264 pages
English language
Published April 5, 2022
When COVID-19 sweeps through New York City, Jamie Gray is stuck as a dead-end driver for food delivery apps. That is, until Jamie makes a delivery to an old acquaintance, Tom, who works at what he calls "an animal rights organization." Tom's team needs a last-minute grunt to handle things on their next field visit. Jamie, eager to do anything, immediately signs on.
What Tom doesn't tell Jamie is that the animals his team cares for are not here on Earth. Not our Earth, at least. In an alternate dimension, massive dinosaur-like creatures named Kaiju roam a warm and human-free world. They're the universe's largest and most dangerous panda and they're in trouble.
It's not just the Kaiju Preservation Society that's found its way to the alternate world. Others have, too--and their carelessness could cause millions back on our Earth to die.
It was a fun read with some really good moments. While I liked the background, the current events in the book felt a bit too forced. I also wanted to learn a lot more about the kaiju and their world.
Still, it was very entertaining and after having read a lot of trilogies and series in the past, it was refreshing to read a stand-alone book.
For me, this is a classic Scalzi oneshot book. Fun premise, snappy dialogue, snarky characters. There's a good quote in the Author's Note at the end about the process of writing this book, that I think describes the book really well:
As a writer I feel grateful to this novel, because writing it was restorative. KPS is not, and I say this with absolutely no slight intended, a brooding symphony of a novel. It’s a pop song. It’s meant to be light and catchy, with three minutes of hooks and choruses for you to sing along with, and then you’re done and you go on with your day, hopefully with a smile on your face.
I think that's both its strength and its weaknesses. It's not mind-blowing or overly complex--it's a nice snack of a book that doesn't overstay its welcome. I'm not sure it's what I'd consider a "Hugo …
For me, this is a classic Scalzi oneshot book. Fun premise, snappy dialogue, snarky characters. There's a good quote in the Author's Note at the end about the process of writing this book, that I think describes the book really well:
As a writer I feel grateful to this novel, because writing it was restorative. KPS is not, and I say this with absolutely no slight intended, a brooding symphony of a novel. It’s a pop song. It’s meant to be light and catchy, with three minutes of hooks and choruses for you to sing along with, and then you’re done and you go on with your day, hopefully with a smile on your face.
I think that's both its strength and its weaknesses. It's not mind-blowing or overly complex--it's a nice snack of a book that doesn't overstay its welcome. I'm not sure it's what I'd consider a "Hugo best novel" and I also wish it had about 300% more characterization by volume, but it was still a fun ride.
I read this a couple of days ago and, like every other Scalzi novel I’ve read, I remember mildly enjoying it but already forgotten most of it. I think the problem is that Scalzi isn’t a very visual or emotional writer and mostly tells his stories through snappy dialogue. Which he’s good at, but not in a way that sticks with me
I dunno, the concept was cool. On the other hand, every character had about the same personality, which wore thin as the book went on. It also suffered from what other reviewers have (accurately) termed a 'B-movie action plot' that was both shallow and predictable. Until this, I had been generally enjoying this book. It wasn't mind-blowing, but it was decently fun. Scalzi could have gone further, developed more and made something truly unique and worth recommending. Unfortunately, this just fell short.
This is written and set in late 2020. Much like Netflix' Glass Onion, it uses COVID in the backdrop, and then gets onto its main bit. This is about as much COVID as I want in a book.
Equally you get the feeling that Scalzi has a lot to say about US politics and is resisting only dropping a few things before getting back to his main hobby of dropping his favourite nerds in as backing mentions (or ship names in Old Man's War).
This was exactly the right amount of silly for me, I didn't quite get into Redshirts. It gets a bit close when they discuss how kaiju are tropes but then follows with a Peter-Hamilton-level exposition dump about how the pretend science works.
Who cares, there are kaiju, and also a bunch of characters who respect others' chosen pronouns. It's like a much snarkier Becky Chambers book.
3.5 stars Need a light sci-fi brain and soul break? Read my full review here.
3.5 stars Need a light sci-fi brain and soul break? Read my full review here.
What can I say? effing John Scalzi can write about almost anything and make it interesting and fun. Kaiju is no different.
The story is a basic three act plot and pretty much all the bad guys are noticable even if they aren't your mustache twirling bad guys.
There is nothing new (save for how the Kaiju exist in an alternate dimension) and I didn't like how they connected our world Godzilla movies to this alternate universe. This is just a fun book with fun characters.
