Reviews tagging 'Alcoholism'

Scorched Grace by Margot Douaihy

30 reviews

greatexpectations77's review against another edition

challenging emotional mysterious tense 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

3.25

I would read another in this series because the premise is interesting. I also appreciated the reveal. But it had a little much ultra-heavy hinting to the backstory until I wanted to scream "JUST TELL ME WHAT TO HECK HAPPENED TO YOU A FEW YEARS AGO GOD." I also felt like 7/8 of the book was kind of pressing forward and at a pretty slow pace and then the last 1/8 was really rushed and everything happened at once. Okay, and I also felt like the running themes and motifs were much farther on the smack-you-in-the-face side of the spectrum than the oh-i-could-see-that side. Also I think I wanted more fighting against god, but that's my personal issue. But I think it has potential! And I would listen to Mara Wilson read an ingredient list, and I'm not even kidding.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Fire/Fire injury, and Murder

Moderate: Alcohol, Bullying, Cancer, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Infidelity, Grief, Homophobia, Lesbophobia, Mental illness, Alcoholism, Drug use, Toxic relationship, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, and Violence

Minor: Sexual harassment, Suicide, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Incest, Religious bigotry, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Addiction, Child abuse, Sexual content, Car accident, and Confinement

Please avoid if fire freaks you out!

brianna_moye's review

dark emotional funny mysterious medium-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? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Murder, Suicide, Drug use, and Alcoholism

Minor: Religious bigotry, Homophobia, and Rape

aceofknives's review

adventurous emotional mysterious 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia, Fire/Fire injury, Animal death, and Death

Moderate: Hate crime, Vomit, Suicide attempt, Alcohol, Toxic relationship, Addiction, Religious bigotry, Grief, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, and Car accident

Minor: Rape, Alcoholism, Death of parent, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Cancer, and Self harm

blewballoon's review

challenging dark sad slow-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

1.0

I struggled with this one. I really wanted to like it, I went to Catholic school and I knew some pretty cool nuns. There was a lot of potential in the premise. I thought this would be a fun time, despite being a murder mystery. It wasn't fun, it wasn't funny, and it didn't have anything new or interesting to say. It was just a series of awful people either doing awful things or having awful things done to them while the author describes how hot and humid it is every other sentence. (Do check the content warnings, there is a lot of dark stuff here.) The book is written in a stream of conscious sort of way, so I would be in a scene and then three paragraphs later the narrator was still musing, reminiscing about the past in a vague way, and talking about how hot it is, and I would have forgotten what was even happening. This was made worse by listening on audiobook and not being able to just flip back or skip over, but I do think Mara Wilson did a good job narrating the material she was given. Sister Holiday makes incredibly bad choices, is selfish and hard to root for, and doesn't really figure anything out that isn't completely obvious. The word "sleuthing" is heavily overused by her, especially considering that she doesn't actually do any. I would say the diversity is good, but because the diverse people are flat or terrible, I'm not sure the representation does anyone a service. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Death, Fire/Fire injury, and Infidelity

Moderate: Addiction, Blood, Drug abuse, Police brutality, Rape, Sexual harassment, Toxic relationship, Violence, Drug use, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Cursing, Cancer, and Death of parent

Minor: Alcoholism, Pedophilia, Incest, and Self harm

bronteberry's review

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Drug use, Fire/Fire injury, and Alcoholism

madsw14's review

dark mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Police brutality, Fire/Fire injury, Suicide, Bullying, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Religious bigotry, Lesbophobia, Cancer, Drug use, Death, Rape, Animal death, Alcoholism, Death of parent, Murder, Drug abuse, Homophobia, Terminal illness, and Addiction

Minor: Infidelity, Incest, Toxic relationship, Stalking, Fatphobia, Self harm, Confinement, and Sexual harassment

katiewhocanread's review

adventurous 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? Yes

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Rape, Religious bigotry, Homophobia, Animal death, Pedophilia, Child abuse, and Death of parent

Minor: Police brutality, Alcoholism, and Suicide

piphux's review

mysterious tense medium-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

4.0

“Holy Mary mother of God, let the afterlife have central air and hot women.” 

