Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with an ARC of this story.
SPOILERS TO FOLLOW

This was a very interesting read. The world felt VERY established as there was a lot of talk about things that happened in the past and colonies that were spread across the entire galaxy. I don't really know if I liked Vinh or Amara though. Their relationship felt very toxic and destructive. They literally brought out the worst in each other. What Amara did to Henry is unforgivable and I can't believe she would do something like that. (I actually can believe based off how she was characterized but it's still wild to me). Jesse was actually my favorite character and so when he was accepted by The Gray and not killed by it, I was glad. The concept of The Gray was also very interesting. The hive-like mind concept is always fun and I really liked how it was done in this story.

I think that this novella may have benefitted from being a full on book, as I didn't feel like I got enough context or world building to be fully invested in the story and its characters. I think that another issue is that this is pretty heavy on the Sci-Fi elements and all the things that come with that, and while I fully can see Sci-Fi people really enjoying this, as someone who was there more for the horror it was a little bit of a challenge for me. But I will say that the horror stuff is TOP NOTCH and incredibly disturbing. Had there been more of it I would have been more fully on board. As it was, I wanted more. But man, Sci-Fi fans who really love space horror absolutely need to check this out.

This World is Not Yours by Kemi Ashing-Giwa is a claustrophobic, deeply unsettling environmental horror set on a distant planet when an existential crisis forces a fledgling colony to make a drastic decision. Faced with extinction, the colony runs rough-shod over its people’s rights. Settlers Amara and Vinh find their already troubled marriage suddenly annulled, both women forced into new relationships — Vinh with a stranger, Amara with a childhood friend — the new family units tasked propagating the species.

So begins a toxic spiral of jealousy and hatred that proves to be even more destructive than the strange amorphous substance which is creeping across the landscape, seemingly intent on devouring every human being in its path.

With deceit and distrust on every page, the sense of doom never lets up, but you can’t help but be pulled into the mire of Amara and Vinh’s increasingly toxic relationship, fearing for everyone’s lives as disaster looms.

Bleak, yes, but beautifully written.

DNF @ 46%

The only thing scary about this book is how easily things could have been solved if Vinh said one (1) sentence to her wife. I did not sign up for ridiculously contrived domestic drama; I signed up for space horror. If your colony is on the verge of potential failure, why do you have fancy restaurants and vacation destinations? Why is literally the only thing of concern to anyone sexual reproduction between partners of the opposite biological sex? There was no chemistry or even warmth between Vinh and Amara - just Amara being insecure/paranoid/jealous and Vinh not telling her WIFE about any of her trauma.

Amara also randomly mentions her privilege (like the dress made from a long-extinct species or essentially being a princess of at least one galaxy) but since Vinh never actually confronts her about said privilege, nothing is ever done.

Even the guy giving into an intrusive thought that was literally “please swim naked in some alien goo that has the capability to systematically delete entire species - and don’t forget to breathe some in your lungs for good measure” didn’t pay off with anything in the first HALF of the book?

I was expecting at least SOME horror in almost 100 pages, but that’s not what I got

This was one of the better sci-fi horror novels that I have read. That being said, that might be damning with faint praise, as I have had bad luck with sci-fi horror as a genre. I LOVED the world that Ashing-Giwa has built here. It's fascinating and dangerous and beautiful. I loved her plot too - the idea that an alien planet has its own security system of sorts meant to protect itself from outside threats was a really cool concept, and I was very excited by the world building of it all. All of that being said, these characters were TERRIBLE. I mean, they were terrible people, for sure, which made me not connect with them at all. If I cannot connect with a character, I have a hard time caring what happens to them. That is why this book is only getting three stars from me. I just didn't care about any of the characters. They all treated each other terribly, had zero respect for the other people in their lives, and acted like overgrown babies. I am ok with flawed characters if they are well developed enough to make me feel some sort of empathy for them, but these characters were too underdeveloped to hook me emotionally, so I just didn't care. Great world building; terrible characters.

For such a short novella, this packs quite the punch! Toxic relationships really doesn't even begin to touch on what is going on between Amara and Vinh and, to an extent, Jesse. The relationships are the main driver of this book; while the sci-fi elements are certainly there (and incredibly interesting - I love Ashing-Giwa's worldbuilding), the true focus of this book is the damage that people do to each other. It was a really great thematic connection, with the Gray and the relationships in the story. And while the Gray is, of course, this creeping horror, I really think the true sci-fi horror elements come from the actions that the Council enacts in order to preserve their colony. The Gray lurks in the background; the action the Council takes led to the real creeping dread in this story, as Amara and Vinh react to those demands. Again, such a great thematic connection.

