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startjpw23's review against another edition
- 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
4.5
Graphic: Misogyny, Sexual assault, Vomit, Death, Gore, Confinement, Child abuse, Murder, Animal death, Blood, Emotional abuse, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Death of parent
readingwithkaitlyn's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Graphic: Vomit, Xenophobia, Addiction, Gaslighting, Body shaming, Misogyny, Child abuse, Death, Animal death, Violence, Alcohol, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Confinement, Gore, Classism, Medical content, Sexual assault, Blood, Animal cruelty, Medical trauma, Sexual violence, Torture, Emotional abuse, Sexual content, Eating disorder, Sexual harassment, Murder, and Grief
Moderate: Self harm, Death of parent, Kidnapping, Alcoholism, Gun violence, Rape, Suicidal thoughts, Body horror, Bullying, and Hate crime
Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic, Pedophilia, Colonisation, Domestic abuse, Incest, Racial slurs, Infertility, and Infidelity
Beastiality.bohemianhermit04's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Moderate: Vomit, Blood, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Sexual content, Sexual assault, Violence, Body horror, Cannibalism, Toxic relationship, Animal death, and Eating disorder
Minor: Alcohol, Death of parent, Confinement, and Physical abuse
orangewitchling's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Graphic: Physical abuse, Rape, Body horror, Misogyny, Gore, Alcoholism, Cannibalism, Death, Death of parent, Eating disorder, Classism, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Grief, Sexual violence, Blood, Bullying, Violence, War, Child abuse, Confinement, Sexual content, Adult/minor relationship, Sexual assault, and Sexual harassment
2_black_dogs's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Grief, Gun violence, Vomit, Bullying, Cannibalism, Eating disorder, Medical trauma, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual violence, Torture, Blood, Body horror, Body shaming, Child abuse, Gaslighting, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Confinement, Death of parent, Gore, Sexual assault, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Murder, and Death
pinkpapercrane's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Graphic: Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Incest, Death, Murder, Emotional abuse, Body horror, Torture, Self harm, Eating disorder, Child death, Sexual assault, Kidnapping, Grief, Domestic abuse, Child abuse, Rape, Pedophilia, Death of parent, Animal cruelty, Gun violence, Animal death, Pregnancy, Gore, Confinement, Cannibalism, Body shaming, and Adult/minor relationship
This book is very dark and very tense, there are some in depth descriptions of sexual violence, with references to it throughout the book.cloud_z's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Graphic: Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Body horror, Domestic abuse, Cannibalism, Child abuse, Blood, Bullying, Confinement, Death, Animal death, and Body shaming
lorie266's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Body horror, Death, Domestic abuse, Toxic relationship, Blood, Child abuse, Eating disorder, Pedophilia, Cannibalism, Gaslighting, Sexual assault, Emotional abuse, and Murder
Moderate: Sexual content, Classism, Animal death, Confinement, Grief, Sexual violence, and Vomit
fervent_faebles's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.0
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Juniper & Thorn is a standalone gothic horror fantasy based off Slavic folklore. It was scary, it was gruesome. Not in a way where big bad things were always happening on page, but the tension. The way the FMCs father eats his dinner set me on edge.
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Marlenchen is a witch, who lives with her two fairly wretched sisters and nightmare of father who keeps them under lock and key, isolating and harming them after turning their mother into a bird. The story itself had many metaphors for abuse. The way those causing harm can’t truly be satiated, their desperation for escalation, control, and the way survivors adapt, ultimately trying to overcome.
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Marlens upbringing has made her naive and meek. The story unfolds as she tries to be brave and secretly rebel to experience what a normal 23 year old might, such as infatuation for a man on stage. Neither of which end up being much more than one or two town characters.
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The actual monsters in this book remind me somewhat of Holly Blacks world building, which I love. The scaley, red eyed creature under the bed was less fearsome than the human men in this story. The ‘beast of man’ seems to be a theme in Reid’s writings.
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Now up until this point, I would have said this book is around 3 stars for all of the above.. but allow me to continue..
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My biggest suggestion is to MIND THE TRIGGERS! There is CSA, gore, death, cannibalism, and EDs to name a few. Overall, I could could handle all of that. Despite these ghastly things, what actually teetered this into a truly “weird” zone for me was the overly frequent mentionings and freakish descriptions of nipples..in graphic, violent, and odd ways…
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Seriously, I would have rated this 1-2 stars MORE if it weren’t for all the weird boobie stuff. This book mentions breast and nipples an insufferable amount of times. It became a joke, I was so frustrated by it that I wanted to rip the book apart then and there, which never happens. I would have DNF usually I don’t hate read something but I had to see it through, and I had to take a week long break before I got past the last 15%.
