Juxian's Reviews > Subjection

My first try to review while reading :)
Finished.
Aww, it's sweet. It's the first master/slave story where I actually find master/slave relations enjoyable, normally I'm all for equality. No time to write, need read the next one :)
At 71%.
Still so interesting I can't tear myself away from it. And still... instead of my heart going out for Sascha, I rather find his dramatics funny. Makes me feel like a terrible person. I usually stay away from slave fics because I get too upset and worked up about slaves being treated, well, like slaves. Here I'm kinda cheering when Cashiel has to punish Sascha. Because Sascha is annoying. I wonder if it is the author's intent.
At 32%.
It's interesting. I couldn't stop reading it till two a.m. at night. but I don't like Sascha. Which is strange because he is the kind of character (enslaved and abused) who normally would have had my immediate and passionate sympathy. But I don't feel anything much about him, mild sympathy, maybe, and dislike, too. I don't like him when he is traumatized, and I don't like him in his flashbacks. Right now I feel more sympathy towards Cashiel who has to share his living space with Sascha.
Now the idea of the Demoted is an intriguing one. But it makes no sense. Bodyguards? They make bodyguards out of the Demoted? Because a beaten, starved, raped bodyguard with a low IQ is the best bodyguard ever? And swapping the test results?! If it were so easy, if it were possible at all, people would do it all the time. Parents would bribe teachers to help their kids pass. Bright kids would be failed because someone didn't like them or their parents. And with 15% of the population Demoted... let me see, it makes 30% of the population (two parents of each kid) and probably 15% more (brothers and sisters) traumatized by the system. With 60% of the population suffering from the system (because families normally love their kids, even dumb ones) how comes the system still exists?
And it makes no sense to me that families don't do at least have the first hand right to buy out the Demoted kids. From the economic point of view it would have a lot of sense. I doubt Mistress Brethel paid much to get Sascha, and he obviously didn't cost that much to Cashiel. Now families would likely agree to pay a lot more. It would also make more sense if, for example, Sascha thought he would be bought out by his family and his plight was just temporary, and for some reason they didn't buy him out, oh angst :)
I really don't like when a dystopian book just draws a very dark picture without taking into account how human psyche works.
But the book is really damn interesting!