The City We Became

I have another N.K. Jemisin book in my tbr pile, but I read this one first, from the library. It is the first book of hers that I heard about and wanted to read.

It was really good. I feel like I read this book at the right time. There is a lot of action lately to bring communities together to survive and potentially fight a "big bad." I feel like this book really gets the idea of community, but in a fantastical way. There is a familiar sense in the main goal of the characters. Luckily the story is fantasy and so, while much of this feels familiar, there is a distinct magical theme, almost comic bookish, that keeps the story from being too real.

The story reminds me a bit of Umbrella Academy. But, it is certainly its own thing. I'll leave it at that so I don't spoil anything.

“The City We Became,” by N.K. Jemisin, reminds me a lot of Neil Gaiman’s works. Not necessarily in prose, but certainly in worldbuilding. The concept of Avatars of cities, the power of stories and belief, and using old myths to spin modern fantasies, all certainly do.

The characters are all very well done, with each having a very distinct personality and perspective, and by extension give an interesting view of New York according to the author - a place I have admittedly never been (drive-through doesn’t count, I think). They also bounce off each other in interesting, dramatic, sometimes charming and sometimes tragic ways. I find the dynamics fascinating when the Characters ARE the setting.

That was aided in how I read this book - the audiobook version - which was an absolutely fantastic experience. The reader was able to give each character a very distinct voice, mannerism, and accent, and the occasional and subtle use of music or sound effects were also perfect. Never so obvious as to take me out of the story - it didn’t suddenly turn into a radio play - but rather just enough to emphasize the effect of the scene.

The plot is relatively straightforward, especially if you’re familiar with common sci-fi/fantasy concepts like multiverses, but it lays the groundwork for a thrilling and tense game of cat and mouse that kept me hooked the whole way through.

Also the messaging about misogyny, white supremacy, and the danger (and sometimes vulnerability) of those who embrace alienation and bigotry, are all on point, if perhaps a touch on the nose. I love how it also took Lovecraftian motifs and themes and turned them around to condemn the very ideology of people like Lovecraft. I love seeing that compelling mythos appropriated for good.

There isn’t any romance in the book, but it was still great to see queer representation, as well as BIPOC representation.

All together, I simply loved the book, and I highly recommend it. I can’t wait to start up the sequel!

A poetic urban fantasy with a taste of cosmic horror that functions as (yet another) love letter to New York city. The fundamental concepts, that cities can inhabit one of their denizens who function as their avatar and defend themselves from nefarious beings from across the multiverse, lay a grand stage but the mechanics didn't make much sense to me. There is a lot of hand waving that means you just have to roll with it, and combined with the decorative language it makes for a surreal read, the sort of thing I'd normally enjoy. It feels like the sort of thing that would adapt well to animation, or at least you can see how animation may have inspired it.

However, the book also functions as an intersectional feminist tract, employing an extremely diverse cast of characters and watching them wind each other up. The big bad is the personification of colonialism, gentrification and white supremacy and their broad remit somewhat dilutes the metaphor. There is a moment near the middle where Aislyn, the avatar for white suburbia, is dramatically humanised and it seems like the whole book is going to gel, but it dissolves into a series of melodramatic stand offs and ends with her left as the entry point for everything bad in the multiverse.

It doesn't help that I'm pretty sick of stories about miserable people being awful to each other in New York somehow being spun as charming and witty. The entire city appears to have been in denial about the abusive relationship it has with itself for decades and at this point it's just boring.

I wanted to like this and I think the idea of it is good and courageous, but ultimately it felt a bit preachy and tedious. A few good moments where there is a glimpse of its potential, but not a patch on the Broken Earth and I doubt I'll bother with the sequel.

This story will make such a great movie one day. Clearly cinematographic writing takes the reader through a fast-paced urban adventure. The main characters, city avatars, have been transformed into boroughs of New York. In other words, the City comes alive through the lives and bodies of Manny (Manhattan), Bronca (The Bronx), Brooklyn (Brooklyn), Padmini (Queens) and the primary avatar. They have to work together to defend the city against the invasion of a foreign being aiming to halt the growth and spirit of the city, and consequently cause conflict, pain and suffering. Aislyn (Staten Island), will find herself at a crossroads and have to choose which side she's on.

New York is the main character of this book, which is a complete whilrwind tour of a city under attack, but fighting back. Special appearances by avatars Sao Paulo and Hong Kong bring even more diversity to this urban mix of people, cultures and space. A wonderful urban fantasy to read!

Oh my. This book is so good! It's such a phenomenal subversion of Lovecraft's notion of horror while also being an excellent piece of Cosmic Horror that people have come to thoughouly associate with Lovecraft. The characters are vibrant and compelling, and so delightfully diverse! They are all very different people and it matters in the story, their diversity is a reflection of the diversity that is essential to the plot. This might be a go to example for me to point people to what meaningful diversity in characters looks like.

And the worldbuilding! I love it so much! What an incredibly cool and thought provoking was to construct a fictional reality. And I'm not entirely sure that it's all that fictional. The worldbuilding is born directly out of real problems and real struggles of communities. The birth of a city both invokes and evokes ideas that I'll be contemplating for awhile: What does it mean to belong to a place? What does it mean to be of it?