Reviews tagging 'Death'

Extasia by Claire Legrand

26 reviews

sunbearbeam's review against another edition

dark sad tense medium-paced

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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Religious bigotry and Death

Moderate: Sexual assault, Cannibalism, Suicide, and Death of parent

shelfdeprecation's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gore, Blood, Death of parent, Violence, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Murder, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Body horror, and Child abuse

Moderate: Colonisation, Infidelity, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Domestic abuse and Sexual assault

senwithers's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Physical abuse, Death, Gaslighting, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual assault, Body horror, Religious bigotry, Misogyny, and Gore

The cult/religious trauma is intense in this one.

aseel_reads's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense fast-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? It's complicated

2.5

Kind of odd to mix a super patriarchal society/witches with a dystopian type of world. Not really sure how I feel about that. I liked the witchy and queer elements of it but the overall plot wasn't as smooth as It could have been. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexism, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Bullying, Injury/Injury detail, Animal death, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Lesbophobia, Blood, Misogyny, Murder, Sexual harassment, Grief, Gun violence, Homophobia, Infidelity, Torture, Sexual content, Violence, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Rape, and Religious bigotry

sav_22's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark reflective sad tense 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? Yes

3.5

I very much enjoyed this book. I would describe it as Fear Street 1666 meets handmaid’s tale meets Ethel Cain’s Preachers Daughter. This is very much a deep dive into processing systemically rooted oppression of women, and explores the craving for justice to the extreme. I think if you like June  (Handmaids tale) as a protagonist, you’d enjoy many of these characters. My main gripe is

the underland plot twist. Unless there is a sequel she meant to set up to justify that plot point and further explore, then imo it just as easily could have been removed and replaced with them finding out that the devil is just a symbol of people that assert misery and domination over others or something.

  the pacing was also a weakness but overall it’s an interesting concept and a compelling read 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Sexism, Child abuse, Grief, Blood, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Torture, Toxic relationship, Kidnapping, Physical abuse, Religious bigotry, Sexual violence, and Gaslighting

Moderate: Death of parent, War, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Death, Child death, and Emotional abuse

Minor: Confinement, Abandonment, and Adult/minor relationship

lillygabriella's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

This book is definitely not for everyone, and even though it's listed as a Young Adult book, I would not want my teens to read it. It's very dark, and the depictions of violence and sexual content are too graphic for younger teens in my opinion.

This was an absolutely gripping read from start to finish and I read it in three days. Every time I thought we were at peak WTF moments, it threw another curve ball at me. This is well marked as horror, and anyone considering reading it should definitely pay attention to the warning tags.

If you like dark and post apocalyptic stuff, this is probably right up your alley.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Cannibalism, Gaslighting, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Sexism, Sexual content, Child abuse, Death, Death of parent, Blood, Gore, and Violence

jokehelldo's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense 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? Yes

2.75

Ending fucked everything up. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Sexual violence, Murder, Misogyny, Religious bigotry, Abandonment, Body horror, and Torture

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Death, Fire/Fire injury, and Death of parent

Minor: Lesbophobia and Homophobia

lvjysunday's review against another edition

dark mysterious 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? It's complicated

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Religious bigotry, Murder, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Gore, Physical abuse, and Death

Moderate: Homophobia, Misogyny, Injury/Injury detail, and Violence

Minor: Grief and Animal death

This book deals with a lot of heavy topics.

ghostlyprince's review

challenging dark tense slow-paced

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

3.5

 

I'd rate this higher if it wasn't for the constant sexual content of minor characters :/

 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Death, Death of parent, Gaslighting, Gore, Animal death, Cannibalism, Sexism, Sexual harassment, Torture, Body horror, Child death, Fire/Fire injury, Misogyny, Murder, Sexual violence, Animal cruelty, Bullying, Child abuse, Physical abuse, Religious bigotry, Sexual assault, and Sexual content

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Infidelity, Confinement, and Self harm

Minor: Homophobia and Lesbophobia

Honestly there is so much heavy stuff in this book it'd be impossible to list it all, this book is not for the feint of heart and if any of the tw's contain a trigger of yours I'd advise to steer clear from the book, it's a good book but it's extremely heavy and disturbing

sarah984's review

dark mysterious slow-paced

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

1.0

I was so excited to read this because I loved Sawkill Girls but this book did not work for me.

First of all I think it's kind of cowardly to set this book in the context it winds up being set in and not explicitly make the cult religion Christianity. The society isn't described particularly well; the book is so long and drags on but so many things are glossed over so there's not much of an idea what their everyday life is like. I kind of wish that Amity had had a few "normal" visitations and other duties as a saint before it all hit the fan.

The characters are all cardboard cutouts (the only one I found mildly interesting was the

second POV character

and she's only in a couple of chapters near the end), the witches feel pointless (their entire role could easily have been fulfilled by other characters who were already present) and the romance is very silly.

The magic system isn't well set up and basically just works however the plot needs it to. The plot itself just does whatever to get to the next point - I never understood why Amity was so set on meeting the devil in the first place.

Also it's annoying going into a book that says it's about revenge and righteous anger and then having the message be that we need to be nice to bigots because maybe they don't know that racism and misogyny are bad. I almost wish racism hadn't come up at all because it's handled so clumsily

- there are like 3 (marginally) important Black characters because the founders of Amity's cult were white supremacists, but of those characters 1 dies and 1 is a villain, and since Amity only even found out Black people existed like last week the cult's racism isn't super plot relevant. Two different revolutions happen basically off page so the author doesn't have to try and explain how they did that without hurting anyone's feelings.

Also the sequel hook was stupid. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fire/Fire injury, Misogyny, Religious bigotry, Child abuse, and Child death

Moderate: Death, Injury/Injury detail, Animal death, Body horror, Blood, Bullying, Cannibalism, Confinement, Grief, Sexual assault, Torture, Violence, Death of parent, Murder, Racism, and Self harm

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Drug use, Homophobia, Infidelity, Vomit, and War