Reviews tagging 'Racism'

Once Upon a River by Diane Setterfield

25 reviews

thepurplepixel's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Child death, Murder, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Death, and Physical abuse

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Death of parent, Rape, Pregnancy, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide

Minor: Racism and Sexual content

matcha_cat's review

emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

3.75

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Child death, Blood, Death, Kidnapping, and Pregnancy

Minor: Medical content, Alcohol, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Death of parent, Racism, Sexual content, and Rape

skylarkblue1's review

mysterious sad slow-paced

• 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

2.25

For starters, this book aint a fantasy or even magical realism. There's some fairy tales and shit but it's just a late 1800s realism story. The science there is explained in the authors note, it's based in reality. There's like 2 pages that could be fantasy but is explained away with reality. 
"Once Upon a River is a glorious tapestry of a book that combines folklore and science, magic and myth." is an insane claim lmao. There's not an ounce of magic in the book and the only folklores and myths are basically just stories told.

While I loved the premise, the actual story fell quite short on expectations. Not only was it not fantasy as described above, the "mystery" had a very predictable path and the ending was just a bit shallow. Family trees, who did what, etc was all "hinted" at earlier in the story with the subtly of a brick through a window. Coincidences don't really exist, so if something lines up that's likely the answer.

The book feels like it's written like a river, a lot of little threads at the start slowly weaving into the larger plot and by the end it's all entwined. I thought it'd be akin to a river with it's pacing as well, start slow and gain speed, but while it did pick up a bit it did stay quite slow throughout.

There are.... a *lot* of characters. I really quite struggled to work out who was who, and especially who's POV each chapter was on (since theres a narrator throughout it gives less of a distinct voice to each chapter) and once people started having more than 1 name it just got even more confusing. Trying to work out who's child was who (there's far too many missing girls the same age in such a small area what the fuck lmao) and all that stuff was far too confusing.

I think, like Babel, I would have liked this a lot better from another author. Or maybe if it wasn't marketed as fantasy/magical realism.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Child death, Grief, Racial slurs, Misogyny, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Stalking, Rape, and Domestic abuse

No miscarrages, but a lot of mentions and descriptions of trauma around birth, death of mothers during birth and similar. Additionally there's a lot of racist and ableist slurs used throughout - and even a whole page explaining one particular slur used against people who have Down's Syndrome.

gcrkl's review

dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

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

4.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Child abuse, Pregnancy, Kidnapping, and Violence

Moderate: Ableism, Bullying, Gaslighting, Racism, Stalking, Suicidal thoughts, Child death, Chronic illness, Classism, Racial slurs, Suicide, Grief, Medical content, Rape, Suicide attempt, Blood, Death, and Domestic abuse

Minor: Alcohol, Homophobia, Animal death, Slavery, Fire/Fire injury, Pedophilia, Sexual content, and Death of parent

kato_dg's review against another edition

mysterious slow-paced

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

3.0

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Murder, Sexual assault, Child death, Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Violence, Alcohol, Death, Rape, Suicide attempt, Grief, Racism, Sexual content, Child abuse, Kidnapping, Suicidal thoughts, Injury/Injury detail, Emotional abuse, Pregnancy, and Terminal illness

Minor: Animal death, Medical content, and Blood

kcmg710's review against another edition

emotional hopeful mysterious medium-paced

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

5.0

The best word I can think of to describe this book is magical, it’s literally on the cover!

I’ve fallen in love with the characters and can’t imagine continuing life without them. I’m actually grieving finishing this book. 

The writing was so beautiful. I loved every minute of this book. 

I’ll admit it was abit tricky keeping up with everybody’s different stories because of the multiple POVS? (I think that’s the right term) however these are my favourite type of books, I love piecing it all together. It kinda reminds me of the starless sea (which I also loved) but if you found yourself not enjoying them maybe this book isn’t for you. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Kidnapping, Misogyny, Murder, Pregnancy, Toxic relationship, Domestic abuse, and Death

Moderate: Rape, Animal cruelty, Child death, Physical abuse, Animal death, Incest, Sexual assault, and Sexual content

Minor: Racism and Sexism

emmagreenwood's review against another edition

lighthearted mysterious slow-paced

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

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Ableism, Alcohol, Classism, Death, Domestic abuse, Grief, Kidnapping, Physical abuse, Racism, and Child death

Moderate: Animal death, Gaslighting, Suicide, Bullying, Toxic relationship, and Animal cruelty

cookiecat73's review against another edition

dark mysterious slow-paced

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

3.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Blood, Medical content, Misogyny, Stalking, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Child abuse, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Murder, Suicide, Ableism, Emotional abuse, Gore, Grief, Child death, Physical abuse, Racism, Suicide attempt, Toxic friendship, Xenophobia, Death, Kidnapping, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Sexism, Sexual content, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Sexual harassment, Death of parent, Chronic illness, Rape, Sexual assault, Gaslighting, and Domestic abuse

superiour_medium's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious reflective sad slow-paced

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

3.75

I think this book, like many in the fantasy genre of magical realism, has a tendency to take twice as long to explain something as it needs to. While the ensemble of characters is daunting at first, the stories all knit together quite well in a way that feels satisfying (if at times a bit improbable). In all honesty, I would have given this a 4.75 except for one, in my eyes, major problem: the author REPEATEDLY uses the g-slur in reference to a group of Romani people who live up the river from Radcot. I understand that this term was used contemporarily (I think the book takes place in the 1870's?) but there were definitely better ways to refer to these people especially knowing the term was a racist misidentification from centuries prior to the book's setting in time. 

On a similar note, one of the ancillary antagonists Mrs. Eavis (spelling?) is stated repeatedly to have a very pronounced nose. Eavis is a cruel

landlady/madame of the Brothel where Robin's wife is found dead

, and her villainy also continues during the

harvest faire when she claims publicly that The Child is Robin's

. I wouldn't have thought too much about the nose being used as a characteristic if not for the existing troubles re:Romani ethnic populations, so the hints of Romaphobia compounded to make me genuinely wonder if this was potentially slightly veiled antisemitism? I may be reading too far into things, but a certain British author always in the news has made me suspicious of even the most subtle signs.

Overall a fine venture into magical realism, but with some truncation & slightly greater cultural sensitivity could be a great story. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death

Moderate: Ableism and Racism

rey_reads's review

emotional mysterious reflective relaxing medium-paced

• 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? It's complicated

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death

Moderate: Ableism, Child abuse, and Racism