Reviews tagging 'Emotional abuse'

The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty

15 reviews

ameliasbooks's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious sad 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? Yes

3.25

This is a tough one to review. The author throws everything at you that is on her mind and you have to deal with it. Some parts leave you breathless and others weirdly are a bit of a slog.

The writing is strong most of the time, but the story can't keep up with it. Too many side characters, whose stories don't get really elaborated and I could have really done without this totally uninteresting son of a celebrity mother.
 
I'm rating this a bit higher, because of the strong writing. The story gave me sadness and loneliness (which I'm totally here for), but apart from that, there wasn't enough meat to the bone for me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Blood, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Sexual assault, Animal cruelty, Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, and Misogyny

Moderate: Drug use and Alcoholism

indigo666's review against another edition

dark reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Vomit, Gore, Toxic friendship, Animal cruelty, Blood, Sexual assault, Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Child abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Emotional abuse, and Violence

polite_yam's review against another edition

dark emotional funny sad medium-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? It's complicated

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death, Violence, and Emotional abuse

fkshg8465's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional medium-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

3.5

This was parts funny, parts pathetic (not in the looser sense but in the sense it emoted empathy from me), and parts despicable. The ending was sad for me (that was pathetic, for example). But getting to the end was largely amusing, but only if I removed myself from the characters (usually, I read as if I was a fly on the wall, but in this case, I often found myself being a fly on the other side of a window). If I’d been in the house, it would’ve been far too pathetic and far too despicable and hence, too hard to read.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Adult/minor relationship, Infidelity, Sexual assault, Torture, Violence, Animal cruelty, Emotional abuse, Child abuse, and Death

peckreadsbooks's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Animal cruelty, Panic attacks/disorders, and Sexual content

cstein's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny informative mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

4.5

In this ambitious and then painfully pointed examination of contemporary struggle, Gunty employs a unique narrative style and extensive knowledge of her spiritual and philosophical forebears to great effect. The late, Dostoevsky-esque monologue chapter was the novel's highlight and a pleasure to parse through. Gunty has a keen eye for phenomena one passively observes but never articulates. However, when it finally arrived, the scene anticipated from page one felt underexamined.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Animal cruelty, Toxic relationship, Adult/minor relationship, Body horror, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, Animal death, Emotional abuse, Sexual harassment, Bullying, and Gaslighting

Moderate: Classism, Blood, Mental illness, Cursing, Violence, Sexual assault, and Stalking

Minor: Vomit and Sexual content

lucyatoz's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Blandine isn't like the other residents of her building. Welcome to the Rabbit Hutch. 

Well, that was a reading experience I was not expecting at all! The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty is a gut retching novel, with an online obituary writer, an old couple who have a rodent problem, a young mother with a secret and four teenagers who have aged out of state foster care, living as neighbours in a run down, lost cost apartment block. The story is set over the space of a week and accumulates with a violent stabbing. 

I appreciated how the narrative was written and how the story elicited strong emotions as I read it, however I felt that it did not flow exactly and sometimes the plot lacked focus. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Sexual content, Infidelity, Suicidal thoughts, Adult/minor relationship, Cursing, Injury/Injury detail, Drug use, Medical content, and Mental illness

laurataylor's review against another edition

dark slow-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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Blood, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Animal cruelty, Infidelity, Medical trauma, Injury/Injury detail, Alcohol, Death, Emotional abuse, and Murder

ashar_allaire's review against another edition

slow-paced

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

3.75

I have mixed feelings about this book. I listened to it as an audio book, which I made it hard for me to keep track of all the characters and loose threads. That being said, I am sure I would've DNFed this in physical form because some chapters were over an hour long. I loved the story, and I found each character interesting, I just found myself being like "Wait, what? Who is talking? What's happening?" way too much. 

The end of this book is predictable by design, but I still found it anticlimactic. James never confesses, and Joan never felt fleshed out enough for it to end with her. The reason the sacrifices continued was never clear to me. It felt like I had to suspend my disbelief quite a bit as it was a clunky plot point at best. I am also not sure why the older couple or Hope were included, but maybe I just missed something there.

I genuinely did love this book overall and the opening chapter was the most beautiful opening chapter I have ever read. The prose is unique and powerful. I would recommend it with the warning that it is dense and difficult to keep track of at times.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, and Animal death

Moderate: Stalking, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Emotional abuse, and Sexism

mirandaandtitania's review against another edition

dark reflective tense slow-paced

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

The writing in this was stunning!! I felt like underlining every sentence but I managed to restrain myself. The disjointed narrative did hinder my enjoyment as I found myself just wanting to know what was occurring in C4 but there was good payoff at the end. The last chapter was lovely.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Emotional abuse, and Violence

Moderate: Bullying

Minor: Alcohol, Drug use, and Self harm