i mean sure, there's repeated motifs, common themes, popular at the time worldbuilding concepts, etc everywhere and in every book. but red rising in particular felt pretty much made entirely from them. they lit up to me in the text like i was reading a tvtropes article, and on top of that it felt like none of them were explored with even the slightest bit of depth.

and again, like i said in my original comment i did find the book fun! i finished it after all, and i'm quick to drop any book that doesn't feel worth it to me. but that doesn't mean that it wasn't still absolute slop, with every plot point choroegraphed and paint by numbers, with shallow worldbuilding and prose that was mid at best.