for some reason on an over populated earth, girls are shipped off to a distance planet, or something and join gangs. ( )

DNF at 31%. It took me three and a half weeks to get this far, and I just couldn't bear it anymore. Not when goodies like Women Talking and Exit, Pursued by a Bear are burning a hole in my Kindle.

Normally I'd blame this on a reading slump - and, to be fair, I am rather preoccupied with an upcoming cross-country move - but really, I've come to realize that's a cop-out, because I hate writing critical book reviews. That is, as long as there's nothing egregiously offensive to really earn my ire. Aside from some gendered slurs - twat, pussy, etc. - which get double-side eye from me when penned by a male author, I wasn't really insulted, just bored. (Though I do agree with other readers' assessments of Hurley Girley, the would-be sexual predator. I suspect I was too disinterested to get as worked up as I might have otherwise.)

Many of the book's elements - an off-world, all-female penal colony (hello, Bitch Planet!), girl gangs, Amazonian cannibals, political intrigue, asexual and lesbian characters, an all-female presidential ticket, political corruption - are right up my alley. In theory, I should have loved Daughters of Forgotten Light. But it just felt like the author was trying too hard: at being edgy, yeah, but also in general. Like, for example, the descriptors, which felt hecka clumsy and cringe-worthy:

"Sharp shoes clicked down the hall, sounding like a deranged tap dancer shuffling off to eternity."

"Her eyes bulged like some junkie on high."

"She kept her eyes on the Amazons cooing over the baby, something Norman Rockwell would have painted if he were schizophrenic and dropping acid."

"thundertwats"

(I'll let that last one sink in.)

...........

Aside from this, the writing felt tedious and drawn out. What can I say, it wore me down. At the end of the day, not even the promise of Amazon biker chicks maybe feasting on soft baby thighs (or feeding said baby someone else's soft tender thighs) was enough to keep me going. *shrug* ( )

I read a galley and blurbed it. ( )