The reason that this doesn't quite get five stars from me is because, while the publisher describes this as a toxic polycule, I would argue that the story doesn't give enough focus to Jesse to really rate as a polycule. <spoiler>Given what drives Jesse to do what he does, that feeling of being ignored and looked over, it makes total sense that even the story keeps sliding past him, but it does mean that I was somewhat sad that we didn't really get a true toxic polycule.</spoiler> I still thoroughly enjoyed this, though. I am loving the sci-fi horror novellas that have been coming out of Tor - they are truly top notch.

I'm so glad I read this; when I read Ashing-Giwa's debut novel last year, I noted that she was one to keep an eye on, and I'm glad I did. She has a great deal of talent, and I look forward to seeing what she does next. Thanks to NetGalley and Tor for providing me an eARC for review; all opinions are my own.

I wish there were more books like This World Is Not Yours.

It's not just that the book is sci-fi/horror, the combination that seems to be among my absolute favorite genre mash-ups; the book puts all of its human drama up front, leaving the science fiction elements as a vehicle to explore the humanity at the book's core. And the book really is about human desires and human flaws, even if it features an inhuman intelligence that feels classically sci-fi.

Ashing-Giwa's central conceit about a hostile planet looking to protect itself from humanity, as if they are a disease, feels terrifyingly poignant in today's world. As we watch the planet overheat and push ourselves toward the brink of our own possible extinction event all in the pursuit of profit, This World Is Not Yours is a seething indictment of human cruelties. It isn't just the caustic way humans act towards the environment, taking increasingly more in the name of sport or profit, it is the belief in humanity's self-assured superiority that has led us to destroy whole habitats and push whole species into extinction that seems to be our most fundamental flaw, one that perhaps we aren't capable of resolving. The book handles the issue of human imperialism with a powerful metaphor; a planetary immune system that rejects foreign bodies that cannot assimilate beyond its species' weakness.

And humans are terrible to each other, not just to one single planet's ecology. The human issues at the core of this book are also centered plainly on our inability to even incorporate our own selves into a community, our virus infecting all aspects of our society with greed and bigotry and destructive ambition. Ashing-Giwa gets it right, showcasing to us how absolutely petty we can be in the pursuit of profit and the comfort of so few. What do we continue to sacrifice by cutting at ourselves like a dysfunctional autoimmune system? We poison ourselves in ways we can never recover from.

Still, the book leans on its own hopeful elements outside human systems, suggesting that perhaps we might yet be capable of some form of evolution, if only we could actually get past our pettiness and our clandestine hierarchies. It presents complex feelings about love and longing, about the need for belonging and our inability to satisfy those needs when we only consider the profitability (socially, economically) of our connections.

There's so much packed into this novella, stuff that I understand and stuff I'm still only grappling with, and it's beautiful. Horrifying. Fascinating. Always beautiful.

Disclosure Statement: I was provided an early review copy of this novella by the publisher. My thoughts and opinions about the book are entirely authentic and my own, uninfluenced in any way by publisher or author.

Actually a 3.5/5.

If you are looking for a slow-burn, toxic relationship, Environmental Sci-Fi Horror story, this book is for you. Set on a newly colonized distant planet in the far-off future, This World is Not Yours focuses on the relationship between Amara, Vihn, and Jesse with brief hints of environmental horror. This planet is home to something only known as The Grey. All that is known about The Grey is that it is currently harmless to humans, but will destroy anything that it considers a threat to the planet. This leaves the question of what happens when The Grey decides that humans are harming the planet? I was looking for something different than what I had been reading, and this was perfect. It's a quick read filled with tension that Kemi Ashing-Giwa builds up perfectly as the story progresses, and having the chapter numbers count down to something adds to the tension. While I didn't like the characters, I feel this is a story where you aren't supposed to want a happy ending for everyone. I would recommend this novella to anyone looking for a quick but tense Sci-Fi Horror read. Thank you to Netgalley and Tor for providing me with an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

[ Huge thanks to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for this ARC! ]

While it wasn't exactly what I was expecting, I still had a good time with this read. It was much less horror than I was hoping and more about the toxic relationships between the characters. Something about it vibed with me though. The horror that was there was done well, and I enjoyed watching the characters make each other worse. Would recommend if you like to read about messy relationships with a dose of sci-fi horror.

I got an ARC of this book.

The cover! The idea! I was so ready for this book. It was hard to not just start this when I had other ARCs due first. I was hoping for horror that was as good as S.A. Barnes (my gold standard of sci-fi horror).

