Reviews tagging 'Blood'

The Story of the Lost Child by Elena Ferrante

3 reviews

risemini's review

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Murder, Medical content, Infidelity, Death, Death of parent, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Alcohol, Blood, Gun violence, Grief, Cancer, Sexual content, and Toxic friendship

radfordmanor's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Grief, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Alcoholism, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Death of parent, Cursing, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Gaslighting, Homophobia, Infidelity, Kidnapping, Medical content, Mental illness, Medical trauma, Murder, Pregnancy, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence

quickermorequickly's review

dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Lenù comes to the end of the very long story we are reading, recounting as she and Lila go through their prime as adults, with parallel pregnancies in their early 30s, and eventually the difficult transition into old age.

Ferrante does unsettling very, very well. Reading this series (as well as The Days of Abandonment) is like taking  stiff shots of very different, equally strong emotions, and then realizing you're drunk, and stumbling through a sinister amusement park. In a good way, I swear!

I found Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay and The Story of the Lost Child to be less enchanting than the earlier installments of the series, if only because I haven't yet been through most of those life stages yet and so the pings of deep recognition or identification were less frequent. But I think the more time I spend on this planet seeing sad and strange things happen, the more I will recognize.

Hats off to Ann Goldstein for this very long project of translation.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Death, Toxic friendship, Grief, Murder, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Addiction, Blood, Violence, Suicide, Kidnapping, and Terminal illness

Minor: Abandonment, Child abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Sexual content, and Outing