Gretchen Felker-Martin

At the end of the world, three broken girls entrusted with the piloting of biomechanical monstrosities known as Dreadnoughts are all that stand between humanity and annihilation at the hands of the Lilim, a race of monstrous giant women from another world. As sanity and civilization teeter in the balance, Leah, El, and Kelly struggle to reconcile their hated minds and bodies with the perfect engines of destruction with which they must bond to survive.

Dreadnought

ivan

Beautifully written, Dreadnought is probably an unexpected favorite of mine this year. A hard read, but something that you can't take your eyes off of. There's so much to unpack in this - imagery, themes, metaphors, etc etc this is definitely something to read in one sitting and then reread over the course of your lifetime.

From the get-go, this is not a story about heroes saving the world. It's about girls barely fitting into their bodies and burdened with the weight of a worldwide extinction they have to prevent. It's the brutality of girlhood, of not having enough room to grow because of the suffocation of your own skin, the repeated exposure to violence (from your hand, by those of others) - and the heavy ache of wanting to have a home, a place to belong to, and a body you at least tolerate.

Be mindful of the content warnings (there are a lot) when going into this book.

Dreadnought

Reviews