Reviews tagging 'Toxic relationship'

She Is a Haunting by Trang Thanh Tran

14 reviews

lunitareads's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

5.0

  She Is a Haunting by Trang Thanh Tran is a chilling, gothic story that blends ghosts, family, & identity with a haunting twist. Jade Nguyen, a Vietnamese American teen, visits her dad in Vietnam to help restore an old French colonial house with a familial connection. The Nhà Hoa, Flower House isn't just falling apart-it needs a whole limpia (cleansing). It is full of spirits, dark secrets, & a hunger that can never be satisfied.

At its core, the story reminds us of the remnants of French colonization in Vietnam. The house, a relic of colonial power, symbolizes how the past keeps its grip on the present through haunted rooms & the cultural scars left behind. Jade feels the pressure of this history as she struggles with her identity. She doesn't feel "Vietnamese enough" when she's in Vietnam & doesn't feel "American enough" when she's in the U.S. Not only is she grasping that identity dilemma, but also about her sexuality. It's like being stuck between worlds, much like the spirits in the house.

Body parts serve as interludes, keeping suspense. Food plays a magical role; it's not just about meals but links to her culture. Traditional Vietnamese dishes carry warmth and a strange fear, reflecting the spirit's hunger and the hunger for belonging that Jade herself feels. Ugh... but you smell, at times, the rot and feel the parasites crawl.

This book is perfect if you love ghost stories with deep meaning, creepy, eerie atmospheres, and the idea of belonging to more than one world. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Emotional abuse, Gore, Physical abuse, Toxic relationship, Violence, Grief, Abandonment, and Colonisation

Moderate: Death, Panic attacks/disorders, Xenophobia, Blood, Gaslighting, and Classism

Minor: Suicide, Car accident, Fire/Fire injury, and Alcohol

devynreadsnovels's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racism, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Alcohol, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Biphobia, Child abuse, Slavery, and Lesbophobia

margaretwaltemath09's review

dark mysterious 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? Yes

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Gore, Hate crime, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Racism, Sexism, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Kidnapping, Grief, Religious bigotry, Car accident, Suicide attempt, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Lesbophobia, Fire/Fire injury, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

shaunashares's review

challenging dark mysterious slow-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Colonisation

lunarexorcist's review

dark mysterious sad slow-paced

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

i thought this was a new adult book until like twenty pages in my bad. i was so let down jade was 17 and not... like... 22.

i cried at the last forty pages but then went "what. what? what???" until the end. unhinged. i cant decide if it was unhinged in a genius or stupid way, but i will say that

being horny for a ghost that is horny for you also in a toxic yuri way and also a "wow you are so repressed colonialism slash misogyny slash queerphobia is a hell of a thing huh"

is one of the more unique interpretations of "this house eats people" ive seen. 

i think the fact everyone sucks so bad throws people off but that just made my chest ache with how real it felt. that was my dad. thats my eldest daughter trauma. im gonna lose it.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Racism, Xenophobia, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Child abuse, Confinement, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Misogyny, Sexism, Slavery, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Grief, Car accident, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Abandonment, and Alcohol

vanessamariebooks's review

dark mysterious slow-paced

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

2.5

I wish I could say I loved this, but it just wasn't for me. Way too much description and the writing tries to be lyrical/poetic, but it just ends up making things more confusing (and the story was already pretty confusing to begin with). I do think that for the chapters that start with a body organ (kidney, liver, brain, etc.) the lyrical/poetic writing works well with these chapters, but I wish it would have been used for those chapters only and not Jade's chapters as well. I appreciate the topics/themes it tries to tackle (colonialism, intergenerational trauma, bisexuality), but it fell a little flat to me and didn't feel fully fleshed out. As for the characters, I honestly didn't care about any of them, even Jade, our MC. I didn't hate them, but I didn't love any of them either; I was really indifferent. This was also a really slow read, and I was bored throughout most of it. If it wasn't for the audiobook, I definitely would have DNF in the beginning. On the plus side, the cover of this book is gorgeous (and one of the reasons I wanted to pick this one up)! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Biphobia, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Racism, Grief, Abandonment, and Colonisation

melodyseestrees's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Racism, and Colonisation

Moderate: Confinement, Death, Death of parent, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Addiction, Alcoholism, Toxic relationship, Violence, Vomit, and Car accident

the_unquiet_librarian's review

dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

3.5

This house isn’t just haunted, it has an appetite for its occupants.

Jade Nguyen leaves her home in Philadelphia with her younger sister to spend the summer with their estranged father. Ba has purchased a 1920’s French Colonial house in Vietnam where Jade’s great grandmother grew up in servitude. Nha Hoa, as the house is called, is to be a bed and breakfast and a home for the Nguyen family. He has also agreed to pay Jade’s college tuition if she stays the summer and creates a website for the B&B with his business partner’s daughter, Florence. Strange nightly occurrences, an abundance of dead insects, and the constant smell of rot plague Jade. Her father is adamant that the house is not haunted and the relationship between father and daughter becomes increasingly strained. 

When a ghostly presence warns her, “don’t eat”; she must find a way to protect her family from an unknowable threat and enlists the help of Florence. The longer they stay, the hungrier the house becomes and the seeds of fear bloom into paranoia. The house with its sinister past become a body, representing the parasitic nature of colonialism, creating a dark backdrop for the haunting. Vivid imagery bathed in Vietnamese culture and atmosphere is illuminated through eloquent language. Its verisimilitude is achieved through adolescent prose that capture the insecurities and concerns of a teenager contemplating the cost of college, sexuality, and cultural identity. Despite the narratives’ slow pace, the beguiling setting of this gothic horror is the true star and will leave the reader hungry for more. —Rebekah Palmer

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Content Warnings

Minor: Gore, Toxic relationship, Vomit, and Car accident

moiramaclir's review

dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

3.75

Slower start then what I was hoping for. But eventually picked up speed and started to settle into the pace and I liked how it played out. 

I’ll admit the slow start had me and I was hoping for a bit more in places. Specially with how the fmc saw herself and also her mothers reactions in the end. But still a good story worthy of being told again and again.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship and Cultural appropriation

Moderate: Racism and Outing

Minor: Death of parent

kswartz's review

challenging dark mysterious slow-paced

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

3.0

The themes explored in this book, such as family, generational trauma, colonialism, are interesting in the context of a hungry, haunted house. But the author's style was not to my taste. It seemed fussy and overly complex, very twisty without much payout. It was hard to focus and I found myself skimming without missing very much. Still, it was weird and gross and unique.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Toxic relationship, and Colonisation

Moderate: Racial slurs, Blood, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail