"too slow" "too much" information on space and marine biology? Don't threaten me with a good time"too slow" "too much" information on space and marine biology? Don't threaten me with a good time...more
This is an excellent historical fiction book! I loved all the characters in it (especially the botanist, who turned out to be real!) Wonderfully fun tThis is an excellent historical fiction book! I loved all the characters in it (especially the botanist, who turned out to be real!) Wonderfully fun to read. ...more
I read reviews of this book that loved it and those that panned it. I see both sides, though I really enjoyed it. I do not think anyone in this book iI read reviews of this book that loved it and those that panned it. I see both sides, though I really enjoyed it. I do not think anyone in this book is being presented as anything other than deeply, deeply flawed and traumatized humans trying to make the best decisions that they can in frankly awful circumstances. ...more
I can easily buy a world with dragons. What I can't buy is whatever wonky AU this version of MIT is operating in.
Listen, here's the good: The characteI can easily buy a world with dragons. What I can't buy is whatever wonky AU this version of MIT is operating in.
Listen, here's the good: The characters in this book are charming, the descriptions are lushly visual, there are dragons, Kyoko clearly has an awesome imagination, and there is a wonderful range of adventures. But the book just didn't work for me for a series (probably) silly and specious reasons.
It is not, of course, Kyoko's fault that this is the second book about Komodo dragons I have read this month. (The first was The Dragon Keeper). Probably I would have been more patient with this one if I had read it first. Also: I am a science writer who has worked with both zoos and academic institutions. I am a very niche market, and probably most people who read these books do not have my specific background that made my reaction to this book so (occasionally) irate. Probably the book will work for you much better than it did for me.
However.This is not the way any of this works. This is not the way any of this works.
Here are my issues in no particular order.
1. I still don't understand the part where they were just apparently putting an egg and a sperm in the same petri dish and just . . . letting them chill? I don't understand why they didn't use a donor egg. I don't understand how their PI was just letting them cruise along improvising. I don't understand how there wasn't a much more rigorous experiment plan. Seriously.
2. How did they get that Komodo dragon so fast?? They hand-waved it as being from "a reserve." Do you have any idea what it takes to import an animal from overseas?? Especially an endangered species? We're talking months, if not years, of meetings, paper work, approvals, negotiation, and that's even before you start worrying about the logistics. And you have to have a much more rigorous care plan than apparently keeping it in a non-secure multi-species veterinary hospital with, as far as I can tell, almost no supervision, scrutiny, or security. Who was caring for Sarah? Who was monitoring behavior and enrichment? What about diet? Who was responsible for her, legally? The hapless postdocs??? A Komodo dragon is not a lab rat. (Frankly, lab rats need more attention than Sarah got in this book). I know this needed to be easy for the plot to work, but this step should have involved, at minimum, the USDA, the IUCN, IACUC, maybe the AZA, and at least a care team of a vet, pathologist, and at the very minimum one actual herpetologist/keeper. As you can tell, this bothered the heck out of me.
3. Have you tried to break into an animal exhibit area at the zoo? (I hope not. You shouldn't. But just in case you're considering it: It's way harder than this book makes it seem. You've been warned.) Maybe years ago this is how zoos were, but now breaking in a zoo exhibit, especially something like a Komodo dragon, is a lot more like trying to steal artwork from a museum. Because they're freaking precious endangered creatures and we care for them as such.
4. OMG, you all, the press conference. Listen. I know people who work at MIT in the PR/communications department. They also have a highly regarded science communication program. There is no way they wouldn't have all been heavily involved in an effort like this. The entire program and outreach, not just the press conference. But OMG! The press conference! Which was run by . . . the post-docs?? (not even the PI! Just the post-docs!) And don't give me this BS about not letting Kamala be part of the press conference because she is a woman of color. That's utter and complete bullshit, and the comms team would have told them that. She should have been there. And it completely boggles my mind that the PI wasn't there! He should have been front and center, giving the press conference! Then waving off-sides to Jack and Kamala as "the ones who did most of the work." Jack and Kamala are exhausted after the press conference, because they spent all day doing the job that the PR/comm team should have been doing. Seriously. This is MIT. They're awesome at this. There is no way this is the way it all would have gone down. (I'm serious: I have a far easier time suspending my belief for dragons than I do for this nonsense.)
5. The care of the dragons was awful. You don't invite the press to a hatching. First of all no one, let alone a whole roomful of non-science journalists are going to just chill until eggs hatch. Secondly, even if they would (and, honestly, if my editor would let me, I as a science journalist probably would have), there is no way the vet team would have let them. You don't move eggs ready to hatch. You keep them safe, secure, stable, and in a relatively sterile environment not in a room full of germy, mask-less members of the public. That's just an awful idea. However, it pales in comparison to anesthetizing a new hatchling just to check out its skeleton. Seriously. If it's that necessary (and it isn't!) you restrain it, move quick, and hope for the best. And by "you" here I obviously mean "you, a veterinarian with herpetological expertise" or "you, a team of vets, keepers, herps, techs, and other experts" not "you two plucky genetics/cellular biology post docs." That same team, conveniently, is also the one who should be conducting the necropsy. (Not an autopsy, a necropsy. Of course, it's OK that Kamala and Jack don't know this term because they're not qualified to do one anyway.) And when did they suddenly become experts on pathology? This just didn't make any sense and it literally ruined the book for me.
I can suspend my belief for lots of things: spaceships, FTL travel, sapient AIs, dragons, unicorns, magical telepathic horses that don't need oats, etc. But when it comes to my world, the stuff I know (zoos, biology, science communication, academia) there were just too many loose ends flying about in the wind for me to enjoy what I was meant to be enjoying....more
This was a lovely, quiet book. I enjoyed the characters and had a lot of fun looking up the artifacts on the British Museum's website as they were uneThis was a lovely, quiet book. I enjoyed the characters and had a lot of fun looking up the artifacts on the British Museum's website as they were unearthed....more