I loved the author’s previous book “Liar, Dreamer, Thief”, but I did not love this.

Everything in this book is bland. The world is bland. The main character is bland. The events are bland. The relationships are bland. I found it extremely hard to care about anything. That said, I very much believe the blandness of the story is an intentional choice by the author to show the power of depression to create a sense of nothingness.

We know from the beginning that the FMC, Young, has recently attempted suicide. She believes she was abandoned by her parents, her crew just died, and she’s stuck in a prison colony that she likely will never leave. Oh, and she will probably die of cancer from her mining job. She doesn’t have a lot to look forward to, or a lot of good memories to look back on. She’s unhappy, and everything she experiences in the book carries the weight of that unhappiness.

Even though I think this is a well rendered depiction of mental illness, I still did not enjoy the reading experience. I don’t think it’s objectively bad, and I fully appreciate the intent and execution. The project of it just didn’t appeal to me. In fairness, I am also not the biggest sci-fi fan, which could be part of the reason it didn’t hit.

Going forward, I’ll keep Maria Dong on my radar, but will only pick up her future works if the plot/genre also appeals to me.

Maria Dong’s “Braid Me a Howling Tongue” was one of my favorite stories of 2023, so when I saw she had a new novel coming out, I jumped at the chance to give Psychopomp a try. 

Psychopomp takes place in a prison labor camp on a moon that’s tidally locked to a planet that is itself tidally locked to the local star. The lead has been abandoned by her parents, has failed out of training to be one of the Pomps that help map out valuable ore deposits, and has failed in a suicide attempt. Now she’s assigned to work underground with a group of unfamiliar miners, but their efforts are undone by dangers seemingly only she can see. There’s a piece that will make the puzzle make sense, but with no idea who to trust, the question is whether she’ll be able to find it while there’s still something to be done. 

If that sounds like a lot stuffed into one medium-length sci-fi novel, it is. In fact, I’d go as far to say it’s too much on at least two axes. First, the lead’s life is horrible almost to the point of parody. A few of the bigger pieces—like the abandonment by her parents—offer hints at future explanation, but a significant chunk feels like an endless succession of casual cruelty. There’s a scene early in the book, in which a teammate badgers her for details about her suicide attempt and acts surprised when greeted with an emotional outburst, that had me wondering whether the secondary characters had ever met other human beings. Losing one’s parents, being imprisoned, failing the test for a key position, and being thrust into a new work role with no support network is plenty of cause for emotional distress. The rest feels like an unnecessary play for pathos that’s so over-the-top that it backfires, pulling me out of the story. 

In addition to the tragic backstory, there’s also a lot going on from a plot perspective. Seemingly every major character has hidden motivations, and coupled with the obvious fact that the lead has some sort of special trait that no one has told her about, it gives the novel the feeling of a secret around every corner. Which can certainly work, but Psychopomp doesn’t give these elements enough room to breathe, instead delivering cascading revelations with little time for the characters or readers to sort through the implications. It’s not necessarily a bad thing for every character to have secrets, it just develops too quickly for each one to generate full emotional impact. That does help the reader get into the mindset of a lead who is overwhelmed and struggles to tell what’s true and what’s not, and the lingering chaos at the end feels true to the major climactic actions. But at the same time, it doesn’t do enough to pull things together into a satisfying resolution. Some uncertainty at the end can be well and good, but the ending comes too suddenly for my tastes, with a flurry of changes and revelations that don’t have time to settle before it’s all over. 

But for all that the story feels overstuffed, there are still plenty of ways in which Dong’s writing chops are on full display. She builds the tension from the first chapter and keeps it high throughout, peppering small revelations into increasing layers of uncertainty, so that there’s always a big danger or a big question driving the reader to keep turning the pages. And just as much as it’s a page-turner, Psychopomp is an exploration of a traumatized main character, desperately searching for ways to cope with a life she’s not even sure she wants to live, yet struggling to find any with even a glimmer of hope. There are times that watching her can be maddening, but it’s hard to say it’s not realistic for someone so deep in a psychological hole. 

Overall, Psychopomp is a novel that tries to do a bit too much, with a proliferation of subplots and intrigues that don’t have enough time to breathe and a lead with enemies behind every corner. But it’s also a compelling dive into the world of a traumatized lead, a sci-fi thriller that’s gripping even in the midst of the chaos. It would benefit from a bit more subtlety and a steadier finish, but it’s a book that will keep the reader engaged through its many twists and turns. 


Overall rating: 12 of Tar Vol's 20. Three stars on Goodreads.

Science fiction at its best is a very bold claim and should maybe not be used so lightly...

