Reviews tagging 'Violence'

The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady Hendrix

524 reviews

mirandaleighhhh's review against another edition

dark funny mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

I have no idea how Grady Hendrix writes women so well….it was weird to read some of it knowing a man wrote it, when my main feeling about men coming out of this book was disgust. 

I love female friendship, sisterhood, and camaraderie!!!

I found the whole scene in which the women were ambushed and belittled by all of their husbands, collectively, all because those men love money more than their families, to be so infuriating I had to scream about it.
Carter was just awful and im so so so glad that Patrice finally divorced him! I was hooting and hollering for her the whole time. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Vomit, Domestic abuse, Child abuse, Terminal illness, Violence, Mental illness, Rape, and Blood

ginagale's review against another edition

The book became pretty grizzly. It was fun in the beginning, but now we have children, committing suicide and graphic attacks. I did not sign up for this.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, Forced institutionalization, Violence, Pedophilia, and Rape

ashtonebemis's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Gore

Moderate: Sexual violence

averageawkwardasian's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

Listened to audiobook narrated by Bahni Turpin. 

Overall fun and entertaining with a enjoyable imprecation of the vampire troupe. Love the female lead and female centric supporting cast. 

Narrator basically saved the book for me. Around the 75% mark it feels the story is dragging too long too much.

Putting a 3-year gap in the plot before the plot twist makes it difficult to stay engaged to the book.

If it wasn't for the entertaining performance of the narrator I would have dropped it. Huge kudos to Bahni Turpin.

Upon review I realized it is littered with triggers. While most are relevant to the plot, some are graphic enough I found mildly unsettling. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Misogyny, Body horror, Racism, Rape, Gaslighting, Violence, Religious bigotry, Sexual violence, Sexism, Gore, and Sexual assault

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Infidelity, Child death, Death, and Suicide

crytetra's review against another edition

dark emotional funny tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence

Moderate: Sexual assault and Child death

Minor: Vomit

delphellia's review against another edition

challenging dark sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

I enjoyed it for the most part even though it’s not my typical style. Writing style is easy to read. There were a lot of gross and graphic moments and a lot of abuse. The preface is important since it was written by a man. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual violence, Vomit, and Violence

femmeprints's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

This was an unexpected fun read! The story was long but well paced and the vampire edge was unique. There were some racially sensitive parts that made me a bit uneasy but not put down the audiobook uneasy. It was actually a good way to bring in true southern American racial dynamics. The characters were very well written and had me feeling all the emotions on their behalf. A surprising good read.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Animal death, and Violence

Moderate: Child death

ging090803's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

I didn't have any expectations. I wanted a little read and that's what I found. 
It starts pretty slow and there isn't a lot of action except by the end. There are a few disturbing scenes, especially toward the end. 
I felt one big emotion throughout the book and it was anger.

It angered me how she was always victimized, never believed, how her husband and kids treated her

. Even though there isn't a lot of action, it is still a fluid read. I wish it had been more energetic: the detective work wasn't really detective work. It was more of a "I know that's all" which was kinda "ok". Though, I liked how vampires were pictures.

Always alive/truly immortal, no fangs, can go into the sun... Not the usual vampire

and I also liked how friendship was portrayed. 
Even though most of it felt superficial

it was easy for them to turn their backs on others the minute they disagreed on something

, you can see how the women shared a deeper connection between themselves even if, by appearance, they didn't share anything in common. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Blood, Death, Dementia, Gore, and Violence

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Rape, Racism, Excrement, Murder, Suicide attempt, Sexual content, Child abuse, Child death, Gaslighting, and Vomit

chelbelle122's review against another edition

DNF @ 50%

This book should come with a trigger warner for mansplaining.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Dementia, Racism, Suicide attempt, Cannibalism, Sexism, Suicide, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Body horror, Murder, Pedophilia, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child death, Classism, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Death, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Misogyny, Violence, Child abuse, Gaslighting, and Gore

aheinicke27's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Holy cow. This book was waaayyyy more intense and gory than I thought it was going to be. When I heard it was a comedy horror I thought I’d be able to handle it, but I think the comedy is some light southern women banter and that’s about it. And the horror is HORROR. This book made me realize that I haven’t really ever read a horror book written for adults before and I underestimated my tolerance level. The psychological manipulation, sexual violence, child abuse, racism, and societal horrors of being a women in the 90s in the wealthy, patriarchal south was a lot, not to mention the physical violence and gore. I listened to the entire story…but I do have to admit there were times I had to pause and come back later. Let’s just say the raccoon scene towards the beginning was not the vibe driving into work at 7:00 AM. 

I was really invested in the characters and wanted to punch all of their dumb husbands in the face pretty much every time they made an appearance — which granted wasn’t often because the husbands were pretty distant from their families due to their dumbness anyways. This was a great female power book, and I loved seeing how the women band together to keep their community safe. Amidst all of the horrors surrounding them, their friendship was the tool that helped them do what would have initially seemed impossible at the start of the book. 

Overall, I liked the book. Will I read another horror book anytime soon? Probably not. Will I tell people about this book? Yes, but primarily to process my trauma from reading it. 😂

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, Gore, Toxic relationship, Physical abuse, Sexism, Stalking, Death, Murder, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Misogyny, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Injury/Injury detail, Racism, Rape, Child abuse, Suicide attempt, Violence, Child death, Sexual violence, and Pedophilia