Tinker by Wen Spencer

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


Interesting world. Disappointing protagonist. Morally grey developments. Trigger warnings required.
Almost loved this book from the beginning. Or I really wanted to love it.
Because it has a weird complicated world of magic, elves, and space technology (and it’s all very weird because technology level ranges from ancient(absent) to futuristic and there’s no defined standard) and a weird, independent, smart heroine.
But then… A nasty love triangle enter stage left (it’s ugly and a waste of good positive character), weird sex spells enter stage right (a lot of morally grey questions there), and…it all just went downhill from there. But the worst disappointment was that the heroine is actually neither as independent nor as smart as I first wanted to believe. She mostly gets washed down with the flow left and right without questioning what is happening to her (see the weird sex spells and love triangles). She needs people to tell her what to do, and does what people tell her more often than not. She blabbers around to everyone. And it’s not that she is a badly written character. It is actually very believable neurological profile—person who is too smart in “maths” but likely forever to remain an ignorant child on the side of ‘life intelligence’. The problem is that she is more annoying than fun to read about.
Then there’s also the problem so many female writers suffer from: the abundance of attractive positive male characters, most of whom are very fond of the main character (and even some negative ones who inspire more sympathy than hate) versus female characters who come only in two categories: either complete bitches or crazy grandmas.
Then, as if grey-zone love triangles and sex spells were not enough, we get actual rape (which needs a big trigger warning). And torture. And the reactions from the main character that are closer to black than to grey. Judging from the authors obsession with things Japanese I half expected tentacles at some point.
And I’m not even going to go into the treatment of real-world cultures and political issues cough racism cough.

All in all, very promising premise/setting and beginning, which gradually goes more and more sour under the influence of a morally grey story, disappointing protagonist, and trigger-y treatment of female characters.



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