The City We Became Lib/E

audio cd

Published March 24, 2020 by Orbit.

ISBN:: 978-1-5491-5725-7

(2 reviews)

In Manhattan, a young grad student gets off the train and realizes he doesn't remember who he is, where he's from, or even his own name. But he can sense the beating heart of the city, see its history, and feel its power. In the Bronx, a Lenape gallery director discovers strange graffiti scattered throughout the city, so beautiful and powerful it's as if the paint is literally calling to her. In Brooklyn, a politician and mother finds she can hear the songs of her city, pulsing to the beat of her Louboutin heels. And they're not the only ones.

8 editions

annewalk reviewed The City We Became by N. K. Jemisin (The Great Cities Duology, #1)

Superhero Story

5 stars

It took me a while to get into this story but I'm glad I stuck with it. If you like stories with a lot of battles between heroes and monster villains, this is your book. While I enjoy a superhero show as much as the next person, reading fight scenes in a novel is not to my taste. As the story unfolds, the social commentary ramps up. Would be especially relevant to New Yorkers who are familiar with the personalities of the city's boroughs. As an outsider, I understood enough to see where the story was headed but I'm sure it offers more to New York inhabitants. I read this book via audiobook and enjoyed the voicing and dramatization.

Dee 📖 (book aspect) reviewed The City We Became by N. K. Jemisin (The Great Cities Duology, #1)

Putting "urban" in "urban fantasy"

4 stars

The City We Became is urban fantasy, in that it features a bunch of magical stuff happening in a modern day city. It's also urban fantasy in that it is about cities. People are cities and cities are people, and not in a metaphorical way, but in a more supernatural and literal way.

N. K. Jemisin manages to channel the spirit of New York City (where the novel's action focuses) through the novel's characters, without resorting to tired and popular stereotypes of the city and its people. While in a way the book is an ode to New York, it also doesn't shy away from some of its more dark and shameful aspects. All of this is wrapped up in writing that manages to be evocative and sufficiency casual to flow well. The book paints an engaging picture of both the real New York, and its fictional, supernatural, embodied New …

The City We Became is urban fantasy, in that it features a bunch of magical stuff happening in a modern day city. It's also urban fantasy in that it is about cities. People are cities and cities are people, and not in a metaphorical way, but in a more supernatural and literal way.

N. K. Jemisin manages to channel the spirit of New York City (where the novel's action focuses) through the novel's characters, without resorting to tired and popular stereotypes of the city and its people. While in a way the book is an ode to New York, it also doesn't shy away from some of its more dark and shameful aspects. All of this is wrapped up in writing that manages to be evocative and sufficiency casual to flow well. The book paints an engaging picture of both the real New York, and its fictional, supernatural, embodied New York.

The one complaint to level against the book is against the arc of the plot. The novel feels more like a series of superhero fights, leading up t a bigger superhero fight, with some twists along the way, and a somewhat rushed conclusion. This can, however, probably be chalked up to it being only the first entry in a trilogy, and this being what the genre is.