“The Antidote” First Impressions *No Spoilers*

[SFFBC, Ancillary Mod]

Come talk about your initial, general impressions!

Please save all discussion of particulars, details from the story, character choices, plot questions, etc. for the full spoiler thread.

User-submitted content warnings on Storygraph for those who want them: https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/2...

(More about CWs here.)

[Kaia]

I started listening to the audiobook today, and wow, that prologue was certainly vivid. I'm about 40 minutes in now, and I'm certainly intrigued so far. It looks like there are a lot of different points of view, so I'm hoping that audio will work okay for me.

[aPriL does feral sometimes]

Strange but good.

[Mai]

The opening scene was brutal with the townspeople bludgeoning to death the jackrabbit population. I had to take a day off to digest the violence and gore. Notice that rabbits are coming up in other scenes as well.

[Becky]

Mai wrote: "The opening scene was brutal with the townspeople bludgeoning to death the jackrabbit population. I had to take a day off to digest the violence and gore. Notice that rabbits are coming up in other..."

This scene definitely disturbed me too, especially since it was based on reality. 😞

[Kaia]

I am really finding this book slow going, and it's not a short audiobook. In desperation yesterday, I started listening to one of the POV sections I find especially wearisome on 1.5 speed, and that helped a bit. I feel like the story is teetering around the edge of something interesting, so I hope we eventually get there.

[Becky]

Kaia wrote: "I am really finding this book slow going, and it's not a short audiobook. In desperation yesterday, I started listening to one of the POV sections I find especially wearisome on 1.5 speed, and that helped a bit. I feel like the story is teetering around the edge of something interesting, so I hope we eventually get there."

I made almost this exact same comment the other day in the Team Horror chat (minus the audiobook part, because I'm ebooking this one). I WISH I could listen at my usual speed. I might actually get somewhere with it.

But yeah, it definitely does feel like it's edging up to something interesting... but instead of that last step, it keeps edging sideways to drag it out.

[Kaia]

Becky wrote: "I made almost this exact same comment the other day in the Team Horror chat (minus the audiobook part, because I'm ebooking this one). I WISH I could listen at my usual speed. I might actually get somewhere with it.

I'm sorry you are also finding the book slow, Becky. I never speed up audiobooks because I usually listen while I'm doing other things, and I don't have the concentration to follow along with a faster voice. The funniest part of my experiment this time is that the narrator for this POV section reads so slowly, that when I put it on 1.5 speed, it mostly felt like a regular pace. The audiobook has multiple narrators, and I think part of my issue is that this particular narrator is also not a good match for me.

[Becky]

I listen to a lot of audiobooks, and generally average between 1.75x and 2x for the speed. I also HAVE to be doing something else - like cleaning or driving or walking or playing Candy Crush or whatever on my phone. Anything slower feels like slow-motion to me and I lose concentration. Undiagnosed ADHD FTW (probably) lol.

I'm not worried about liking or not liking it. I am not NOT liking it... it's just slow and meandering and I'm impatient. LOL

[aPriL does feral sometimes]

I also need to set audiobooks' speed to 1.5 or greater.

[Netanella]

Listing on 1x (regular) speed is like watching paint dry. Way too slow for my brain! :)

[Namita]

aPriL does feral sometimes wrote: "I also need to set audiobooks' speed to 1.5 or greater."

I do audio books at 1.5 to 1.8 - I can't listen to it at 1x, I'd go mental.

Waiting for the library for the book.

[Anthony]

Having read a couple of Karen Russell’s very interesting short stories, I’m excited to read this. And yes, the prologue is intense!