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bella613's review against another edition
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.75
This book felt very unfinished and not just because of the ending.
Everything from the descriptions of the violence and the behavior and thoughts of the main character were very in-your-face, and didn't feel imaginative or realistically written. I loved the main character so I wish she had been allowed to just be, and not constantly overexplained by the author.
It read like someone decided to write a dystopia-style version of little red riding hood and stopped there, didn't put any more thought into it. I have no problem with open endings in general, or even with unanswered questions about large plot points. But this book doesn't feel like a story that's meant to make you think in the way that open endings usually do. It almost felt more like an unnecessarily long intro into the real story, than a story itself.
Everything from the descriptions of the violence and the behavior and thoughts of the main character were very in-your-face, and didn't feel imaginative or realistically written. I loved the main character so I wish she had been allowed to just be, and not constantly overexplained by the author.
It read like someone decided to write a dystopia-style version of little red riding hood and stopped there, didn't put any more thought into it. I have no problem with open endings in general, or even with unanswered questions about large plot points. But this book doesn't feel like a story that's meant to make you think in the way that open endings usually do. It almost felt more like an unnecessarily long intro into the real story, than a story itself.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Death of parent, Child death, Gore, Blood, Body horror, Death, Murder, Physical abuse, and Violence
barbie_fett's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Death of parent, Death, Hate crime, Murder, Body horror, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Racism
Moderate: Blood, Death, Gun violence, Racism, and Violence
goodin10tions's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
This re-telling of Red Riding hood is a rollercoaster of a tale! Red is not the little defenseless child of the original story. She is a super bad ass. I really enjoyed the adventure - will she make it to Grandmas? You'll have to read to find out.
Christina Henry with January LaVoy (Narrator)
Christina Henry with January LaVoy (Narrator)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Blood, Violence, Death of parent, and Stalking
Moderate: Pandemic/Epidemic, Cursing, Excrement, and Grief
aparker89's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
fast-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? It's complicated
4.5
Ms Henry does it again! Red Riding Hood is just trying to get to grandma's house but many obstacles stand in her way: a pandemic, the loss of society, no easy method of transportation and so much more... Will she ever make it? Or will one of the wolves get her? This is one adventure you won't want to miss!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Gore, Blood, Grief, Medical trauma, Murder, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Violence
Moderate: Ableism, Sexual assault, Pedophilia, Sexual content, Abandonment, Biphobia, Bullying, Death of parent, Body shaming, Confinement, Dysphoria, Gaslighting, Gun violence, Hate crime, Kidnapping, Sexual violence, and Slavery
naisdayz's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.0
Would have been a solid 5 star without the abrupt/rushed ending. Too many questions about the disease and the crisis were left unanswered.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence and Murder
Moderate: Kidnapping, Gun violence, and Blood
Minor: Racism
neon_red's review
adventurous
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
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? It's complicated
4.0
It was not my first Christina Henry and it will not be my last. In a positive sense it what I expected, a dark/horror story inspired by a fairytale classic. I in particular liked the ending and like with Lost Boy and Alice after starting I didnt stop until I had finished. If you liked the other works of Henry, than you will like this one as well. The book that Henry created once again invited me to escape in to a dark semi fantastical world and I gladly followed the white rabbit...ops wrong book.
I really enjoyed that it was a survival story that focused and stayed with the main theme of survival. Sure the dystopian goverment conspiracies we're mentioned, but Red was not the choosen one who could save the world. I liked the "small" scale. What I didnt really like and why I can Not award 5 stars, were the grenade and the second encounter with Sirois. Okay, the grenade was later on explained and so I accepted it, somewhat. But the Chance that Sirois of all people would find them after fighting the monster is to forced, it does not help that the characters themselves poke fun at it. But I liked the ending evenmore, I had thousand ideas how the story some happy and some not. Also the Idea that Red is the Hunter was quite nice. Even though it was one that was already present in Dropouts.tv Ever After, which I can recommend to anyone who enjoy these dark fairytales.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Terminal illness, Violence, Blood, Death, Gore, and Murder
Moderate: Xenophobia, Rape, Ableism, and Torture
Minor: Child abuse, Child death, and Sexual violence
aely's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Ableism, Blood, Hate crime, Death, Pandemic/Epidemic, Violence, Grief, Body horror, Gun violence, Death of parent, and Gore
Moderate: Confinement, Kidnapping, Fire/Fire injury, Pedophilia, Sexism, and Vomit
Minor: Torture, Sexual assault, Racism, Rape, War, Misogyny, Abandonment, and Medical content
icarusandthesun's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
funny
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
gory and greatly entertaining!
a story that keeps you on your toes. reading this for the second time made me realize quite a few details that i hadn't noticed before.
the characters were great - diverse without feeling like some sort of caricature. i loved red and her attitude, loved the dynamic between her and adam (their conversations and banter were so painfully real for siblings) and her whole personality in general. her family was nice, and the two kids, too.
henry is just so good at writing children. they seem almost lovable when she writes them.
and i liked the story. sometimes the inevitable encounters with soldiers and so forth felt a little forced and unrealistic, maybe even a bit repetitive (but that might also just be because of my already having read the book once).
one of the major plot twists (these slug parasite monster thingies ) was a little random, i guess?? entertaining, but really random.
