Brenna Raney

Everything you could wamt in a book like this: offbeat imaginative, and remarkably emotionally resonant. Rex is the butch, asexual protagonist of my dreams. The victim-of-the-narrative supervillain has been done to death, but it feels pretty fresh here for a few reasons. For one thing, Rex really isn't a villain and never claims to be: her intentions are good throughout, and she does her best with bad situations in both her personal and public life. Though some people paint her as a villain, show more they have to balance that perception against the other roles she takes up for them (civilian, ally, family member, etc.), so that Rex isn't a martyr and her struggles don't become melodramatic. So the government might keep her under surveillance, but they won't murder her--after all, they need her help! And if they tried, she'd be smart enough to protect herself. There is no angry mob or vengeful archenemy, just a bunch of mostly-reasonable people making choices based off of their own experiences. Grounded familal relationships are more central to Rex's pain much more than the whole am-I-a-hero-or-a-villain question (which is an obstacle more than a core theme), and the seriousness of that topic sets off the tropey comic book silliness really well.

Though Rex is not a villain, she has a wonderful edge that a lot of would-be anti-heroes don't quite manage to demonstrate. I think it's because the book never downplays the risks she takes and the mistakes she's made. Yes, her dinosaurs could take over the world if they wanted to. Yes, she did make a virus that could turn all of humanity brain-dead. She plays with fire (sometimes literally) and doesn't back down from a fight over something important to her, and it turns out that's enough to put her at the edge of villainy a lot of the time regardless of her intentions. It's an interesting take on what living in a world of superheroes could look like, and it's absolutely worth a read. show less

We know asexuals have dragons. Now what if we could also have dinosaurs? Enter Rex, an unintentional supervillain who claims she's neither villainous nor superpowered - just a genius. (Although she doesn't know she's ace yet since sex does feel good (although she doesn't quite understand the point of the other person) and besides, she hasn't even heard of the term! (A far too common experience)). Our story begins after she accidentally releases a rampage of clomed dinosaurs (whose very show more existence is a clear breach of the cloning clause) on Decimen City. Or at least that's what the authorities say - she says her incompetent lab techs let them escape #MoreToTheStory. When a real villain turns up and wants to take control, Rex is forced to work for those who have been fighting her and her work or she'll lose even more of the freedoms that the authorities haven't yet taken and maybe her supervillain twin brother and his team will rule them all.

This was such a fun book! So much chaos and I loved it. Maybe some parts felt a bit out of place (this will differ between people due to the wide range of plot points and general happenings). For me this was around the romance (which I know others will enjoy) but it was nice to see Rex struggling with her sexualiy and how this influences her relationships in this. And the cat world was just weird? I mean, it wasn't bad but why? As much as I enjoyed the chaos, I did find myself getting annoyed by some of the characters. I enjoyed the main ones - Rex, Flora and Aya (the AI whose name is the source of some confusion) but some of the others just frustrated me a bit. But the interactions between these three were incredible. And we get what is probably some of my favourite dialogue I've read:

"Am I having a gay crisis?"
"Why does it have to be a crisis? Maybe you're just having a gay"

Oh and the dinosaurs were fun although the way the narrator said "mom" was a little annoying, at least to me. But that's infrequent enough to not have a major impact on the experience. They weren't what I expected but they added a lot of comedic relief. I enjoyed Rex's frustrations around everyone else not concerning themselves with accessibility - all enrichment activities from sign language to baseball seemed to cater best towards those with arms (much to her annoyance).

I absolutely loved Rex as a character. I feel like she is the definition of chaotic neutral. With an emphasis on the chaotic. I'd definitely love to read about more of her misadventures. Think Gru from Despicable Me but the opposite. Although she often causes disasters (ranging from running zombies to a malfunctioning death ray to rampaging dinos) she doesn't mean to. And she sometimes also does unintentional good like curing cancer (Big Pharma is still out to get her). As an older sibling I also related a lot to some of her thoughts and experiences surrounding family and expectations, even though my family life may not have been quite as toxic. I could definitely see some of the things she said about expectations and the way her experiences were treated mirroring some of the things I have been told. Although the story was mostly chaos and mayhem, it does delve into darker moments at times and these felt incredibly real. I really felt for her in these kinds of moments. The author did an incredible job of capturing the pain of trauma between all the fun and action.

If you are the kind of person who enjoys chaos and intelligent dinosaurs and especially chaotic dinosaurs I can definitely recommend this book to you! I was excited to dive back in every time I picked it up. Does it always make sense? Probably not. But sometimes you need a book like this! It definitely made a great addition to a current much heavier book I'm reading (although this one does have its heavy moments too). Think Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy type absurdity, but with dinosaurs and some very real pain and struggles woven in.

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. As always, all opinions are my own. show less

Ten out of ten, best book I've read this year. (Just a little joke, since it's less than two weeks into 2024.) In seriousness, though, this is one that'll stay near the top, just because it felt like a handful of pure gold. The dinosaurs were note perfect, with their ridiculous developmental speed and hilarious personalities, but past that, the humanness of Rex captivated me. She wasn't just a genius, she was smart in ways you want a protagonist to be, not making stupid mistakes that are show more obvious to the reader for the sake of plot development. On the other hand, her trauma was beautifully handled, shaping her choices in occasionally unfortunate but realistic ways. And the ace rep was all that I could have asked for, in the way Rex learned of it and how it made her feel to finally understand something about herself that she never had. I also adored Peter (another cute but brilliant queer character!), Flora (the almost too perfect sidekick-lawyer), Cat Man (a lovely flip of the usually female-coded feline superhero stereotype), and so much more.

Just to add: there might be those critical of this book for "queersplaining" Rex's identity to her. In recent discussion, a colleague accurately responded to that criticism by saying that, in terms of adult fiction, we are simply at the stage where a certain level of that sort of occasionally awkward explanation is necessary. We once saw a lot of that sort of thing in YA books, though now that there's much more rep in that category it's less common, and hopefully a little bit of it now in adult fiction will lead to a similar state there as well. I'll take the queersplaining over no rep at all, and the good massively outweighed any of my reservations in this particular book. show less