Too many characters, too many leaps, too many genres, and a rather distasteful ending. ( )

I have not finished this book, but I've had it for a month or so now and really have little interest in continuing. I may come back to it once I get out of this reading slump I'm in and don't have five million other books I'd rather read.

ANYWAY, I requested this book purely because it was a conglomeration of so many things, as my coworker said a "mad lib" fantasy book. Angels, aliens, magic, science/technology, and fantasy and medieval themes all make an appearance in this one book. Clearly, I was intrigued, and I knew it would take a lot to pull this kind of genre mash-up off and make it work, but I gave it a shot.
Yeah, it didn't work. I was confused and didn't understand what was going on despite the info-dumps that popped up every now and then. The writing wasn't enough to suck me in, and I don't care about any of the characters.
Like I said, maybe I'll return to it when I concentrate more on this one book and figuring it out. But right now I just don't have enough patience to finish it.

I have not finished this book, but I've had it for a month or so now and really have little interest in continuing. I may come back to it once I get out of this reading slump I'm in and don't have five million other books I'd rather read.

ANYWAY, I requested this book purely because it was a conglomeration of so many things, as my coworker said a "mad lib" fantasy book. Angels, aliens, magic, science/technology, and fantasy and medieval themes all make an appearance in this one book. Clearly, I was intrigued, and I knew it would take a lot to pull this kind of genre mash-up off and make it work, but I gave it a shot.
Yeah, it didn't work. I was confused and didn't understand what was going on despite the info-dumps that popped up every now and then. The writing wasn't enough to suck me in, and I don't care about any of the characters.
Like I said, maybe I'll return to it when I concentrate more on this one book and figuring it out. But right now I just don't have enough patience to finish it. ( )

Got this book as part of the Early Reviewer's program. The description sounded pretty interesting, if slightly outside of my usual reading sphere. Upon reading the actual book I've found the story itself to be.. disjointed, jarring, dry, dull. The characters are flat. While struggling through the first quarter of the book I described it to my husband as akin to reading stereo instructions: technical and very dry. I felt like it varied between over-explaining things that didn't seem to have much bearing on the story to skipping whole swaths of explanation about how the story progressed to it's current point. It seems like the fix for this was using quasi-flashbacks. But.. it just didn't work for me.

I struggled to get through the first 10% of this book and then just gave up. It's a confusing mix of sexist medieval fantasy, bizarre genetic sci-fi, strangely selective theology, with some cultural appropriation thrown in just to make it more unbearable. I am so tired of sci-fi and fantasy rehashing the same old tropes. I honestly wonder if it's Scientology fanfic, and I don't plan on finishing it. ( )