The Mad Scientist's Daughter by Cassandra Rose Clarke

The Mad Scientist's Daughter by Cassandra Rose Clarke
Series: N/A
Source: Netgalley
Publisher: Angry Robot
Publication Date: January 29, 2013

"Cat, this is Finn. He's going to be your tutor."


Finn looks and acts human, though he has no desire to be. He was programmed to assist his owners, and performs his duties to perfection. A billion-dollar construct, his primary task is now to tutor Cat. As she grows into a beautiful young woman, Finn is her guardian, her constant companion...and more. But when the government grants rights to the ever-increasing robot population, however, Finn struggles to find his place in the world, and in Cat's heart.

I guess I'll just get straight to the heart of things - I didn't love The Mad Scientist's Daughter. I've seen lots and lots of favorable reviews on it, but it just didn't go as well for me. I thought that the point of view/writing style was very strange, but as the book progressed I became used to it; which means it really wasn't one of my peeves.

But there were lots of peeves. Lots and lots of peeves. Let's start with Cat. In the beginning chapter, Cat is really young - maybe 8 or 10? That wasn't a problem. The problem was that she got older throughout the book - and it didn't register with me until she was like twenty. Her voice didn't really change between those ages, which just bothered me. Everyone's perception of things changes as they grow older, and Cat's just... didn't. She was pretty much the same person, from beginning to end. I hoped for character growth from her, I really did.

And don't even get me started on the romance. We have the romance plottish thing with Finn - that's quite the focus throughout the story, and it honestly raised a lot of moral questions for me - and sometimes just questions like how everything works. Not to be awkward or anything... but robot sex? *shudders* For some reason, the idea just grosses me out. And it makes me question things about Finn's... you know... LET'S NOT GO THERE (how can his junk possibly work?!) (Yep, this is what I was questioning. Laugh if you must.) In all honesty, such a thing should just not be possible.

Aside from all of this "not possible" thing, there's also the fact that Cat repeatedly uses Finn. Like, uses him and then runs off with her boyfriend of the week. The girl is constantly attached to someone else, which made for quite a few annoying and slightly awkward love triangle situations.

Now we'll move on to the pacing - the pacing was insane. Time progressed so quickly that I'm not even sure where some of our time went. I think that there was maybe like... 15 - 20 years packed into this book? And there's lots of gaps in between, so sometimes I just couldn't follow. Coupled with Cat's eternal youth, it really was just awkward.

I didn't have enough background on the world or the circumstances to really love it, but the atmosphere was nice and gothic. I just... I feel like there were too many awkward plot twists and ridiculous changes throughout the book for me to really love it. It's one of the strangest books that I've ever read, but it gets three stars for originality and enjoyment levels, even if there were a lot of things that I disliked.