Elysium

Listening to this book rather than reading it myself was a great choice on this one. The narrator of the book is fabulous. She brought the story to life and gave each character a voice that I easily identified. This is a five star audio production.

The writing is well crafted. I would describe the plot as being intricately woven by a master hand. I found myself caught up in the mystery, wanting to see how all the pieces fit together. As the story moves along, I saw bits and pieces and I found the timing of the reveal to be right on the verge of my understanding and it sheds light on the whole story.

There is a deep dive showing the nature of a multitude of relationships between people. How we feel about each other and navigate these relationships. It's not always pretty and it isn't always honorable.

This story has a trigger for me with graphic sex. I believe it is mainly in one place in the book, may have one other scene that pops up. It's not that I avoid books with sex scenes, I just don't enjoy eavesdropping on that level of detail. I almost didn't continue when after the graphic sex. Had it come up another time, I likely would have walked away. That was a powerful scene that was written so well that it created a lasting image in my mind. Sex by nature does have such emotion to lend power to these images. Had this been a non sexual scene, it would have still been powerful, but would likely not have stayed with the reader like a sexual one does. I salute Brissett for masterful writing, although it was a scene that I felt was not for me to see, if you will.

Overall, this is a mind-bending tale that kept me engaged all the way through. I found myself thinking about the book for awhile afterward, thinking through a number of implications. I really like that this book made me think. I would recommend this book to people who enjoy a good sci-fi dystopian story who has no qualms with a graphic sex scene. The weight of the graphic sex influences my rating in this case, for right or wrong.