The All-Consuming World redefines the word page-turner - the plot races at a whirlwind pace, its permutable rabble of ragtag protagonists playing one reckless risk after another, running against the perils that plague them at a rate of knots. Introducing us to a compellingly eccentric cosmos of corrupt AIs, custom-made cyborgs and avenging clones, Cassandra Khaw artfully evades the catch of infodumping, crafting an eclectic cast of casualty-prone, expletive-loving characters. And how can I articulate how aweing the action-packed, allusion-heavy writing is?

The enduring associates of the Dirty Dozen left alive - centering on Maya, Rita, Ayane, Elise, Verdigris, and Constance - are an energetically animated company, a diverse cluster of cyberpunks that defy death - and the devouring designs of the advancing ageships - and crush expectations with each curveball. Every adventure-rich chapter and chancy endeavour clutches you with edge-of-your-seat anticipation, eager to clock how the audacious choices and electrifying incidents the cabal get ensnared in will end, but perhaps most astounding is the acute, pulls-no-punches and tolerates-no-stereotypes portrayal of truisms about trauma and abuse. Serving state-of-the-art sci-fi, an assortment of nimble-witted name-dropping and a snazzy array of narrative styles, this short-ish novel is absorbing all around, from its scintillating verbalizations to the sharp veneer of the vindications it shadows - add it to your shelves ASAP!

Thank you to NetGalley and Erewhon Books for kindly passing on this ARC!

Having never read Cassandra Khaw’s work before, I was absolutely drawn immediately to their debut novel <i>The All-Consuming World;</i> beyond its gorgeous cover, a book promising a “band of dangerous women, half-clone and half-machine, [who] must battle their own traumas and a universe of sapient ageships who want them dead, in order to settle their affairs once and for all” was <i>clearly</i> something I was going to read. I’m glad I did.
I like Khaw’s writing style, and I feel like the fact that they’re a video game writer really shows here (in a good way, in terms of the level of excitement and the ability to create an entire self-contained world). While in places it is, as far as I’m concerned, too wordy and verbose, overall, the immediate, visceral, descriptive writing very much suited the genre of the book. The universe Khaw has created is compelling and I would totally read another book set within it. The descriptions of the characters’ backstories were interesting and the characters themselves were complex; the ways that they <spoiler>could come back to life after having been killed initially really reminded me of cylons in the newer Battlestar Galactica, though it was ultimately quite a bit more complicated than this.</spoiler> I found the plot kept me interested, though ultimately I think that the plot is secondary to the writing and character development.
I will say that I’m completely baffled by the comparison to Le Guin in the book’s description – as another reviewer has mentioned, I do think a comparison to Tamsyn Muir’s Locked Tomb trilogy makes much more sense to me and I would readily recommend this book to someone who enjoyed that series.
Thank you so much to Erewhon Books + NetGalley for providing an ARC.
<i>Content warning:</i> gore + body horror, violence, surgery without anaesthetic, abuse in relationships

First, the obligatory “My God, LOOK AT THAT COVER” moment. Go ahead, take a few, they’re free.

DISCLAIMER! Cassandra Khaw’s new novel The All-Consuming World does not actually come out until August 21. I found out that copies of this and her other upcoming book were available through Netgalley the other day and jumped, immediately, and got lucky, and then rearranged my reading schedule so I could get to it as quickly as I could. I have read three previous works by Cass Khaw, including her Hammers on Bone, which was #3 on my Top 10 list for 2016. I think that The All-Consuming World is her first novel; it’s definitely the first novel-length work of hers that I’ve read.

I’ll not bury the lede: my favorite thing about Cassandra Khaw is not her characters or her stories, but her writing. Of all the writers I currently consider myself a fan of, and there are dozens of them, she is the one whose writing abilities I would most like to completely absorb and use for my own dastardly purposes. Her writing is gritty and visceral and verbose in a way that is perfect for either Lovecraftian body horror or what we used to call cyberpunk, and All-Consuming World has elements of both, and my God was this book a joy to read.

Now, that’s kind of a problem as a reviewer, because it’s highly unlikely that I’m going to dislike anything Khaw writes because what she’s writing about is almost irrelevant to me. I’d read a recipe book cover-to-cover if Cass Khaw wrote it. But precisely because she is so stylized an author, I can easily imagine my opposite as a reader out there; I’ll read anything she writes because of how much I like her writing, but there are going to be people out there who are going to bounce off of her style, hard. Toss in the legitimate body horror elements (one character keeps a gun in her ribcage for part of the story) and the fact that the word “fuck” is at least a quarter of one particular character’s dialogue and this becomes a “not for everybody” book. But for me? My god, smear it on my face.

Right, the plot. As if that matters. Here’s the blurb, it’s as good as anything:

A diverse team of broken, diminished former criminals get back together to solve the mystery of their last, disastrous mission and to rescue a missing and much-changed comrade… but they’re not the only ones in pursuit of the secret at the heart of the planet Dimmuborgir. The highly-evolved AI of the universe have their own agenda and will do whatever it takes to keep humans from ever controlling the universe again. This band of dangerous women, half-clone and half-machine, must battle their own traumas and a universe of sapient ageships who want them dead, in order to settle their affairs once and for all.

And, like, okay, that’s what it’s about, I guess? But this book is more about how it tells its story than the story it tells. The description leaves out that all of the members of the team are at least nominally women (one of them is nonbinary in a way that is either immensely sloppy or really interesting, because I could not figure out what the deal with … that person’s pronouns was at any point in the story*) and most of them are immortal and several of them die during the book and that’s not a spoiler because it’s also not a problem. I think Maya alone goes down at least three times. I think one of them is technically dead for the entire book? Maybe two? No more than two characters are dead for the entire book.

There’s a lot going on here, is what I’m saying. Pre-order this book and read it immediately when it comes out. If you like good things you will like it.

*The character is sometimes he and sometimes she, and will bounce back and forth between both sometimes in a single paragraph, and I either missed the explanation or just couldn’t figure out what the rules were.

Super surprised that I didn't like this book, considering how amazing NOTHING BUT BLACKENED TEETH is.

I don't know if it was the different genre (sf) or different length (novel) that disagrees with Khaw, but I didn't even feel like it was the same writer.

Too wordy, with boring characters and a boring plot. I'm giving it 2 stars instead of one, as a gesture of respect for the talent that I KNOW Khaw possesses.