I'm going to rant a bit, but honestly this wasn't terrible. It just wasn't stellar.

Almost instantly I was not a fan of the writing style, and other goodreads reviews did not set me on a good foot with this ARC. I would also like to never read the word "circadian" ever again, thank you very much. Less than 2 full chapters in and I'm so annoyed by it, especially with the word "day" still being used sometimes so just. say. day.

There were things that just didn't line up either, like Young going off to the hatch early on with a missing glove? She realizes on her next shift she still only has one glove but apparently her taking a little mental breakdown outside the station and exposure to the elements was just cool and not of note in anyway? This happens repeatedly where things just don't line up and not in an unreliable narrator type of way, just a "didn't keep track of things" way.

Character personality is entirely dependent on what is convenient for the story in that moment, if a character has any personality at all. And for being in a moon base filled with prisoners, you would think you would be bunping into people constantly but nope! It feels like there are maybe 5 people total on this moon.

This failed to have the creepiness or awe factor needed for the weird mind-melding rock stuff going on, and instead just fell flat for me.

As always, thanks to NetGalley and Dark Matter INK for providing an eARC of Psychopomp in exchange for this honest review!

First and foremost, I want to thank the publishers for the e-arc of this book. This book started off right in the middle of the trouble, which I usually prefer and like in most things. This particular book was a miss for me. I just had a hard time catching on to the world building. The world building was scattered at best and at worst was incomprehensible. I really wanted to like this book it had everything I love, but it was just kinda confusing 3/12 stars.

This was an ok read, I found that I didn’t really care for all the details given although it was an interesting setup. Descriptions of mental illness were well done and a company using prisoners to mine substances that will give the workers cancer isn’t a far fetched concept.

I really enjoyed this sci-fi story. You never knew what was going to happen.
I would of liked to hear more about (spoiler).
#NetGalley

This was a little too steam of conscious/incoherent for me. Also I don't know if I was in the right head space for what it was. I was expecting more sci-fi fun.

3.5 stars, Drill Team

PSYCHOPOMP
by Maria Dong

The 18th word in this book is the f word. That doesn't usually bode very well towards liking a book. Thankfully, the book wasn't chocked full of those sorts of 4 letter words.

We follow the strong female protagonist Young as she lives out her sentence in on a prison on the moon. It's a hard life, they women are expected to work long and hard hours in the mines. All Young has wanted since she's been there is to work as a Pomp, which is a guide in another place, giving drilling advice from the safety of an office. A Pomp is completely in tune with her team.

There is the usual mental health issues that are in most of today's new releases. I think the book would have been better without it.

Young was abandoned by her parents, her mother's deafness giving her extra skills that the average person might not have.

Young's boyfriend Gyu helps her get back into the Pomp program, after she had failed the course. Circumstances change, Young doesn't know who she can trust and who she shouldn't.

There were several passages that I highlighted, that seemed interesting. ...if I really am cracking up, it's my own fault....there might not be any coming back. ...as the spirit that possesses me tears out with incredible fury.

I received a complimentary copy of #psychopomp from #mariadong #netgalley #darkmatterINK I wasn't required to post a review.

#strongfemaleprotagonist #sciencefiction #fantasy #sff #space #mentalhealthissues #cancer #abandonment #deafness #mystery #horror #triggerwarning

2.5 stars.

This sounded like it was right up my alley, with its Andor vibes, a corporatist government, life on a sci-fi space penal colony, cyberpunk visuals, and a FMC suffering from parental neglect and mental illness.

Unfortunately, the book was just okay.

While I really appreciated the POC characters, the main storyline and subplots felt like they were pulled from bits and pieces of other sci-fi psychological thrillers I've read or watched before. It wasn't all too gripping, and I wasn't on the edge of my seat, eagerly waiting to see what would happen.

All the story beats and plot twists were predictable. Even the mental illness angle read like it was pulled from a typical psychological thriller story. I have a feeling that I'll probably forget about this book in a few weeks.

Without going into spoilers, I just wanted a lot more from the subplot with Young's abilities and the whole backstory with her parents' fate. And maybe more interactions between the FMC and the actual setting itself. It felt like all she did was have a relationship with Gyu, work/train, question her sanity, and randomly follow directions from someone she barely knew. Rinse and repeat.

I think if you're a seasoned sci-fi enthusiast, this won't be anything new. I liked it for what it was and wasn't all too bored with my experience. The writing was good and easy to follow along, so this might be a good read if you're new to sci-fi psychological thrillers.

Thank you to Dark Matter INK and NetGalley for this arc.

3.5 starts! First off huge thanks to Dark Matter INK for providing me an ARC of this book, I recently got into both sci-fi and reviewing books so this was thrilling haha, anyways onto my thoughts:

Starting with the positives!

