Reviews tagging 'Toxic relationship'

Gallant by V.E. Schwab

3 reviews

justmys's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

An brilliant book that would be perfect reading on a stormy winter's night. 
Beautifully paced with intriguing characters and a bone chilling ghost story woven throughout. It's not a hopeful read, but it's a gift of a story.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Toxic relationship, Body horror, Murder, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Terminal illness, Death, Bullying, Medical content, Torture, Violence, Abandonment, and Child death

Moderate: Confinement, Gore, Animal death, Injury/Injury detail, Child abuse, Grief, Panic attacks/disorders, Torture, Body horror, Pregnancy, Blood, Ableism, Medical content, Mental illness, Murder, Terminal illness, and Gaslighting

addieisreading's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.75

I think V. E Schwab has this habit of making slow-paced books that hold really deep thoughts and messages to the reader so many either hate it or love it.
I'm glad to say I'm with the second group.

Gallant, at first, seems to be the type of book about a girl that's “not like the other girls”. She doesn't care about appearances, she doesn't care about getting the boys' attention but, most of all, she can see ghouls—spirits of the dead. However, as the story develops, and we get to see more of Olivia and the (few) characters surrounding her, it gets more interesting and even relate a little.

(For example, when she seemed to criticise thee girls at the beginning for wanting to be wanted—as she said—later on we see her finally crying, letting go of the strong-girl facade she held for so long because she have no hopes of feeling wanted anywhere. That kind of mirrors the despair of the girls at Merilance since none of them had families and Olivia, for once, hoped she would have one. She thought on "love" and "want" in romantic ways but once she noted she herself wanted that—although not romantically, but fraternally—she fell apart)

 

The title is Gallant but the focus of the book, in my humble opinion, seems to be the family, their loss, their hopes, and the way their love is strong enough to beat Death itself.

I also felt there was a little of talking about parenthood—while Grace's was absent and made Olivia feel outraged for being left alone, it was also understandable since she was putting the safety of her daughter in first place, giving up on her own life to save her baby.  Meanwhile, Death (yes, I see him as a father figure too) is a bad representation of parenthood. He didn't like that his First Shadow (in my point of view, his first son) started to want his own life. The parallels between human kids and the Shadows start by Death saying that “the more they live, the more independent they get”, as if it's a bad thing. Not to mention Arthur, Matthew's father, who was barely mentioned, but you can see through his son that was an inspiration to most of the things she did and said. His rebellious self lived through him.

The only reasons I didn't give it 5 starts was:

1.  The fact that it took around 160 pages for it to start getting some pace and the plot starting to move somewhere;
2. Repeated sentences or phrases (like, "I fall down and I feel a sharp pain running through my veins" or "palm of my hands burning"). It feels like they didn't read the book before publishing and just left a lot of repeated terms again and again.
3. Characters seem quite... off??? The story seems to know where it is going, but the characters don't (Like Thomas. We waited for Thomas and then what?) But I appreciated the storytelling, so I'll give it that.

If that book ever makes it to Hollywood, I want it to be directed by Guillermo Del Toro, not only for his experience with silent characters (Shape of Water) but he made one of my favourite spooky season movies of all times, Crimson Peak, that also bears the name of a place as a title while, in fact, talks about the family in it. Their loss. Their fears. Their mistakes. The secrets they hide. The things unsaid that scream louder than the ones they actually do. 
And the ghosts waiting for us to watch how they died in there.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Blood, Toxic relationship, and Death of parent

kyrstin_p1989's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad 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

3.5

A hauntingly beautiful story of redemption, belonging, and the love of family. This book was very different from Addie Larue, but the storytelling is just as rich and luxurious and the images painted by the author come to life as you read. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Child death, Confinement, Death of parent, Child abuse, War, Violence, Blood, Forced institutionalization, Death, Mental illness, and Toxic relationship