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alexlouise97's review
- 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
3.5
Graphic: Vomit, Animal death, Bullying, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Child abuse, Animal cruelty, Body horror, Classism, Death, Emotional abuse, Sexual violence, Torture, Child death, Violence, Gore, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Physical abuse, and Sexual assault
Moderate: Rape, Body shaming, Excrement, Fire/Fire injury, Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Toxic friendship, Kidnapping, and Pedophilia
anni_ly22's review
Graphic: Classism, Death of parent, Religious bigotry, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Blood, Body horror, Torture, Violence, Death, Domestic abuse, Child abuse, Incest, Kidnapping, Murder, Sexual violence, Physical abuse, Abandonment, and Mental illness
sabrina_the_alien's review
4.5
Graphic: Violence, Child death, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual harassment, Adult/minor relationship, Vomit, Murder, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Pedophilia, Torture, Gaslighting, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Grief, Classism, Gore, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Incest, Medical trauma, Rape, Body horror, Bullying, Death, Domestic abuse, Blood, Child abuse, Excrement, Medical content, and Mental illness
bennifersbody's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Body horror, Domestic abuse, Murder, Pedophilia, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Child abuse, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Emotional abuse, Incest, Mental illness, Vomit, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Animal death, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Gore, Sexual violence, Physical abuse, and Torture
wwmck's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
a). to my absolute chagrin, i … wouldn’t exactly say i enjoyed this book so much as i was morbidly hooked by it. finished it within two days.
b). i’m about to critique and hypothesise upon a book that admittedly doesn’t really offer up more than the hallmarks of its genre. i have a major gripe with modern splatterpunk and it’s largely pointless nature I guess. where it’s creation was founded in rebellion against censorship, those walls have now by and large come down, at least by a great margin. so there’s a real lack of motivation - i feel - behind the senseless depravity found in splatterpunk literature.
anyways, i was pleasantly (?) surprised by this book. there’s a skeleton of something genuinely enthralling here. i grew up on saw (weird kid with unfiltered internet access) and with a love of the whole “death game” concept. so the twisted playground at the centre of this morbid tale was unfortunately right up my alley. obviously the extra twist of the knife, with the victims being children was deeply uncomfortable - but they’re written in a real “wise (?) beyond their years” sort of way so i could mostly just read them as adults. soften the blow a little i guess? back to my point i guess, the groundwork for some great philosophising on childhood abuse and cyclical violence is laid bare within certain beats and as a reader you really are rooting for a surprising number of these characters. i absolutely appreciated the “happy” (?) ending, wherein the absolute monsters of utter evil met their violent end. tanya made it out. three cheers for the diva. if she’d died as well that would’ve really been the straw that broke the camels back for me personally.
ANYWAYS: there’s a decent book in here somewhere, but just when it gets …. not good or entertaining but like … enticing i guess? - aron beauregard throws in some fuck ass bullshit with geraldine or something. truth be told i’d argue “playground” exists closer in nature to “dipper goes to taco bell” than any sort of horror novel. at points it read like a 14 year old boy sat down to write the most grotesque sadistic drivel he could come up with. i’m not sure if an editor was involved here and i don’t care to check because if they were, some peer review was desperately needed. beauregard’s writing again feels immature in a more literary sense, in that some good metaphorical parallels were set up, only for him to quite literally write “look at this metaphor i just accidentally wrote, let’s just say it again more plainly”. it just beats you over the head again and again as if things weren’t glaring obvious to begin with. there’s no “between the lines” here, everything is as tell not show as one could manage.
in some alternate dimension there exists a version of this story that could’ve been pretty great actually. but the constant reminder of geraldine’s tuna box just fuckin like whatever dude. with that said, beauregard sometimes demonstrates at minimum an understanding of good writing. every so often i’d read a passage and ask myself “where was this 5 seconds ago?” - in regards to his literary prowess. with that said this motherfucker seems very capable of viscerally describing extreme violence, yet his descriptions of some of the “playgrounds” was flimsy and confusing. i found myself at odds with what i was picturing and kept having to re read certain descriptions because i could not for the life of me pick up what he was putting down.
at the end of the day, i’m only disappointing myself. this book never had the intentions or claimed to be thought provoking. it’s mean, sick, sadistic, and thoroughly over the top. it’s a splatterpunk book. yay for genre fiction? i think the reason i’ve felt the need to linger on this for so long is because it was an uncomfortably captivating read. and like idk. idk. i truly believe this could be reworked into a more satisfying theme exploration. i hope tom, molly, tanya, and donnie went on to live a calm and fulfilling life filled with absolutely zero mentions of a playground.
