn Yat-Hok wiped sweat from her forehead. The weeks before the rains were the worst: climbing humidity, but not a drop of water from any of the Four Heavens. Even in the dead of night, it was too damn hot. A hawker grabbed at her arm and thrust a platter of bean cakes in her face. She flashed her badge at him, and suddenly he saw the boundless opportunities available in bothering somebody else.
Sergeant Yit Kanq-Sen walked beside her. He was a Garden City boy with an incomprehensible accent, who was wiry as an alley cat and infamously slippery in a fight. He whistled as they walked but didn’t say much. She enjoyed his company immensely. Despite his insistence on calling everybody “mate” and about ten different things a “f***een’ tinny,” he possessed a perishingly rare ability on the force: knowing when to shut up."

Overall, The Dawnhounds is a blend of fantasy and police procedural that will appeal to fans of P. Djeli Clark's A Master of Djinn or R. Morgan's Shadow of the City. It reminded me of those books, because this book is also centers around a police officer trying to solve a mystery in an urban environment with magic. I don't often come across books as original as this, so I love when I do.

I took off 2 stars, because somewhere along the way, I completely lost the plot and had no idea what was going on. It reminded me of reading the first few hundred pages of Crescent City, and trying to puzzle through all of the jargon and information of a new world, which was not a completely enjoyable experience. If you're intrigued by the excerpt above, or if you're a fan of fantasy books in general, you check out this book when it comes out in June!

I have had this book on my TBR for a few years, but when I heard the rerelease is even weirder and queerer and more indigenous, it shot up my TBR. And I’m very grateful I got the opportunity to read it, because Biopunk/New Weird in the vein of Vandermeer with mushrooms and queer pirates and some noir vibes early on is exactly up my alley. And it was a shockingly fast and easy read, too – I finished it in two sittings.

Yat is a cop, recently demoted for having been caught at a gay bar. She’s also a drug addict living paycheck to paycheck and one night, while stumbling home high, she happens upon a corpse – and is immediately shot in the head by two officers herself. Except she doesn’t stay dead. And develops strange magic. And falls in with a crew of pirates. And many other things that I do not want to spoil.

The main star of this book is definitely the worldbuilding. Something happened and now metal is taboo and biological technology reigns. Houses are grown from mushrooms, people can have lost limbs regrown, though there are also more terrifying applications of alchemy, like guns that shoot grubs that burrow under your skin or criminals being turned into mindless slaves. There’s also political turmoil with homophobic conservatives in power and a cult of bird priests (derogatorily called bin chickens because of the ibis masks – the one New Zealand/Australian reference I did get) making trouble. It’s not a very pleasant world, but it’s a very interesting one. Though the tone never gets too dark or oppressive.

I also liked that the issue of the MC being a cop is very much addressed – the systemic flaws, people being blanked en masse because places need slave workforce, there being no good cops in the end, etc. Yat may have good intentions, but we all know what the road to hell is paved with.

If there is a fault, it’s that the book has a little too much going on and tries to do too much at the same time, so some things get a little lost. It’s far from a fatal flaw and doesn’t really bog it down, but I did wish at points it’d jump from place to place and subplot to subplot a little less rapidly, give some time to breathe and for the full weight of things to set in.

But either way, it’s a book I recommend most highly and I can’t wait for the sequel.

Intelligent and innovative, but also highly confusing. The protagonists live a post-apocalyptic bioengineered future in which cities are grown from giant mushrooms and godlike creatures gift unimaginable powers to human avatars. I loved the blend of science and magic that this story toys with. There’s certainly clearly a level of technology and engineering involved, fueling the cyberpunk ambiance and eco-noir (is that a genre? I’m making it a genre) tone. However, there’s also heavy influences of religion and mysticism that suggest deus ex machina at play, particularly when it comes to the sheer, world-bending power some of the characters evidence.

The themes of this novel are heavy but poignant: the characters struggle against homophobia and self-denial, and a central theme of the story is corruption in the police force as the two cop protagonists are faced with the horrific injustice and hypocrisy present in their system.

Why, then, does this merit only three stars? Because when you look beyond the high concept and compelling thematic elements, things start to fall apart. The plot sometimes feels like more holes than substance, with POVs switching and tantalizing concepts going unexplored. There were chapters where I had to flip back because I was convinced I’d missed a crucial section. This was most prominent in the last quarter of the book, where the cause of the central conflict isn’t explained until ridiculously far along into the conclusion. With some heavy editing this story could have knocked it out of the park, but without satisfying narrative cohesion I felt cheated out of what could have been an excellent story.

I was given an eArc of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This book just doesn't quite work. Like on paper this should be a five star book for me, two of my favorite books I've read this year are Fatherland and Automatous of which this is an interesting fusion. It's a bio-punk future and our main character is a bi "good" cop who by the end of the story realizes there's no such thing as good cops and runs with a band of magical gay pirates. This should be a winner for me!

But no part of this book works. The characters feel really flat. The plot has too many moving parts and is difficult to follow, plot important side characters get too little screen time making reveals and deaths fall short. There's simultaneously too much and too little exposition. I couldn't tell what time period the story took place in but characters repeatedly stated their feelings in ways that felt unnatural. It just didn't work.