Reviews tagging 'Homophobia'

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

34 reviews

glacialis's review against another edition

challenging reflective slow-paced

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

3.0

---

Content Warnings

Minor: Homophobia

touchegiantsquid's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

5.0

It's a quiet, reflective fantasy that will probably stay with me for a long time. Being trapped in my house since March 2020, the themes and details of the story felt urgently relevant.

---

Content Warnings

Minor: Homophobia, Gun violence, Toxic relationship, Confinement, Gaslighting, Slavery, and Fatphobia

The big bad is depicted as sinister and as a way to underline his perversion he is also gay. It's a homophobic trope. At the very end a parallel is drawn between a fat statue and the big bad because fatness is also a perversion to this author. It's fat hate that didn't add to the story.

rusya's review against another edition

• 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? It's complicated

1.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Kidnapping, Slavery, and Toxic friendship

Moderate: Homophobia

blackrabbitrun's review against another edition

challenging mysterious medium-paced

• 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? No

4.25

A book being Really Quite Good is never such a disappointment as when for the first 150 pages you see it winding up to something Excellent. I believe I may just have chronic Chekhov's gun -itis.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Gaslighting, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Fatphobia and Homophobia

nikenacs's review

adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

5.0

[Book club - December 2021]
The most five-star-y five-star book I read this year (sorry, Song of Achilles). I could talk about it for two hours (and I did, in book club) and still not mention everything about it that I liked. 

Piranesi is a mystery, a puzzle box waiting to be solved, but unfortunately your narrator has no idea the puzzle even exists. It takes the term "unreliable narrator" to a whole other level. The reader constantly knows way more than the main character, even though he is our only way of knowing things in the first place. It fascinated and engaged me like few books before. 

Piranesi is a drop-dead gorgeous experience even apart from the mystery. Susanna Clarke's world feels incredibly tangible and lived-in (even though so very few people live in it). The House and its Statues will live in my mind rent-free for quite a while. 

But above all, and at the risk of sounding incredibly cliché, Piranesi is an exercise in humanity. It is, fundamentally, a book about what makes a person human and what makes society tick (even if that society consist of one guy, his distant colleague, a few dead bodies and a whole lot of birds and statues). Piranesi's caregiving, his rituals, his morality, his near-religious interpretation of his World, his refusal to harm even his supposed enemy, and, in the end,

his desire for community over comfort - even being stripped of almost all personal identity,

he still remains the most human(e) character of all. 

Susanna Clarke, I will sell my soul to you. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norell has already moved in on my To Read shelf. Thank you for this absolute gem of a novel.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Confinement, Dementia, and Gaslighting

Moderate: Homophobia and Gun violence

Minor: Cursing

hazelsnoot's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense 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? It's complicated

4.5

Reread 12/3/23. 4.75/5 stars. Minus .25 star for the weird fatphobia in the final chapter, and low level but pervasive homophobia towards the main villain?

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Mental illness, Confinement, Death, Dementia, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Kidnapping, Toxic relationship, Bullying, and Gun violence

Minor: Homophobia, Fatphobia, Excrement, Gun violence, and Child death

astridrv's review against another edition

funny mysterious reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Loveable characters? Yes

Read it in one sitting, what a blast! A soft, sad, magical little tale. I adored the mystery of the first half and felt the ending was a bit heavy on explanations. It made sense for the naïve voice of the narrator, but also underestimated the reader a little bit. I would have liked the masterful mystery of the first third to envelop the entire book. Nonetheless, I was somewhere else, and very touched.

---

Content Warnings

Minor: Fatphobia, Death, and Homophobia

veeronald's review against another edition

challenging emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Death, Kidnapping, and Mental illness

Moderate: Confinement, Death, Emotional abuse, Kidnapping, Mental illness, Murder, Torture, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Animal death, Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Grief, Kidnapping, Mental illness, Murder, Physical abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Torture, Trafficking, Violence, and Gun violence

nyoom's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

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

0.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body shaming, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Excrement, Fatphobia, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Gun violence, Homophobia, Kidnapping, Mental illness, Murder, Pedophilia, Racism, Slavery, and Violence

Moderate: Blood, Body horror, and Panic attacks/disorders

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Drug use, Drug abuse, Medical content, and Suicide attempt

podanotherjessi's review against another edition

mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.75

This book was... tedius. I think I liked it, but it was work to get through. Some amazing passages and really exciting moments mixed up with infodumps and the boring mundane. I could go days without touching Piranesi, and devour pages in moments. The character work in this is excellent, and there were moments I doubted my own sanity. There were also moments I wondered why I was bothering. I can't confidently say I would recomend this, but I wouldn't warn anyone away.

Characters: 9
Plot: 6
Setting: 10
General appeal: 6
Writing style: 7
Originality: 9
Ending: 5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Emotional abuse, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Gun violence and Homophobia