Reviews tagging 'Violence'

The Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey

62 reviews

wear_sun_screen's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Infidelity, Medical content, Murder, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Violence

Minor: Alcohol

stevie's review against another edition

dark reflective tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Medical content, Medical trauma, Murder, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, and Violence

samusc's review against another edition

dark emotional tense fast-paced

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

5.0

This book is unlike any other I've read.
The science fiction and horror elements were incredibly well executed. Every detail mattered.
Having dealt with domestic abuse, the situations outlined here were intense and authentic.
Sarah Gaileys' acknowledgement at the end confirmed what I feared, but I'm thankful that their work has hopefully helped them, and I know helped me.

Full review to come.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Violence, Domestic abuse, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Blood, Confinement, Death of parent, Medical content, Panic attacks/disorders, Pregnancy, and Toxic relationship

bi_n_large's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense fast-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Domestic abuse, Murder, Body horror, Blood, and Violence

Moderate: Child abuse and Misogyny

iviarelle's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious 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

5.0

I might compare this to other media, as is so common, as "Wilder Girls meets Westworld", with a heavy hand on the "mind the content warnings". As a survivor of parental abuse, not entirely unlike Evelyn's either, I... almost feel like I shouldn't enjoy this as much as I do? As someone whose worst fear is becoming like my father, there's a strange catharsis in this story and its ending. That is VERY much YMMV and it will NOT resonate that way for all survivors, and don't feel obligated to keep going if it gets to be too much for you as an individual... but gosh. I really, really liked this one. I like that everything that should be portrayed as horrific, is. Everyone who is terrible, is shown in gory detail to be so. There's nothing sympathetic about anyone in this story... and yet, there is so much care at the same time.

I dunno. I don't think I've read a story by Sarah Gailey that didn't fuck with me for a few days afterward, but I also love what they put into their work, the themes they explore, and more importantly perhaps, the way they explore them. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Child abuse, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Infidelity, Medical content, Medical trauma, Murder, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Toxic relationship, and Violence

Moderate: Abortion and Car accident

shaney_swift's review against another edition

dark tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Murder

ehmannky's review against another edition

dark emotional tense fast-paced

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

5.0

This book was stellar. The writing is superb, the plot and pacing is amazing, and the story is so good. It's a rough story, using science fiction to explore grooming and abuse and exploring what are the ways that the toxic people in our lives "program" us and how we replicate those patterns with other people. It's gonna sit with me for a long time. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Death, Body horror, Violence, Toxic relationship, Pregnancy, Murder, Medical content, and Infidelity

Moderate: Suicide

Minor: Vomit

marrowe's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional fast-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Domestic abuse, and Emotional abuse

Moderate: Death, Death of parent, Confinement, Medical trauma, Medical content, Violence, and Murder

enemies-to-friends, found family, orphan black

girlonbooks's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense 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? Yes

4.0

💍💍💍💍(four stars as rated in wedding rings worn until death do us part, do us part, do us part, do us part…)

Evelyn Caldwell’s human cloning technology changed the world for everyone, herself included. When Evelyn’s catches her husband having an affair with a clone of her Evelyn is forced to keep it quiet or risk ruining everything she’s worked for. Now her ex is dead – murdered in self defense by his “new wife” – and the women must work together to cover it up or lose the things that matter most to both of them.

“Why would you ever cut the blooms off the rosebush?”
It was one of the only truly useful things she ever taught me: Stress stimulates growth. Sometimes, in order to make something develop in the right direction, you have to hurt it.

You know that feeling when you’re reading a book and you think, “oh this is going to get made into a movie without question.” I felt that so many times while reading The Echo Wife that I may just go ahead and start my own studio and make the thing myself! It’s just such a gloriously original thriller that the idea of it not getting optioned feels a bit preposterous. I, for one, totally devoured this book and now consider myself an official member of the “Sarah Gailey is brilliantly talented in all ways” club. I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys dark themes, LOTS of internal reflection on the part of the protagonist and morally ambiguous characters. To me, though, none of that felt tiring to get through, which is actually rather shocking considering that this book is far more character based than it is plot based. Especially for a thriller. From a literary standpoint, The Echo Wife is edited just beautifully and the flow of the thing itself is outstanding.

The best part of science fiction (imo) is being asked to suspend your disbelief in order to entertain a false reality. It turns out, though, that there are a lot of people who don’t actually like that. Which is wild to me since, that is literally the POINT behind the genre? The Echo Wife asks a lot of disbelief suspension on the part of the reader. So, if you’re not ready to do that then this book will not hit the mark for you. On that note, if you can’t get on board with fake science then you probably should mosey on out of the sci-fi genre and stay out of it forever. 🙈

✨ Rep in this book: NB author

✨ Content warnings for this book: death of a spouse, death of a parent, murder, blood, medical stuff, adultery, domestic violence, confinement

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Murder, Blood, Medical content, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Violence, Confinement, and Suicide

Minor: Death of parent

shelfmadewoman's review against another edition

adventurous dark reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

You won’t find me reading a lot of domestic thrillers... but you can certainly find me picking up a domestic thriller by Sarah Gailey that are about... well... what this is about. I suggest not looking at the summary before reading if you can bear it. As with most thrillers, its best to go in with a blank slate!

Without getting into any specifics, I can tell you that Gailey goes beyond the surface ideas of the story and explores ethics and consent in a new way.

I liked it a lot! It was twisty as heck! I would do it again!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Car accident, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Gore, Grief, Infidelity, Medical trauma, Misogyny, Murder, Physical abuse, and Violence