Nostromo
2.0 Stars
4-20-2025

Yet another in the raft of prequel entries for this IP. To be honest I am not sure why they keep making these prequels, perhaps it is because of contractual obligations, like with Sony and the Spiderman franchise? In any case this book explains one more bit of a back story that never needed to be explained at all, and fills in one more bit of background in a painting that was already a complete and self-sufficient work of art. The content of this prequel is just as much of a dog's breakfast as it initial motivation; we are shown scenes and characters and different viewpoints, but it takes like 70% of the book before they ever resolve into anything approaching a story. I was left asking: who are the MC's? What is the plot supposed to be? Are we supposed to care about these characters, or be scornful of them? These seem like basic questions when writing a novel, but the author did not seem overly concerned with them. For much of the narration I had this feeling of "why are you telling me these things?" Which, again is a weird feeling to have when listening to a story. The audiobook narrator did not do the story any favors either; his reading was rapid, and seemingly irritable? irate? scornful? And again it had me questioning what is even going on here? If you dislike this activity so much, why not find a different occupation? Audiobook narration can't pay that well, can it? Because of the narration, passages that might be have been luxurious, or moving, or gently ironic, instead marched along this odd line of barely subdued hostility and judgement.

About 70% of the way through the book events finally started to cohere, and the novel reaches its climax of three men in a boat. The three men are each wildly different, and spend a perfectly dark and still night out on the water. This was ... ok, and reaching towards good. However the men were each very silly in their own way, and this kept the extended passage from being genuinely great. Which brings us to the isms. One of the men on the boat is Jewish, and oh boy does the author go to town on him. This is another theme through out the novel, with plenty of lines being tossed off about the quality of women's thought and the nature of the South American or of the Englishman. I looked up the author and it turns out he is Polish, so I feel like he is throwing a lot of shade for someone who is within slur distance.

Anyway, this was a novel. I'm not sure about the point of it, and I would not recommend it.