Reviews tagging 'Sexual violence'

The Half Life of Valery K by Natasha Pulley

6 reviews

neggnogg's review

emotional 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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cancer, Terminal illness, Forced institutionalization, and Death

Moderate: Child death and Murder

Minor: Sexual violence, Rape, and Sexual assault

cleot's review

challenging dark emotional informative mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Death, Gaslighting, Confinement, Animal cruelty, and Police brutality

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, War, Antisemitism, Homophobia, Terminal illness, Violence, and Animal death

Minor: Sexual violence, Ableism, Genocide, and Misogyny

gulag, soviet repression, femicide, human experimentation, nazism, Josef mengele, radiation, surveillance state, child experimentation, willful exposure of civilian population to lethal circumstances

spicedmice's review

dark informative tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual violence

Minor: Miscarriage

fdallachy's review against another edition

emotional funny sad slow-paced

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

3.5

In some ways I enjoyed reading this book - the writing is quite breezy and full of nice turns of phrase and little jokes - but on the other hand, in some ways I had to force myself to pick it up again to continue. I'm not sure why this was. It might have been partly because the subject matter is quite bleak.

I'm not sure how widely the incident on which it's based is known, though I was certainly aware of the apparent nuclear-accident coverup at Chelyabinsk, which means there isn't really a mystery as such to be revealed here.

Although I did like the central character, Valery, I didn't entirely warm to others.

I also found the romantic relationship which develops between Valery and another character didn't ring true for some reason.

I don't want to put anyone else off reading this, I think in many ways it was an excellent novel, it just didn't connect with me for some reason.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Violence and Terminal illness

Minor: Sexual violence

pvbobrien's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cancer, Violence, and Gaslighting

Moderate: Forced institutionalization, Homophobia, Infidelity, Medical content, Police brutality, Terminal illness, and Antisemitism

Minor: Sexual violence, Torture, Xenophobia, Gun violence, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Pregnancy, and Rape

roosereta's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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

Comparant-lo amb els seus altres llibres, es nota que és un llibre més adult, tant per la temàtica com pel gènere elegit, ha abandonat la ciència ficció/fantasia històrica i s'ha limitat a la novel·la històrica. 

Com sempre, la història d'amor, que és la part central del llibre, brilla. Però per principis he de criticar-la. Elegir liar a un pres polític de l'estalinisme enviat a un gulag a Siberia amb un agent de la KGB... that was a choice, wasn't it? 

Al César lo que es del César, i li he de reconèixer a Natasha Pulley que ha aconseguit una cosa pràcticament impossible; que devore un llibre sobre la radiació nuclear i m'interessen un mínim les matèries de física/química (que ja és més del que poden dir els profes del meu institut). Estic gràtament sorpresa perquè el llibre mai em resultà dens ni avorrit, i mig m'ha enganyat per a llegir un thriller, que és un gènere que no em crida molt l'atenció. 

Les crítiques que li faig al llibre, i i la raó per la qual li lleve una estrella, és que el final no m'ha paregut que proporcionara una resolució satisfactòria, s'ha llevat a personatges inconvenients de damunt d'una forma massa descuidada. Bé, i que habitualment m'agraden els meus llibres amb menys (presumptes) violacions de la Convenció de Ginebra.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Cancer, Forced institutionalization, Rape, Sexual violence, and Terminal illness