Reviews tagging 'Torture'

Góry śpiewają by Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai

37 reviews

lightsleeper_heavydreamer's review against another edition

4.5

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

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This was a wonderful family saga and I cried and learned a lot! The things I knew about Vietnamese history I mostly had from museums, this book brought history to life in all its tragedy, cruelty, all its sorrow and grief, all its persistence and kindness and love. At times this story is almost unbeatably sad and I felt so much for the family and everything they had to go through but it also managed to be hopeful throughout. The women here are so strong for their persistence and their unwillingness to give in or to lose their kindness. 
Highly recommended the audio book, there's so many Vietnamese proverbs in this and   hearing them spoken by a Vietnamese speaker and not just reading them wrongly in my head.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Genocide, Miscarriage, Rape, Sexual violence, Suicide, Terminal illness, Torture, War

bessadams's review against another edition

4.0

challenging emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, War

Moderate: Alcoholism, Bullying, Cancer, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Physical abuse, Torture, Excrement, Abortion, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Classism

Minor: Rape, Suicidal thoughts

bonha's review against another edition

5.0

challenging dark emotional informative sad slow-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: No

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Loved it. So sad, so emotional, but it was also beautifully written and still hopeful/ uplifting. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Genocide, Misogyny, Rape, Sexual violence, Terminal illness, Torture, Violence, Grief, Abortion, Death of parent, Colonisation, War

now_booking's review against another edition

5.0

challenging emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

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Wow. I’ve known about this novel for ages not least of all because I have many friends on Bookstagram who’ve raved about it for years. The truth is they just might have undersold it. This is a truly brilliant, compellingly-told multigenerational family saga that is filled with so much life and tragedy but yet so much hope for healing and reconciliation even in the face of hardship. 

First of all, I entered this book not knowing much about Vietnamese history beyond America’s interventionist role in it, the dispute in America around their own involvement, and the resultant mess left behind. To my knowledge, contemporary Vietnam is a gorgeous place that tourists visit and that is on my bucket list to go to. Yet outside of this perspective, I’d never really experienced Vietnam from its own perspective as the subject of its own story rather than through a Western lens. Knowing my own family’s experience of war and occupation in my own country, I know the story is never simple and not everyone will agree with this author’s approach to telling this story or perspectives on historical events as reflected through Huong and her grandmother, Diêu Lan. That said, from my perspective as an international reader, I think the author tells an eminently and universally human story where if we acknowledge the commonality of of our humanity, we will understand that there are no real winners in war. 

Diêu Lan is clearly the star of this book even if Huang’s voice remains strong throughout. Sometimes with books about characters that are resilient in the face of incredible trauma and hardship, the inspiration they provide as strong characters can simultaneously feel a little dismissive of the magnitude and impact of the suffering of others- sort of like “if Diêu Lan can move on and keep going, why can’t you? If she can forgive, something must be wrong with you that you can’t.” I think this book approaches this sensibly. Diêu Lan has Pollyanna ways, but she also feels deeply her grief and processes it through her faith. And through that faith, she’s also able to accept people (her children, for example) at different stages of grief and anger and PTSD without judgement and without insisting on her own approach or perspective. I loved how pragmatic she was but also how loving and how emotional. For me, her story was a coming of age story that revealed a lot about how much her family and the way she was raised set her up to face some of the challenges she did in her life. Huang’s story was a parallel coming of age story but more reflective of our journey as readers being novices in Vietnamese history or in Diêu Lan’s life and maturing as we read to a state of of not quite full adulthood, greater understanding of the multiplicity of perspectives and experiences that can be true and the commonality of suffering of everyday people in a war.

The language in this book was absolutely gorgeous, the use of proverbs and stories and viewing the world through a rich lens of culture and traditions, lent authenticity to the history we were reading. This was absolutely tragic but it never felt like grief porn, your heart was broken but in Diêu Lan’s resilience, it was healed again. Even in difficult moments, I was drawn to this and could hardly put it down. This is absolutely my favourite read so far this year and a new all time fave that will stick with me for a long time. I can’t recommend this enough.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Cancer, Child death, Death, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Violence, Blood, Grief, Abortion, Death of parent, Murder, Abandonment, Sexual harassment, War, Classism

Moderate: Confinement, Genocide, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Torture, Medical trauma, Toxic friendship, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Ableism, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Incest, Infertility

annorabrady's review against another edition

4.0

adventurous challenging dark hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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I loved the look into the history of Vietnam through the generations. The characters and their stories were fully fleshed such that it reads more like a memoir than a historical fiction. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Cancer, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Hate crime, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Torture, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, Classism

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Infertility, Police brutality, Abortion

____emily____'s review against another edition

4.0

challenging sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Torture, Violence, Abandonment, War

singout's review against another edition

5.0

challenging dark emotional informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

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Powerful story about three generations in North Vietnam: it goes back-and-forth between a young girl’s experience of the end of the Vietnam war, and her grandmother’s survival of the 1940s great hunger and harsh land reform, with the middle generation being portrayed either as children or soldiers.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Body horror, Child abuse, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Kidnapping, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Abandonment, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail

starsincline's review against another edition

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, War

Moderate: Genocide, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Death of parent, Colonisation

Minor: Child abuse, Abortion

beca's review against another edition

5.0

challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Death of parent, Abandonment, Colonisation, War

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Genocide, Physical abuse, Terminal illness, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, Sexual harassment

Minor: Rape, Torture

edilund's review against another edition

emotional hopeful sad tense fast-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Child death, Death, Physical abuse, Rape, Suicide, Torture, War