Sister Holiday, a lesbian punk rocker turned nun, puts her amateur sleuthing skills to the test when a serial arsonist strikes the school she teaches at and lives are lost in this debut novel by Margot Douaihy. 

Thank you to the publisher, author, and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. 

I thoroughly enjoyed this fresh take on the adult crime genre. However, while it was a crime novel at heart, the thing I found most compelling was Sister Holiday’s characterisation. Douaihy revealed her backstory at an excellent pace, maintaining my interest the whole way through. The flashbacks were well integrated and didn’t detract from the story. The description of the setting was evocative. Furthermore, the plot thickened as the story progressed, which built suspense. 

I have a few minor quibbles. Firstly, I found it unrealistic how Sister Holiday managed to find evidence that the police had missed within seconds of arriving on the scene. It felt like her reactions to events were a little disproportionate at times too. Unfortunately, I also found the big reveal easily predictable.  

That said, I always looked forward to sitting down with this book. I definitely recommend it! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Fire/Fire injury, and Murder

Moderate: Drug abuse, Rape, Alcoholism, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Suicide, and Blood

Minor: Mass/school shootings and Self harm

mothie_girlie's review against another edition

adventurous emotional 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? Yes

4.5

"Holy Mary, Mother of God. Let the afterlife have central air and hot women"


I was immediately hooked from the premise, a queer nun solving crimes?? Sign me up!! As one of my most anticipated reads of the year, I went int0 Scorched Grace with high expectations and I was certainly not disappointed. I loved the way that Sister Holiday was written, especially how she defies traditional nun and religious standards people have. As a lesbian that also hates the church and religious authority but still loves christian elements such as rosaries and calling upon the saints, this book felt so cathartic. I will definitely be continuing to read whatever Margot Douaihy writes next. I will also gladly be picking up a physical copy so I can annotate and show this book all the love i have for it! 

Thank you so much to NetGalley for giving the opportunity to read one of my most anticipated reads of 2023 in exchange for an honest review. Margot Douaihy, your writing is so eloquent and gorgeous, you are truly a genius.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Fire/Fire injury, Religious bigotry, and Cursing

Moderate: Alcoholism

Minor: Cancer, Death of parent, and Confinement

wortfluesterin's review

dark emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-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

3.5

Thank you to NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read this book early in exchange for an honest review!

Scorched Grace is a nun murder mystery. These are certainly words I didn’t expect to say in a sentence, but needless to say, I loved the concept.
The main character, Sister Holiday, might not be the typical nun (tattooed from head to toe and queer) but I was still able to see her love for religion clearly.
The book jumps back between Holiday’s past life, turbulent and tragic, to the present in which someone is setting fires to the church she works in, and the school attached.
The thing I love most about murder mysteries is not knowing who did it and being pleasantly surprised by the reveal in the end. Sadly, I was able to guess the correct person about halfway through the book and the actual reveal was pretty anticlimactic as well.
Mostly I enjoyed the past of Sister Holiday more than the present scenes, they just felt filled with more emotion whereas in some of the present the story seemed to fall a little flat.

I’m not catholic so I can’t comment on how realistic the portrayal of the religion was, but I thought the way it was written into the story was beautiful. Especially, because a lot of it revolves around religious hate and intolerance (especially homophobia) but still shows how Holiday was able to find peace in the very same religion that brought her so much pain.

I understand that the murder mystery was the driving force of the book, but during bits of the story, it seemed to be a side plot that was pushed into the story to give the book a driving factor.

The book is a tragic portrayal of life (definitely a dark one as well CHECK THE TRIGGER WARNINGS!) interwoven with a fun murder mystery and many lovable (or at least realistic) characters. 
Definitely pick this one up if it sounds interesting to you!!


(Small addition I’m not yet 100% sure how I feel about: Nina was the only bi rep in this book and is only shown to cheat on her husband in order to be with Holiday. While this can obviously happen regardless of sexuality, I think it’s essential to think about if and how this representation of bi-woman is necessary.)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia, Fire/Fire injury, Alcoholism, and Death of parent

Moderate: Sexual assault, Violence, and Rape