Soundless by Richelle Mead | TBR SPOTLIGHT

 

Soundless by Richelle Mead is really high on my TBR, but it's been sitting on my shelf since Christmas. Somehow I've just not gotten around to reading it yet!

I know the upside of standalone stories is that I don't have to worry about waiting for the next book to published or trying to find a copy of the next book the matches my current copy. (It's the actual worst when publishers change the height and/or cover art on books midway through a series, so nothing matches or lines up on your bookshelf. Dear book publishers, please stop! You're ruining the aesthetics of my bookshelves)

I absolutely love Soundless' cover art and the blurb hooked me from the start. I find the idea of a whole town not being able to hear in a hidden village in ancient China, an interesting concept. It reminds me a little bit of the Giver, where there was a whole community removed from the rest of society. 

I'll let you know my thoughts once I'm finished, though I'm already sad that this is a standalone. I really enjoy reading series, and the ability to learn more about characters, their relationships and the internal histories of the worlds I'm reading that only deepened when you have the opportunity to spend more time with those characters. Standalone novels just don't have a chance to do that.

I read quite widely within the fantasy/sci-fi genre and I'm loving the trend towards creating greater diversity of voices and settings. The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer, particularly the first book in the series Cinder, does this really well. That being said, this isn't a new idea. There are so many inclusive stories out there. I remember reading the Dragonkeeper series by Australian writer Carole Wilkinson in primary school, though those books didn't enjoy nearly as much publicity as Soundless or Cinder. So maybe there is hope that the marginalisation of stories of those considered 'other' will end as they become more mainstream and more widely consumed. 

Including different experiences, perspectives, and voices in our stories can only be a good thing - a more complex understanding of people, places and things builds a greater depth to the reality being created. Many times while reading new novels I find this aspect missing, and feel many stories suffer from its absence. 

If you're looking for stories with a variety of voices from a range of different lived experiences, a project that works on helping readers connect with those stories is WeNeedDiverseBooks. You can read more about their campaign via the We Need Diverse Books Official Campaign Site.

Happy reading!

x E