This just felt like it was missing something. I don’t quite know what it was. For a bit, I thought I had my finger on it. It was missing horror! Then there would be something horrific that would really just stick in my mind as something that really was truly awful and I never wanted to experience. Then it would calm down just as quickly. I think I expected more on the page, visceral horror. Instead this was a slow burn that required a bit of thought. There were the elements of being trapped on a planet with no hope of escape, which seems to be pretty standard sci-fi horror (or trapped in a ship). This also generally means the planet is rejecting the humans for some reason, usually environment or something like that. In this case it was a gray ooze. I just kept imaging gray jello. It didn’t sound scary, but the more that was revealed about the Gray, the more horrifying it became.

The characters were exciting. They were messy. They were interesting. I didn’t feel like I really got a chance to really know them. So when there is a twist that requires knowing the character to see how sinister the twist was, I was a bit let down. I didn’t notice any difference with the character. I had to rely on someone narrating that there was a difference. But then the differences were dismissed immediately, so were they even there? That part was fun, because it messed with me a bit. I wanted to know if it was truly different or if it was done that way to show how little is actually known. I both wanted more from this section and liked it exactly as it was.

The ending was interesting. It leaves room for a sequel, while feeling complete.

Overall, I think I would have liked this story more if it was a full length novel instead of a novella. The horror and the characters could have been more fleshed out with more time. I really did enjoy reading it. It was one I could read a chapter or two at a time and know I would come back.

An accurate and terrifying portrayal of relationships and new surroundings. This novella explained just enough to ensure the reader did not feel lost but instead wanted to keep reading to get more information. You can plainly see that the imagined planet is rich in fauna, flora and the author showed great restraint in order to pare it down so that we would not be overwhelmed but only focus on aspects of importance to this story. The same was done with dynamic multi-dimensional characters. I can’t wait to read more from this author.

This novella moves so slowly, and it focuses on character drama instead of the horrific aliens for the first 34%, which is how far I got.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Nightfire for letting me read an e-ARC of This World Is Not Yours by Kemi Ashing-Giwa! I rated this 4.5 stars, but rounded up to 5 for this review.

We meet our main female characters, Vinh and Amara, who are married and have escaped negative family relations to colonize a planet, New Belaforme. With them, they’ve brought Amara’s childhood best friend, Jesse. Now, all three of these characters are vital contributors to the colonization efforts in their own right: Amara and Jesse are scientists studying life on the planet, and Vinh is part of the security efforts to keep the colony safe against threats. There is one major not-quite lifeform that has presented itself on New Belaforme that remains an enigma to all: the Gray. It appears to consume anything that it deems a threat to the planet or its survival. Originally, this means it destroys or “cleanses” anything invasive, but it hasn’t harmed any human hosts, so the colonies continue their work.

Not long after their arrival on new Belaforme, the governing body determine that unless people start having children, their colonies will not last. This leads them to make decisions regarding married couples in order to increase the likelihood of childbearing. For Vinh and Amara, this means their marriage is effectively dissolved and they are assigned a new male partner with whom they’re expected to procreate. Amara, fortunately, falls into a relationship with Jesse who has no expectations about engaging in physical intimacy, and Vinh is assigned a man named Henry, who seems to fawn over her and only wants the four of them to live together and coexist happily.

What happens throughout the rest of this novella is a result of these forced marriages and how it impacts their human nature: mistrust between two people who love each other, but who have hurt each other deeply in the past; jealousy and rage toward individuals who are not to blame (shouldn’t they blame the governing body who forced them into this situation?). All of these twisted family and relational dynamics are put under more pressure as the Gray slowly starts creeping in more and starts attacking more humanoid creatures. What will destroy these people first? Their jealousy or the Gray?

I loved that this novella threw me into the deep end and I had to surface as quickly as possible to catch my breath. The chapters count down instead of increasing, so you know exactly when this book is going to end and it makes you want to keep reading more to find out how these very human people will continue to hurt each other. There were times that I wish the author leaned more into the horror of the planet and the Gray than focus on the tense relationships, but ultimately, a nice balance was struck between the two driving forces. I absolutely did not see the ending coming, so I really enjoyed the conclusion. If you like sci-fi horror (it reminded me a lot of Annihilation in some respects) and messy queer drama, you might enjoy this!

I unfortunately have mixed feelings about this book :( This is a space horror novella that takes place on a colonized planet. This planet was believed to be safe, but is slowly being taken over, or taken back, by a mysterious liquid called the Gray, which consumes everything in its path.

There were a lot of interesting aspects that made for a world that was both fascinating and horrifying:
- The Gray was terrifying in its own right
- The simple detail of the chapter numbers going backwards like a countdown increased the tension of the looming horror of the Gray
- The setup of the colony and their forced marriage structure made the world feel fully realized and added another layer of complexity of survival beyond the Gray

However, I can't actually say that I enjoyed the process of reading the book. The writing felt choppy, the timelines sometimes felt hard to follow, and I feel like we didn't see some of the interesting parts of the story. This is the second book that I have read by this author, and I actually DNFed the first for similar reasons. I suspect that this unfortunately may not be an author for me.

