Reviews tagging 'Trafficking'

Wranglestone by Darren Charlton

12 reviews

axel_p's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful fast-paced

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

3.0

The beginning kinda sucked, but after that it was amazing.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Stalking, Alcohol, Domestic abuse, Gaslighting, Xenophobia, Cannibalism, Child death, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Child abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Body horror, Murder, Pandemic/Epidemic, Slavery, Blood, Death, Excrement, Grief, Sexual violence, Trafficking, Confinement, Violence, and Pedophilia

lilifane's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious sad medium-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

3.0

This was purely a cover buy, which I'm still loving. I wasn't expecting this to be a great book... and it wasn't. The writing is... bad. Really bad. I would describe it as inconsistent and clumsy, same applies for the characters. The plot is all over the place. But I kind of liked it? There were some mysteries and twists I was interested it. And although I liked the characters, I didn't love them. Still, I was rooting for them. Also, the setting and atmosphere are really cool. I liked the national park sceneries, the community on small islands on a lake surrounded by mountains. 
Probably wouldn't recommend it, but I don't regret buying it. It's really pretty. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Trafficking, Violence, Slavery, Blood, Body horror, Pandemic/Epidemic, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Death, Gun violence, Death of parent, Gore, and Injury/Injury detail

numerous_bees's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional 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? No

2.0

I try to go easier when reviewing YA books - I'm not the target audience - so I'm not going pick on the themes for being heavy handed or the writing for being clumy or the characters for being and acting like teenagers. Those aren't faults but a quirk of genre, but this novel didn't work for me structurally. 

The first issue I ran into was that the author uses a lot of similes in an attempt to create a voice for the character and I found them be distracting and occasionally inappropriate for the situation.

The second thing - the one that really turned me off - is the sudden slavery/sexual assault plot point that shows up at about the 75% mark, lingers for a couple of chapters, and is dropped and barely brought up again. The sex abuse in particular is completely out of left-field, totally uncalled for, and adds nothing. I'm of the opinion that something that serious needs to justify it's presence in a story, and this didn't. 

The racism metaphor that followed the slavery plot point only served to highlight the lack of racial diversity in the cast. 

Finally, the climax is emotionally hobbled by how little we see of Peter and Cooper's community - the main(?) villain gets an emotional monologue where they try to justify their decisions, but they'vebarely featured in the story to this point and, despite Peter waxing poetic about how many happy memories they had together, we didn't see those events and Peter hadn't thought about them until that point, and I simply didn't care about this character or their motivations. 

It's a shame, because I think that the concept of a queer romance novel set against the backdrop of a zombie apocalypse has a lot of potential, but this book isn't really that. It starts off as a romance but ends as a survival adventure, and I don't think it did a good job of transitioning between the two genres. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Murder, Pandemic/Epidemic, Racism, Slavery, Trafficking, and Xenophobia

Moderate: Animal death, Blood, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, Rape, and Sexual assault

Minor: Alcohol, Child abuse, Death of parent, and Physical abuse

jjjreads's review against another edition

dark emotional inspiring fast-paced

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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical trauma, Trafficking, Blood, Murder, Stalking, Suicide attempt, Death, Grief, Gun violence, Hate crime, Slavery, Terminal illness, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Classism, Cannibalism, Child death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Pandemic/Epidemic, Injury/Injury detail, and Violence

Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Sexual harassment, and Sexual content

spttsn's review against another edition

dark tense fast-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? It's complicated

2.75

Difficult book to judge for me, it had a lot of promise.

I liked the premise and I read through it in a few hours, but the execution left a little to be desired. The beginning was confusingly written, the plot in the middle was interesting, and the end was messy and disappointing.

Overall - it kept me interested enough in where the plot was going to not put down, but not invested enough to pickup the second book despite the many questions the ending leaves. 

The map was cool though.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Gore, and Death

Moderate: Gun violence and Trafficking

Minor: Sexual assault and Death of parent

erzywerzy's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

😭I loved it so much, the plot was so good and the characters aahhhhhh. I cried, I laughed and shouted at my book. I LOVE PETER AND COOPER. I couldn't put it down. <3

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Blood, and Violence

Moderate: Confinement, Gun violence, and Gore

Minor: Trafficking and Death of parent

ethen_rey's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Violence, Gun violence, and Death

Minor: Trafficking, Death of parent, Suicide attempt, Sexual assault, and Child death

jupiterlee's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious 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

5.0

Zombie apocalypse novels can be touch and go just due to the natural of them, but this one was a little different of a take (nothing majorly new though) but with a romance at the heart of it. If you are wanting something gory, action packed and full of zombies, this really is not the book for you. However, if you are looking for a romance set in this type of world, a romance between two shy boys then this is the book for you. 

Now while this is a zombie/undead apocalypse book, it does touch on slavery: exploiting ones that are different to do the work for another, in fear of being killed or found out. There is also a hint of implied sexual assault, but that it is if you squint at the page and if your like me and that's where your mind goes when someone says "they'll be made to do more than just work for them". 

Such an easy quick read, and ill be picking up the sequel as soon as I can! 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death and Violence

Minor: Trafficking, Slavery, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence

nevermoregothic's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious sad tense fast-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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Murder, Violence, Animal death, Injury/Injury detail, Death of parent, Death, and Gore

Moderate: Kidnapping

Minor: Bullying, Slavery, Trafficking, Sexism, and Misogyny

magpi3's review

adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring 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

4.0

This was a little slow to start but it started running once it got going. The events towards the end were a little jumbled but it was an excellently crafted story. Romance was sweet if a little quick but they are both teenagers which fits. I liked Peter being softer and being able to be soft in a post-apocalyptic world, it’s something most books don’t even consider.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Trafficking

Moderate: Gun violence, Gore, Animal death, Blood, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Sexual violence and Death of parent