Jaime Leigh’s Reviews > Water Moon > Status Update

When I started reading this book, I immediately thought "this reminds me of the Starless Sea." I got nervous because not only did I not like that book but I had zero idea what happened in it. I understand the plot in this, but like that book, it has proven itself to be whimsical nonsense coated in hyper quotable sentences and "morally impactful" messages about life that just don't resonate in context.

Also, can we please all agree that Hana's dad is the absolute worst?

Someone else mentioned this in their review but there are some parts of this that are dark - like forcibly tattooing a baby's future on their whole body or them not having one and then getting taken away to be buried alive and become undead children/monsters. That is some dark stuff, but it's so not congruent with the rest of the tone of the book that it feels incredibly strange on off-putting.

This is the least earned, most uncomfortable sex scene I've read in a long time. Oophf.

Wait so you're telling me we took a detour from the action to sit in a convince store and then tell a different story about a lady giving birth in an elevator???
I'm so confused about this writing and pacing. It's less a story and more little disjointed vignettes.

You know a really good way to build tension? Stop in the middle and pivot to something totally different with zero urgency

I think it's the writing and not the narration but there is 0 tension in the "tense" scenes. Everything is both whimsical and also so, so flat. These characters feel like they were written by Libravox.

*movie narrator voice*
It was at this moment she new she wasn't going to like this.

There's a distinct pattern in how this is written
1. Problem is presented
2. They have to go to a mysterious place
3. Place is described and human makes some comment about his world
4. There's some brief meditation on humanity
5. They find the next piece to the mother puzzle which no one is thrilled to talk to them about
6. Drama ensues as new place and problem are presented.
Getting repetitive & hard to unnotice