Inspection

"I bow down to this man, who puts the capital W in being a writer. "Inspection" was another hit for me, with such thought-provoking and vivid scenes I felt I could taste them. Although slow at the beginning (I wouldn't say I liked the Warren POV much) once the ball started rolling it kept gaining traction and I couldn't stop. You're tackling a pretty hefty job when trying to imagine what it would be like to meet a person of the opposite sex for the first time. Malerman CRUSHES IT, some of the writing is just purely exceptional. The crushing fear the children endure? SPOT ON! I think authors tend to underestimate how people would react to crazy hypothetical situations they are put in. Malerman plays it up perfectly, with vivid descriptions of a mind in turmoil, of a mind about to crack, of minds that do crack. I also applaud K who is an amazing MC to follow, Although J was too, he's quite weak when you compare him to K. K is the hero of this story and It's just another thing to love in my opinion. I liked the novel much more when the perspectives switched around the halfway mark. The ending was icing on the cake, 12-year-olds are FREAKING SCARY. - Do you think studies could show asexual humans being on average more productive members of society? Or is the sex appeal only part of the equation and the real distraction is the bonds we form with people in our lives? - What if the reality we hold close to is as fabricated as in this novel and more intelligent aliens are just using us for their experiment? - Books are one of the most powerful tools for and in opposition to misinformation."

"It was a very interesting and mysterious book. I really liked the idea. 🚨🚨spoilers 🚨🚨 I did not like the 12 year-old sex that happend or at least the insinuating of it, and I don't believe the kids could go all children of the corn on everybody like that there's just no way."

"After having more discussions with people after this book was released, I'm more frustrated by it than I already was, and I think my experience was closer to 2⭐ instead of 3⭐.<br/><br/>This is a difficult review to write since I have really mixed feelings on Inspection. I enjoyed some parts of it, and was quite annoyed by others.<br/><br/>Even if I don't always love the outcome, Josh Malerman always has creative concepts for his books. I was intrigued by the synopsis of this book, and a fair amount of the story was mysterious and held my attention. <br/><br/>I have to be so vague about my thoughts on this book because I don't want to spoil anything. My biggest issue with this book is that it's already outdated, and it hasn't even been released yet. If you've read the synopsis, then you know that boys and girls are separated while they're growing up. There's more that I can't go into, but it's completely illogical to not even address the possibility of homosexuality in this setting. Kids (even outside of this setting, even without being taught what sex is) can figure out what feels good, and could probably figure out that it would feel good if someone else did it, too. They are so obsessed with keeping boys and girls apart, but there's never any mention of what would happen if they liked each other. It's weird to pretend like it's not an option, and it threw off my enjoyment of the book. It doesn't make sense to never mention it, and it's an out of touch thought process. Gender is show in these neat little boxes, and there's no other option except to be one of two things. I hoped there would be more to the book than what the synopsis described, but I was wrong.<br/><br/>Some parts of this book dragged and got repetitive, but I still liked reading it for the most part. I was very interested to find out what was going on, but I didn't feel like the pay-off was enough. It felt like it could have been very sinister in the beginning, and then never really went to the horrific level that it could have. It just sort of flatlined up until the end, and then I couldn't really buy into the ending. That's all I'm going to say about it. <br/><br/>Overall, it was an interesting story, but I just had too many issues to fully get into it. The synopsis in my ARC called this a "sinister and evocative gender equality anthem", but I'm not sure who and what era this is supposed to be an equality anthem for, because it doesn't really work for 2019."

"Mixed feelings. It took forever for the story to go anywhere — the synopsis didn't fit until the second 50% of the book. I felt the ending was too convenient & unrealistic. But as an idea, and the way it explores an idea, I loved it."

"Couldn’t get into it. Gave up about a third of the way through. "

"oh. my. god. i didn’t know what to expect with this but i instantly fell in love with it! fav quote “women don’t distract…they inspire” "

"I read this book in a day, it's an insane ride and will have you feeling super disturbed at the end. I would try to elaborate but it'd spoil the best part"