Reviews tagging 'Vomit'

Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam

149 reviews

just_danusch's review against another edition

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mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? N/A
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.0


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jdhauk's review

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mysterious fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.25


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andrews_bookshelf's review against another edition

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dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • 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

I'm actually in awe right now. This was an absolutely haunting, traumatizing, powerful, frightening, relevant, ominous, and stunning read. 📚 
Rumaan Alam captured me in the modern-day world he carefully crafted, complete with thrilling events that psychologically affected me as the reader.

This was a VERY different kind of thriller. Themes of war, terrorism, fear, and so much more were tackled in the narrative. Instead of clear and concrete events/answers, Alam wrote of various ominous events that slowly began to affect the same few characters. I found it quite powerful that the setting itself never once changed -
only the perspectives, mental states, and physicsl states of the characters themselves.
 

The character development in this novel was subtle, but was indeed present.
Amanda, as pessimistic and stubborn as she was, learned that Ruth and G.H. were the only other allies that they had. If she would have any chance of making it out of the tragic events that were occuring - they would have to stick together.
Amanda's pessimistic attitude was forced to change throughout the novel simply due to the fact that she had to learn to trust her only other allies.

WHY 4.5? 🌟🌟🌟🌟✨️
Ok so this was absolutely incredible! 😲 😮 😯 🫢 For the most part, I lovedddd how this was written. That ending??? OMG it was so twisted yet relevant yet disturbing all at once. I was shocked to my cote for sure. Still, some parts of the novel were a bit too wordy for me and felt a bit dry or unnecessary.

This was a great book club pick. The discussion will be one to remember, and I definitely recommend this one!

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bloodmaarked's review against another edition

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

2.5

3* and maybe i’m being a bit generous here. i stopped looking forward to reading leave the world behind after watching the netflix film adaptation (which i also gave 3* over on letterboxd and which, unfortunately, was a pretty faithful adaptation), and then even more so when i spotted the mediocre 3.16* rating on goodreads. however, the randomiser (how i make my most important decisions) gave me this book to read from my tbr, and i spotted that it was thankfully under 300 pages, and so read it i did. and to summarise, it was not disappointing but only because my expectations had already been brought down to a reasonable level.

✧ full review on my tumblr

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starglitters's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

Tense and unnerving. While the ending does leave a lot to be desired, I certainly respect the artistic intention for ending it the way it does.

What the author would like to convey, I believe, is this: If they didn’t know how it would end—with night, with more terrible noise from the top of Olympus, with bombs, with disease, with blood, with happiness, with deer or something else watching them from the darkened woods—well, wasn’t that true of every day?.

Maybe there would be better execution to the concept and the message that the author would like to deliver, but for now this book deliver it in its own strange and compelling way.

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thatsssorachael's review against another edition

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mysterious reflective tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • 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

3.5


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hannahyorkey's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious reflective tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

I initially saw this movie and while it was strange I was excited to read the book and get some more context to the story. The book however, falls even shorter than the movie. Some of my favorite scenes and aspects from the movie were not even in the book. The writing is choppy and confusing and ultimately nothing really happens. A few weird unexplainable events but ultimately no explanation and I was left wanting more. 

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frozenheartv's review against another edition

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dark mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

 3 stars 
🌕🌕🌕 

🧠 My thoughts 
I’m very disappointed with this book. The premise was promising, the tension-building was done pretty well too, at least it kept me reading to see what was going to happen next. The prose was interesting to read because I haven’t seen this kind in many books but sometimes it could be dry and there were useless fancy words as well. However, it failed to deliver any meaningful details to me, it all fell flat at the end. 

It felt to me that the book tried to be deep but couldn’t get there. Maybe there were too many things to talk about but nothing was resolved. The first half of the book felt a bit unrelated to the second half as well. The first half tried to dig into the problems related to racism, political issues, sexism, classism, and so on. However, the second half was more about the story itself, and how the situation developed. 

I checked the movie right after reading the book and I thought the movie is far much better. At least, the movie explained why things in the book happened without the disturbing and unrelated sexual scenes.
For example, in the movie they mentioned that Amanda’s work was all about convincing people to buy stuff they didn’t need so that she could sell stuff. This made her become a terrible person as she was, she just hated people and her work. Moreover, the scene where Clay abandoned the Spanish-speaking woman when she was begging him to help her lead to the fact that Ruth didn’t trust white people and she told G.H. to be careful with these people because they might abandon them too if things happened. Even the ending when Rose found the Friends DVD and sat there to watch the series ending was more meaningful. She told Archie before that the world was sad anyway, if there was something happened to it, at least, she wanted to know what happened to Ross and Rachel because Friends made her happy and she was done waiting. That was so relatable and made me feel nostalgic, in the book it was not portrayed like this.
There were more things to talk about here but I think these details are enough to tell you that the movie makes more sense. 

👍 What I like 
  • Interesting premise
  • The prose when it’s bearable

👎 What I don't like
  • Weird and unrelated sexual scenes
  • Nothing is resolved, try to be deep but fail to do so
  • Falls flat and the end

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lizzieinmt's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense fast-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

4.5


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mel_bee_421's review against another edition

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tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

1.0

The plot drives the book. Unfortunately, the plot is unrealized. There is random sexual imagery that is out of place. By the end I wasn't rooting for any of them. 

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