#rotinhellgeraldine #rockredemptionarc
oh god actually on the subject of rock, like fucking good god we gettt itttttt. like from the jump you know how that whole situation is gonna play out. aron please im begging you for some subtly, for some - rather for less of like, everything i guess. really sucked any kind of climax out of the books ending when so many chapters would basically end with “rock is getting there guys, he’s gonna save the day soon”.
maybe i’ll be the one to rewrite this. i can guarantee that THAT chapter and anything even vaguely similar would be scrubbed out so clean you could see your own reflection. fuck the scat people #kinkshamingisok
Graphic: Violence, Kidnapping, Injury/Injury detail, Alcohol, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Confinement, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Sexual content, Infertility, Death, Emotional abuse, Torture, Suicidal thoughts, Gaslighting, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Gun violence, Vomit, Incest, Grief, Death of parent, Cursing, Child death, Bullying, Animal death, Animal cruelty, Misogyny, Excrement, Body horror, Homophobia, Gore, and Domestic abuse
zyderm's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
I ended up with a copy of this book from my sisters colleague, who is a published author and used to work at penguin publishing. She raved about this and called it a pinnacle of modern horror. A complete load of shit.
Any bad reviews you read about this are true, including the authors particularly misogynistic writing. His blurb at the back states he has a wife, but I refuse to believe that since this reads like he’s never touched a woman in his life, and in fact seems like he’s actively disgusted by women’s personal parts.
The authors writing is exceptionally juvenile, and were it not for the subject matter, his writing combined with the illustrations included would lead me to believe this was ya. He also has odd wording choices “a single tear pissed out of his eye” that he uses consistently and that quickly became irritating.
The worst part is I think the author may have actually been trying to write a mature book that was disgusting and at times clearly intended to be emotional and impactful. However everything comes off extremely comical, the end had me laughing, the rest I was amused or annoyed by. Writing for these characters is non existent. I wouldn’t recommend this to anybody unless you actively like schlocky garbage.
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Confinement, Excrement, Infertility, Sexual assault, Child death, Death of parent, Bullying, Gore, Grief, Incest, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Torture, Blood, Gun violence, Misogyny, Rape, Classism, Domestic abuse, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Violence, Body horror, Death, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Murder, Toxic relationship, and Vomit
kaiyamooks's review
- 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
4.5
Graphic: Body horror, Death of parent, Excrement, Grief, Physical abuse, Child death, Infertility, Blood, Domestic abuse, Vomit, Child abuse, Violence, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Ableism, Bullying, Classism, Death, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Sexual content, and Toxic relationship
Moderate: Cursing, Alcohol, Animal death, and Animal cruelty
lycheehoneydew's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
3.75
Graphic: Murder, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Rape, Blood, Gore, Death, Child abuse, Body horror, Child death, and Torture
Moderate: Cursing, Death of parent, Sexual content, Gun violence, Infertility, Vomit, Animal death, Bullying, Domestic abuse, and Fire/Fire injury
Splatterpunk, very disturbing imagery and gorey details.fifthyshadesofreading's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
I was curious so I read Playground...
First of all... idk what I feel about this book. A rollercoaster of emotions.
Second of all...I don't think this is my genre.
Was it as bad as social media made me believe? Not really. Despite the obviously very disgusting parts and extreme discomfort I felt due to what happens to the kids (It is very SAW-esque), this book was very well written and I will never read anything from this author again.
Graphic: Confinement, Gore, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Child abuse, Bullying, Emotional abuse, Cursing, Child death, Toxic relationship, Body horror, Vomit, Violence, Physical abuse, Murder, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Torture, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Mental illness, Excrement, Gun violence, Domestic abuse, and Death of parent
dirtyal_93's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Graphic: Gun violence, Homophobia, Death of parent, Vomit, Child abuse, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Blood, Mental illness, Bullying, Death, Incest, Murder, Torture, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Grief, Body horror, Violence, Cursing, Kidnapping, Confinement, Child death, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Sexual content, Excrement, and Gore