I think this is a book that some will really like, so it might be worth giving it a try, but unfortunately it was not for me.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the gifted eARC!

Sometimes it’s clear from the beginning that a book is something special. This World is Not Yours grabbed my attention from the first page, and dragged me into its lush and dangerous world with alarming swiftness. Ashing-Giwa’s brand of horror is creeping, inevitable, and beautiful, with prose that feels like a love letter even as it rips you apart. This novella strikes an admirable balance in illuminating both the human and extraterrestrial as horrific; even as the characters experience fantastical circumstances they feel grounded and real enough to become deeply invested in. As a lover of queer horror, I appreciated that the queerness in this book is a matter of course as opposed to the primary thrust driving the violence. Sometimes we just want to see gays going through it for some other reason than their gayness, and this is a stellar example queer identities existing and being explored without being the cause of the horror. Some novellas leave me feeling like the form is an excuse to not fully flesh out the plot/setting/circumstances, but in this case, Ashing-Giwa obviously took precisely the amount of pages she needed to tell the story, and not one word more or less is included. I have no frustratingly unresolved questions, no feeling of being cheated out of a more complex story. I honestly can’t think of one negative thing to say about this book.

My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher Tor Publishing Group, for an advance copy of this science fiction novella, that looks at the relationships take for granted, between each other, the planet around us, and how these relationships can consume us in ways we don't understand.

My gateway drug to science fiction was of course Star Wars. I had watched Star Trek, but never felt the need to consume more media similar to it. Star Wars was ahh, I need more about space battles, big ships, robots. I gradually came to enjoy Star Trek, and other science fiction that wasn't space opera but it did take some time. Over the years I have seen many trends come and go, but I am enjoying the current state of science fiction over almost all the eras I have passed through. The stories seem more thoughtful, more inclusive, and just seem to have more of a stake to them. I also am enjoying the rise of novellas again. These are a great way to find new authors, see what they are like, and what stories they want to tell. And the author here has a lot to tell. This World Is Not Yours, by Kemi Ashing-Giwa, is a story about people doing what they think is right, on a world that is actively trying to keep itself free of outside influences.

Vinh and Amara are married to each other, who have done what so many people in relationships have done before,fled to the stars to flee Amara's powerful family, who promised Amara to some one else. The wives, along with Jesse, a long time friend of Amara, have come to the planet of New Belaforme, a lush world full of beauty and potential, as part of rival colonies. New Belaforme has a problem. The planet produces what the colonists call the Gray, an almost immune response to outside influences, that consumes what it could consider a threat. The colony has been good about staying out of the Gray's way, but is suffering in other ways. Vinh and Amara are forced to separate for the good of the colony, to bring more life to the colony, something that neither one is happy about. And the other colony on the planet has drawn the ire of the Gray, and things might be going from bad to worse.

A small book with a lot of big ideas, especially in the relationships we have with other humans and the natural world around us. There is a lot of toxicity in the story. In the relationship between Amara and Vinh, the couples that are by the colony for survival breeding purposes, and even the planet itself. The story builds in a different way, the chapters almost counting down to the end, with a lot of switching of time and points of view. This isn't hard to follow, but in the beginning when one is getting used to the world, this might make for slow going. Patience will be rewarded. The characters are intriguing and it was different to see a couple who will remind readers of many couples they know. People who shouldn't be together, but fight to stay as one. The horror of the story kicks in about the second half, and I can understand why people might want a longer story, but I liked the fact that things unfolded fast, held up and made sense. Good characters, interesting ideas, a storyline that keep me wondering what was going to happen next. An enjoyable read. I look forward to more by Kemi Ashing-Giwa.

Thank you very much to NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read this book early!

A tight, quick novella about a failing colony on a once-believed benign planet, this book had my skin crawling as I waited for the other shoe to drop. While I wished there was more description of the planet itself, which only would have added to the growing suspense if done well, and that the relationships were a little more developed, the ultimate payoff of the story was well worth it.

The initial setup for This World Is Not Yours was interesting, but the characterizations left much to be desired. Reading felt a little tedious but the actual plot was still interesting.

I'm not normally one for sci-fi horror but this was genuinely eerie, and I loved it. The combination of the survival aspects, the entangled emotions, and the ever present threats looming in the background made the creep of the story exceedingly effective.

I'll start this by admitting I didn't know what a polycule was before I started this book. It made more sense when I looked it up after getting a good ways into a book.
Unrelated to that, this was a strange story, but I get what the author was doing. The chapters counting down was a neat thing that I haven't seen done before.