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A review by thewiserslone
The Atlas Complex by Olivie Blake
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
3 Star
OOF. If I had to pick one word to describe this book, it's CONVOLUTED. I consider myself an intelligent person, and worm holes and time travel and quantum physics aside, the basic plot of this book is SO difficult to follow for no reason.
In her Author's Acknowledgement at the end, Blake mentions that she set out to write this story with "the characters being the plot." I think she greatly accomplishes this in the first book. Not much really happened, but the characters where very authentic and realized, and I thoroughly enjoyed the vibes of the Atlas Six.
In the Atlas Paradox, the story got expertly convoluted in a lot of BIG science and philosophy that lost the vibe of a being a character driven story. I had to force myself to finish it, and if wasn't for the very last page, I probably would not have picked up the third book to read the story's conclusion.
Plot holes aside, one of my biggest icks from this book was the CONSTANT repetition. Both of thoughts/points, and literal words. I get what she was going for, but the more you say "What else will you break Ms. Rhodes" the more I clearly understand the answer is "literally everything" and the less I will care when it happens because I'm so annoyed with all the talk and none of the show. I also felt like some of the character development was severely rushed this book to give some of these characters redemption. But honestly, I didn't WANT redemption. I wanted it to stay a scathing critique that some people (especially those born into privilege) can just be garbage humans. There was also WAY too many additional POVs this book. Six is already a lot, all the one-off additional POVs slapped me out of the story too often.
The single redeeming quality is the audio narration. All but one of the OG six narrators came back for this story (and I dearly missed the original narrator for Parisa, her vocal fry was exactly how I personified Parisa in my head) and they were all excellent in portraying the characters in audio form.
If I had one recommendation, it would be to read The Atlas Six as a standalone in the fall *just* for the dark academia vibes, and pretend the rest of the series doesn't exist.
OOF. If I had to pick one word to describe this book, it's CONVOLUTED. I consider myself an intelligent person, and worm holes and time travel and quantum physics aside, the basic plot of this book is SO difficult to follow for no reason.
In her Author's Acknowledgement at the end, Blake mentions that she set out to write this story with "the characters being the plot." I think she greatly accomplishes this in the first book. Not much really happened, but the characters where very authentic and realized, and I thoroughly enjoyed the vibes of the Atlas Six.
In the Atlas Paradox, the story got expertly convoluted in a lot of BIG science and philosophy that lost the vibe of a being a character driven story. I had to force myself to finish it, and if wasn't for the very last page, I probably would not have picked up the third book to read the story's conclusion.
Plot holes aside, one of my biggest icks from this book was the CONSTANT repetition. Both of thoughts/points, and literal words. I get what she was going for, but the more you say "What else will you break Ms. Rhodes" the more I clearly understand the answer is "literally everything" and the less I will care when it happens because I'm so annoyed with all the talk and none of the show. I also felt like some of the character development was severely rushed this book to give some of these characters redemption. But honestly, I didn't WANT redemption. I wanted it to stay a scathing critique that some people (especially those born into privilege) can just be garbage humans. There was also WAY too many additional POVs this book. Six is already a lot, all the one-off additional POVs slapped me out of the story too often.
The single redeeming quality is the audio narration. All but one of the OG six narrators came back for this story (and I dearly missed the original narrator for Parisa, her vocal fry was exactly how I personified Parisa in my head) and they were all excellent in portraying the characters in audio form.
If I had one recommendation, it would be to read The Atlas Six as a standalone in the fall *just* for the dark academia vibes, and pretend the rest of the series doesn't exist.