Had a fun time with this one, as mentioned I only recently got into sci-fi as a genre (when it comes to books at least, long time sci-fi TV fan) and I feel like this was just the right amount of science-y where I could easily get into the world Im reading about and not get lost in too much science terms and whatnot. The premise of prisoners being sent to the moon in a sort of legal slavery was pretty cool, knowing everyone on there was a criminal in one way or another made them all a bit more interesting to me than if they were just regular people working in a mine.

I enjoyed putting together the pieces of the puzzle alongside with Young and did in fact get shocked once or twice by a twist towards the end of the book. Getting different stories from the different characters was also fun because you have to figure out who’s telling the truth and who to trust which was fun!

I also found the story pretty interesting, with all the conspiracies and stuff getting revealed towards the end, the whole Pomp thing was genuinely cool to read!

The negatives:

Had a hard time with liking Young as a character, she was very meh to me for the longest time. I get why she is the way she is but the way she treated everyone around her, especially her situationship made it really hard to like her, I have a bunch of notes just going “girl you’re horrible to this man oh my god” tho I do get that was sort of the point. To be honest I had a hard time caring about any of the characters very much, they were all very human and flawed (which is a good thing!) but it just did not catch my interest, I did start caring a bit about Young by the end but it was definitely after the 60% mark of the book.

A bit predictable, I clocked some things from the get go. Alternatively, we were supposed to catch that but in that case seeing Young miss all the clues until about halfway through the book was kind of infuriating haha. May be a me thing honestly, I have personal beef with clueless MCs.

Last thing I wanna talk about is the ending, my biggest grievance with the entire book was probably the ending. I feel like everything was way too rushed, again, I get that even plot wise it was very rushed but I feel like it would've been better if we got a few more chapters to tie everything off nicely. There's some more thoughts I have about the end but you can read them in my Storygraph review because they're very spoiler-y and I don't think I can spoiler tag on here haha.

Thats about it, overall had fun, would probably read more books from this author at some point!

Huge thank you to Dark Matter INK for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

Thank Almighty Cake, a sci-fi novel that doesn’t bury the reader in deep political landscapes. I am so unbelievably happy to a real, honest sci-fi story to dig into!

Welcome to Hibiscus, or Hib. The first pages immediately launch you into the world of Young, who’s working as a miner in a penal colony. Her crime? Trying to kill herself. Her story is revealed slowly and reluctantly not unlike Young herself. Battling with her past, flunking out of pomp training, and coming to terms with her new existence, Young has a lot of issues to work through. Everything changes the morning she’s late to work and an explosion takes out the cave her team is in, sparing her. And everything Young thought she knew was wrong, even about herself.

This world is so well-built and detailed I can’t help but feel as if I’ve been plopped down in the middle of a book series. I’m not mad about it, though. Maria Dong’s writing pulls you into the story and does not let you go. I was more than halfway through the book before I knew it. It was a single day read for me, I just couldn’t put it down. This is true sci-fi and I’m thrilled to have it front and center again!

3.5/5

This was really hard for me to get into. I’m not sure if it’s because I’m getting into sci-fi or what, but once I was able to lock in so to speak, it was quite fun. It was very tense and fast pasted which I enjoyed. The plot was interesting but felt like there could’ve been more, but it was still enough to be me intrigued and focused. The mc is very flawed and very unreliable and I found it hard to click with her, but that could’ve been the point I’m not sure, and she felt a bit exhausting to read the narrative from. The world building aspect did show but I would’ve appreciated and loved more, especially since this is sci-fi novel.
This was very tense mental health wise and I wouldn’t recommend it to most probably. It’s for a very niche group of readers that would enjoy it. But I do appreciate the author taking the time to tell a story of trauma and mental health so tense and personal.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for sending me an e-arc!

The chapters were fast paced, the concept was really cool and unique and I had a lot of fun!

However, it kind off lacked world building which made it really confusing at times. I really couldn’t keep up with the story and was confused the whole way through.

This was boring. I was expecting something a little more action packed with way more scifi stuff. I got mild scifi with a prisoner falling in love with her psychiatrist. It just really didn't vibe with me. Our main character was just so hard to read from her perspective because I just kept hoping that the unreliable narrator trope would itch a certain scratch that scifi horror gives me but I was really let down.

