Reviews tagging 'Drug abuse'

The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton

90 reviews

brittaanson's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

2.0

I wanted to love this book, and the beginning really sucked me in with the mystery. The structure is ambitious and intriguing, but by the end, I was confused and unsatisfied. Partly due to the nature of the plot, there wasn’t any deep character development, and as the truth of what was going on was revealed, I disliked the story more and more. The ending has so many twists that didn’t feel completely earned, and by that point I didn’t care about any of the characters. The rules, ethics, and motivations of those driving the story remain ill-defined to me. I didn’t enjoy the violence and aggressive fat phobia in the book. However, I will concede that the cleverness of the overall concept may be enough for someone else to find more satisfaction in this read than I did. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Death, Alcoholism, Body shaming, Drug abuse, Murder, Body horror, Fatphobia, Gore, Physical abuse, Suicide, Ableism, and Torture

Moderate: Self harm

Minor: Stalking and Rape

hjb_128's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Rape, Infidelity, Violence, Mental illness, Gun violence, Drug abuse, Torture, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Death, and Murder

Moderate: Suicide and Medical content

meganm1587's review against another edition

challenging mysterious tense medium-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? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Blood, Child death, Death, Gore, Murder, and Suicide

Moderate: Animal death and Drug abuse

Minor: Ableism

picketfences's review

challenging dark mysterious slow-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? Yes

3.0

i fought to finish this. the violence became frequent and bloody by the end, there were word choices that were questionable

(the leaves were demoralized??)

, and i got sick of all the dialog. the was less of a time travel vibe, more so a play on groundhog day.

i found the seemingly endless reiterations of the same scene from different perspectives exhausting.

i should have left this alone after i dnf the audiobook version a few months back. i was three chapters from the end this time and i almost dnf the ebook.  in short, THIS WAS A SLOG. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood and Violence

Moderate: Drug abuse and Alcohol

will_meringue's review against another edition

2.5

Incredible concept with solid delivery. There's one or two plot points that made me roll my eyes, but even considering that I think Turton pulls this off.

However - the fatphobia in this is horrendous and obscene. I would actively warn fat people against reading it and I'm appalled it got past the editor. They should be ashamed - we should all be ashamed - that something so vile was allowed to be published in 2018 (!). And, not to the same extent as the fatphobia, but some of the characterisation is pretty misogynistic. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Fatphobia, and Murder

Moderate: Rape, Drug abuse, and Misogyny

shadowmuse's review

dark slow-paced

• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated

2.0

The book is well written which is why I'm giving it 2 stars. It's just not one I'll ever read again and through the middle it was a slog that I debated stopping reading multiple times. 
It may just be even in the end I didn't find the main characters likeable. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Alcohol, Suicide, Blood, Drug abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Torture, Violence, Addiction, and Murder

crimsonsparrow's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.75

Time travel meets murder mystery meets Face Off... This has got to be one of the most complicated, convoluted detective stories I've ever experienced - in the most interesting and unique possible way. I didn't care how it ended; it was a fascinating ride. 

I was especially intrigue  by the author's ingenious use of a unique, first-person narrative and meta-narrative.  It had both both a science fiction feel and a psychological thrill without compromising the best character qualities of the MC.

The only reason it's not a perfect 5:  I would have liked some of the details to be more meticulous. Some things that seemed important up-front ended up a tad slap-dash in the end.  It got a little rushed at the end.  And the final explanation was not terribly well-supported or as well-developed as so many other aspects of the story. I absolutely recommend it, though, if for nothing else than novelty's sake

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Blood

Moderate: Murder, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Addiction, Confinement, Drug abuse, Animal death, Child death, and Gun violence

wickedgrumpy's review

challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.5

To relate it to a movie mash up, take Being John Malkovich and pair it with Knives Out with a dash of unexplained world building sci-fi time loop situation. 

Premise was quite good, but the execution suffered.  It dragged in the middle and the wrap up at the end wasn’t very satisfying because it left so many questions unanswered.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Abandonment, Ableism, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Stalking, Domestic abuse, Toxic friendship, Violence, Child abuse, Child death, Classism, Misogyny, Murder, Chronic illness, Confinement, Death, Drug abuse, Torture, Gore, Toxic relationship, Addiction, Blood, Body shaming, Infidelity, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Sexism, Drug use, Eating disorder, Fatphobia, Gun violence, Self harm, Cursing, Death of parent, Dysphoria, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Medical content, Medical trauma, Pregnancy, Rape, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Bullying, and Alcoholism

priscillarobock's review

adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Alcohol, Blood, Death, Child death, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Gun violence, Murder, Physical abuse, Suicide, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Drug use, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Drug abuse, Medical content, Medical trauma, Mental illness, and Suicide attempt

blewballoon's review

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• 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

3.5

I was intrigued and a little intimidated by the premise of this book, but the intimidation wasn't needed. The author does a good job of dropping the reader into the story and having the POV character figure things out along the way. This book feels like a mystery-thriller, and leans more one way or the other depending on which body the main character is inhabiting and how that host's mind works. I did sometimes get annoyed by the

footman popping up to be a malicious murderous nuisance in scenes where there was already danger and tension, so he felt like overkill.

The descriptions of people are mostly grotesque and include mentions of being fleshy, wrinkled, or gaunt. If it's a maid, they are almost universally described like "[hair color] spilling out of her cap" on introduction. Minor complaint aside,  the descriptions across the book in general are very immersive and quickly get you a mental picture of the scene. I was very absorbed in trying to put the pieces of the mystery together, but didn't solve it for myself before the reveal.

I don't love when a murderer's motivation is basically just that they're a psychopath, that feels lame. There was so much to the mystery that there should have been enough for a more compelling motivation.

I also don't know how I feel about the explanations offered for the premise

I remember feeling a little taken out of the story when the plague doctors spoke to each other. I never got a good sense of what time period this was. It seemed like an afterlife thing, like maybe they were in purgatory, but then it sounded like this was the normal prison system for living people??

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Gun violence, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, and Death

Moderate: Fatphobia

Minor: Alcohol, Classism, Rape, Sexual assault, and Drug abuse