(no subject)

[skygiants]

So I picked up The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf, and immediately a pile of tropes out of the YA Dystopia of the Week fell straight on my head: Ashala is a member of the resistance! with superpowers! but she's been captured! and turned over to the dystopic government! by a mysteriously hot boy who infiltrated her resistance group and BETRAYED HER and she HATES him even though he's SUPER HOT with MYSTERIOUS MOTIVES!

BECCA: oh noooooo I can see the GRIMDARK and the BORING LOVE TRIANGLE looming around the corner AS WE SPEAK @___@

So I read on, glumly braced for the Standard YA Dystopia Plot to run its Standard YA Dystopia Course...

....but instead, I got:

- a heroine of Aboriginal descent -- written by an Aboriginal author -- with superpowers grounded in her heritage
- a plot that's about two levels more complex than it initially appears and revolves around the foresight, choices and agency of Ashala and her two best female rebel friends, The Brilliant And Ruthless One and The Creepy Little Girl Who Loves Spiders, so, I mean, well played appealing to character archetypes for me there
- in general, a sense of agency for pretty much everyone -- including, for a wonder, some sympathetic and useful government officials! what! I didn't know that was allowed in dystopic YA!
- overall, a worldview that explicitly rejects the entire grimdark trend and throws it out the window -- Ambelin Kwaymullina says in her author's note that the end of the world is also the beginning, and once you get through all the initial trappings of the current trends in YA literature, that sense of optimism, of the resurgence of the numinous, permeates the book the whole way through
- ....a boring romance. Well, you can't have everything.

(And, I mean, it's not a love triangle, and it's not rage-inducing, SO SURE, I'll take boring!)

I also really enjoyed the evil mind-control machine with the heart and soul of an adorable puppy dog.

Seriously, though, if you're going to pick up any dystopic YA of the recent crop, I'd absolutely recommend this one; unlike most of the rest, this actually hits the optimistic, team-building action-adventure that I'd like the post-apocalyptic trend to be, rather than what ... it generally actually is ....

(I mean, don't get me wrong, many of the others have given me great entertainment -- 'AND THEN THE PLAGUE-RIDDEN LAND GOT HIT BY ANOTHER, EVEN WORSE PLAGUE!' -- but reader cannot live on over-the-top hilarity alone.)

I will absolutely be reading the rest of the books in the series as soon as they become available.

Comments

[kate_nepveu]

Ebook sample sent to myself!

[skygiants]

:D

[genarti]

Ditto!

[shati]

I also really enjoyed the evil mind-control machine with the heart and soul of an adorable puppy dog.

(a) omg!, (b) like, literally? or.

[skygiants]

One of the helpful government officials is like "o I see, you broke in to destroy the evil machine! Well done!" and our heroine is like "I ... broke in ... totally to do that .... and not take it home and name it Fido at all .... yes. Right. Yes."

[hokuton_punch]

OH GOD. I NEED IT. *wishlists like whoa*

... I have a thing about AI okay don't judge me.

[skygiants]

For the record, there's not MUCH AI in this, but what there is is great, and hints at potentially more to come!

[rachelmanija]

I'm reading this for sure.

[skygiants]

Definitely do! I'll look forward to your thoughts. :D

[lacewood]

Is this meant to be a trilogy, or series-of-indeterminate-length? I mean, given the height of my TBR pile, I might as WELL wait for the series to be complete and read everything in a go, as opposed to "read first book now, wait forever for the rest" >_>

[vass]

It's a quartet. The second book's out already in Australia.

[lacewood]

Thanks for the note, it's good to know I won't have to wait TOO long XD

[skygiants]

Oh, I thought trilogy for some reason. Well, quartet is fine too.

[skygiants]

The bright side is it may potentially be easier for you to get ahold of than me, seeing it's being published on your side of the world!

[vass]

YAY PEOPLE ARE READING AND TALKING ABOUT THE TRIBE SERIES.

I've read the second book too, because the Australian edition came out earlier than the international edition. It's about Ember but still mostly from Ashala's POV and with more character development for her. (The romance is boring in that too.)

I love how Australian it is, how the physical geography is all basically "okay, all the continents fused into one big island continent LIKE AUSTRALIA, and most of the population lives in one of these cities LIKE AUSTRALIA'S CAPITAL CITIES..." And the Indigenous Australian protagonist's superpower is DREAMING. And calling the oppressed minority Illegals.

[skygiants]

Oh, lucky! I'm really looking forward to the second book -- I thought Ember was fascinating (but I'm also glad it's still mostly from Ashala's POV, because Ashala should remain the series protagonist.) (....though sadly I'm not surprised the romance is still boring. Connor Justin Justin Connor I Can't Remember Which Name Actually Comes First is just so overwhelmingly bland!)

hahahaha I loved that too. "This is an everycontinent! ... but look, y'all, it's totally Australia. LET'S NOT EVEN PRETEND." Australian-ness infuses the whole thing.

[oyceter]

a heroine of Aboriginal descent -- written by an Aboriginal author -- with superpowers grounded in her heritage

I was already sold by this line and then it just kept getting better! (Except the lukewarm romance, but ah well.)

[skygiants]

The best thing about the romance is that it's really kind of only there in the most perfunctory fashion. Like, the author is like "Ashala and Connor are SO INTO each other!" and you're like "...ok?" and then we go back to Ashala scheming with her friends or hanging out with sentient dinosaurs. (Relatedly: I can't believe I wrote this whole review and forgot to mention the sentient dinosaurs.)

[oyceter]

OMG there are sentient dinosaurs too?! AWESOME.