Review: Highly self-centered and myopic, verging on psychotic narcissism. That is the MC condensed for brevity's sake. Every frikin' page is this HUGE lament on her: life, abandonment, social interaction, people’s opinion, self-loathing, self-gratification etc. etc. When you are self-aware that your actions harm yourself and others, at some point you get better at pulling yourself out of detrimental emotions, rather than have them ruling your daily existence. She talks to herself about how bad this action is going to be, then goes ahead and does it. Riiiiight. She is constantly: limping, bleeding, aching, crying, sleeping, exhausted, dreaming or digging. As a reader, you get no breaks as well.

If you can wade through pages of self-recriminatory drivel, the world building and REAL story line is intriguing enough to bear witness. The characterization was limited in scope, especially the supporting roles. You just didn't care what happened to any of them. "Oh gee, we lost a crew of five. Time for a new crew assignment". Since the character depth is meager, it begs the point that the plan was to write them out anyway. But why not give it all in that short space, to build the best character that people will miss?

I like this world. It is creative and echoes Anne McCaffery's, Crystal Singer. The MC is insufferable in presentation, but you root for her, despite her dumb choices and lack of perspective.

I received this ARC for an honest review.
4.0/5

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own :)

This is a tense, dramatic sci-fi set on a penal colony on the moon, following Young, a former trainee Pomp (these specialists who remotely lead mining teams) who washed out due to a mental breakdown and attempted suicide. Now, she’s just a miner, stuck in a cycle of work that will never pay off her debt and hallucinations that leave you questioning what’s real. Is she mentally ill or is there a conspiracy here? As an unreliable narrator, she keeps you guessing—but also I found her absolutely exhausting.

Young is a deeply flawed character in a way that really works for the story. Dystopias should mess people up, and this book actually shows the weight of trauma rather than giving us another protagonist who’s weirdly just fine despite a horrific backstory. That said, I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone who isn’t feeling mentally strong - it goes to some dark places.

For me, the book felt a bit repetitive up until about the 2/3 mark. Young cycles through the same routine - sleeping with Gyu, going to work, and then having another minor psychotic break. While the mysteries surrounding her past, her abilities, and the colony kept me going, the pacing dragged at times. But the last third? Really rather exciting. The payoff for the side plots came together in an exciting way, and the story finally hit its stride. The main story is left on a slightly hopeful note which is always nice in a dystopia.

This book is heavy, tense, and packed with high-stakes drama. If you like slow-burn, particularly bleak sci-fi and protagonists who actually feel the weight of their world, I do recommend this. Just be prepared for a bit of a slog before the real payoff.

Trigger warnings include suicide, mental illness, trauma, hallucinations, and generally heavy dystopian themes.

I don't have too much to say for this one. It was good and fun. I thought the world building was neat (loved the idea of a tidally-locked planet, very fun for a guy who grew up on that episode of "The Universe" where they explained what would happen if the Earth stopped spinning). I really loved Young as a protagonist, and Dong does a fantastic job of getting you inside her thought process and making her decisions understandable, even if you are on your hands and knees begging for Young to maybe be a little less self-destructive. She never felt unintentially whiny to me.

I was really impressed by Dong's ability to keep the narrative tense, which was absolutely critical for this to work even a little bit. The reader needs to be kept unsure of the reality of the situation, even when there are a couple of facts about the situation that they're going to grasp well before Young is (e.g. her parents did not just abandon her, she isn't having random hallucinations) due to genre and narrative conventions. If not, the whole thing becomes a slog where the reader is waiting for the point-of-view character to play catch-up. Fortunately, everything worked great here! I'm a seasoned sci-fi/fantasy reader, and I could guess what was getting put down by the blurb, but I still felt like I was getting through for a loop just as hard as Young was. The text did a wonderful job of getting the reader just as confused as Young often is, yet when Young really gets in the zone and feels good, you can feel that ease in the prose as well. It's all very well done.

My only complaint is that the ending was rather rushed and a bit too ambiguous for my taste. It doesn't ruin the whole experience, but I would have liked a little more time on the last events in the book.

Thank you to NetGalley and Dark Matter INK for the ARC!

I understand that this is reality for a lot of people, particularly poor and/or marginalized people who are penalized for their mental health issues instead of treated for and assisted with them, but Young as a character in a fictional dystopian world is exhausting. There are so many interesting tidbits we cautiously extract between the waves of paranoia, self-doubt, and erratic behavior - about the world, about Young’s past, about the roles of these prisoners in their strange society. But so much of it is buried that the book feels so much longer than it is. This is a short book, but even curiosity couldn’t keep me pushing through it.

Thank you to NetGalley and Publisher for the arc!
Oof. This hit way way WAY too close to home, and it’s too real. This is something only people in a decent mental state with a decent foundation should read. I could not handle this right now. This is obviously personal.
I do also think this book was stream of consciousness to the point of near and at some times, incoherence. That’s all I got, folks