Reviews with content warning for Homophobia - Hurricane Season

Reviews tagging 'Homophobia'

Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor

128 reviews

yajairat's review against another edition

dark tense medium-paced

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

3.75

The most grim and dark book I’ve read in a long time. Just when you thought things couldn’t get more depraved, they do! A graphic and unflinching look at the darkest corners of humanity. What made me not just DNF it was the writing and the structure of it. Short but packs the biggest punch.

Fernanda Melchor, tiene mis respetos. Nunca voy a olvidar las emociones que senti cuando estaba leyendo esto.

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oversherin's review

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challenging dark sad tense medium-paced

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

Not rating this book because it is not my taste - but I respect the hell out of it.

This book is incredibly violent and dark. You get right into the mind of the characters who are deeply troubled and hateful people who are wrecked by their environment. Chapters are long dark spirals into the depths of these characters and their darkest thoughts imaginable. Despite this, Melchor is very skilled in giving them just enough humanity that I empathized with them and wanted to stick it out to the end. As other reviewers have said, this book is deeply, disturbingly, honest in a way I have never read before. To me, the hardest part of this book is that most of the characters are children who are wrapped up in the worst of the world. The run-on prose took adjustment, but I found it very natural by middle.

Overall, I thought the story was compelling and timeless. I gritted my teeth through the whole book and had to scan some chapters because I just couldn't stomach it. However, I respect this book and the stories it's telling. There is more truth to this book than I'd like to face. It definitely affected me in an artful way.

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elizafiedler's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional medium-paced

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

3.0

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snovella's review

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challenging dark mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.25

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moi_stephanie's review against another edition

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dark reflective medium-paced

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

3.5

Very dark stories intertwined with misery as a common thread.

Very descriptive, which makes it easy to imagine what characters are going through.

Worst part of it might be that there's no happy ending, but that's reality for many people.

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cat_22's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

4.75

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ceco_'s review

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dark sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

I struggled to write a review that would do this book justice. If you have the time, I recommend you read M John Harrison and Anthony Cummin's reviews (both published by the Guardian).

In short, this is a brutal book and it's not going to be for everyone. The reading experience is shocking, repulsive, but its lingering effect is profound.

A local Witch is found dead, throat slit, floating in a canal. What follows is a whirlwind exploration of life in a rural Mexican town - its constricting familial relations, sexual violence, and deadly masculinity.

Besides the 'bookending' chapters that function as an introduction and conclusion, each chapter of Hurricane Season is a different character's "retelling" of the circumstances of the murder. I use quotation marks because, truthfully, it's less of a retelling and more of a character study showcasing that person's life, motivations and anxieties, with clues to the Witch's death threaded in between, leaving the reader to piece together what happened and why certain events were interpreted in a particular way.

It's undoubtedly a challenging read, but one that will stick with me for a long time.

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brandaisyork's review against another edition

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dark tense medium-paced

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

3.75

This book is beautifully written, but I found it hard to get into. It’s a very dark subject and written very lyrically, so at first it feels almost surreal.

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s4ily's review

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dark medium-paced

3.0

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amelietherin's review

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challenging dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

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