(i mean, these thingies were introduced in the middle of the book and then it wasn't even resolved in the slightest. just i know this book is about a deadly virus, but by the way, some government lab also created an otherworldly weird science-fiction ass, human-eating monster that nests in people's stomachs. like whuuut )
but whatever, it's fine. great book, great characters, great story.
a story that keeps you on your toes. reading this for the second time made me realize quite a few details that i hadn't noticed before.
the characters were great - diverse without feeling like some sort of caricature. i loved red and her attitude, loved the dynamic between her and adam (their conversations and banter were so painfully real for siblings) and her whole personality in general. her family was nice, and the two kids, too.
henry is just so good at writing children. they seem almost lovable when she writes them.
and i liked the story. sometimes the inevitable encounters with soldiers and so forth felt a little forced and unrealistic, maybe even a bit repetitive (but that might also just be because of my already having read the book once).
one of the major plot twists (
(
but whatever, it's fine. great book, great characters, great story.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic, Blood, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Death of parent, and Gore
Moderate: Medical content and Violence
Minor: Hate crime, Grief, Racism, Vomit, and Gun violence
ladykatka's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
First off, I love Christina Henry, I have purchased all of her books to date and have thoroughly enjoyed all of them including this one, even if I didn't really care for the ending. I think this was a really clever update and modern version of Red Riding Hood, it was well told and easy to read. That being said when I got to the penultimate chapter I was left thinking how is she going to wrap this up. And it turned out that it was more of a non-ending than an ending.
Red says a couple times in the book that she is not the main character in a movie, that becomes abundantly clear at the end when we are provided no answers what so ever on the virus, or the creatures, or the camps, or the lack of women, or anything really. This book is in desperate need of an epilogue.
Red says a couple times in the book that she is not the main character in a movie, that becomes abundantly clear at the end when we are provided no answers what so ever on the virus, or the creatures, or the camps, or the lack of women, or anything really. This book is in desperate need of an epilogue.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent, Gore, Murder, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Racism, and Violence
aformeracceleratedreader's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.0
Overall really enjoyed it. I loved that our main character, Red, is mixed race and enjoyed the brief discourse on race and how some people, even in times of crisis, will gladly let their racism fly. In the beginning when one antagonist basically asks Red her ethnicity upon first meeting, it reminded me of so many people doing it to me. It's annoying to say the least.
I think as a retelling of a fairy tale, it was quite good too. Loved that it was a dystopian kind of setting although it wasn't the best idea for me to read a book on a respiratory pandemic while living through C19 and seeing parallels to how some fictional characters acted and how real life people are acting. Humans are predictable I guess.
<Spoiler>since Red and the kids were able to make it to grandma's safely and that the grandma seems to be alive and safe, I'm believing some of DJ's family made it to him as well. He was such a kind man and he deserved the best
I do wish we got a little more about thecreatures that burst out of people like how it escaped the lab, what even was the point in creating the creatures, how they got inside of people, how they would get rid of them but reading this after reading Near the Bone it seems the author likes to leave stuff like that pretty open.
This isn't a perfect book, there was a lot I feel could've been cut down since I could glance through paragraphs and still not miss any of the major story, and it was a little slow here and there, but I was def interested in it the whole time and needed to know what would happen.
I think as a retelling of a fairy tale, it was quite good too. Loved that it was a dystopian kind of setting although it wasn't the best idea for me to read a book on a respiratory pandemic while living through C19 and seeing parallels to how some fictional characters acted and how real life people are acting. Humans are predictable I guess.
<Spoiler>since Red and the kids were able to make it to grandma's safely and that the grandma seems to be alive and safe, I'm believing some of DJ's family made it to him as well. He was such a kind man and he deserved the best
I do wish we got a little more about the
This isn't a perfect book, there was a lot I feel could've been cut down since I could glance through paragraphs and still not miss any of the major story, and it was a little slow here and there, but I was def interested in it the whole time and needed to know what would happen.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Murder, Racism, Death of parent, Blood, Death, Grief, Violence, Body horror, and Child death
Minor: Confinement, Gaslighting, Gun violence, and Kidnapping