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I started counting at one point.. 6 “breasts” in a chapter. The next chapter? 11. . And that’s just breast, doesn’t include nipple, which were alternated between sometimes multiple times per page. For WHAT REASON!?
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A vague excerpt from one PARAGRAPH:
“My nipples knotted with cold.. ….it circled my breast.. …and latched itself onto my nipple” then you turn the page and it’s literally just more breastnipplebreastnipple. In moments where it literally doesn’t have to be mentioned at all. I can’t stress this enough 😂
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I think three times does she mention cutting nips.. “I imagine cutting my nipples with garden shears” and then goes on to say something like “and watch the skin unfold like the petals of a flower” or “bloom” or “the skin crawling back and blood covering like a glove” or some WEIRD SHIT LIKE THAT. It was SO MUCH, ALL THE TIME.
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“Her breast swinging like a pendulum” “I wanted to hide him in my breast” (I feel like that was said twice) “my heavy breasts” please, stop.. I’m actually begging 😩😭
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Following THAT would be the overusage of “plain faced, and maidenhead”.
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All of these ridiculous redundancies completely took you out of the story, which would have been rather good otherwise!.. aside from the weird codependency instalove like mutual trauma attachment with the love interest, who is literally stupid (sweet, but dumb) for fucking around with her like I don’t see that appeal other than she ~sees~ him.. idk. That would have been my biggest complaint had it not been for the boob stuff.. oh my god.. so much boooooob stufffff!!! The actual sex scenes were really whatever, generally, I mean one was kind of weird, but I still could have just moved on from it.. however I can’t move on from the nipple-breast infatuation. Like if I punched myself in the face every time she brought up the titty-region for no reason I would be in a padded room, which honestly sounds peaceful after reading this.
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Reid does have a lyrical way of going about such themes- but it is still a grim tale. But no amount of deep prose or atmosphere could cure me from the irreparable ick of all the above though! It started to read very much like a pretentious college student trying to be dark and poetic over and over without even realizing they were using the same strange metaphor they clung to and made the whole personality of the piece, to be different and tortured/edgy. I respect artsy, but this was so overdone, and rancid to the point of being straight up fetishization of those darker things. Her bulimia was just there, and borderline romanticized. She touched upon xenophobia and cultural shifts/classism.. and as a reader I’m like “thats and interesting thing ti fold into the foundation of the bad guy- these things are bad” but in the story they just float around.
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And I literally hate to say any of this because I thought A Study in Drowning was beautiful, and as I mentioned, I have her other works in the queue. I do think she’s clever.. I seeeee what she’s trying to do in general with what I have read. I was excited for this read and gearing up for her to be a favorite author. I will still go into them with hopes I don’t run into anything like this again and that this was just… something she was trying out, *maybe* she didn’t have an editor when Juniper and Thorn came out.. because I just don’t see how no one else would be like.. hey, can we talk about this? Like, are you okay? What’s going on here.. let’s reeeeeeel it in a pinch, it’s taking away from your work and the seriousness of this story.
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At the end of the day, I signed up to read a gothic, fairytellesque, adult horror fantasy.. that’s what I wanted, and there were some aspects of that in there! But I feel like I read some studiously written kink-fic. I feel like other reviews were vague like “it was overly sexual, graphic” no, no no.. it was freakish. I’m here telling you it’s not JUST sexual, one person said the fmc and mmc were “scurrying away to bang all the time” which isn’t true… there’s not that much intercourse.. it’s just a CONCERNING amount of TIT-shit, amongst other extremely dark and odd things that kind of get sexualized/romanticized for nothing.
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I’m so glad I read ASID first otherwise I would be so reluctant to try her other work but I KNOW she’s good and hope that it just shows how she has evolved since.
Graphic: Confinement, Sexual content, Xenophobia, Body horror, Child abuse, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Blood, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Child abuse, Death of parent, Vomit, Murder, Adult/minor relationship, Eating disorder, Pedophilia, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Incest, Physical abuse, and Animal cruelty
szink005's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Graphic: Confinement, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, and Eating disorder