Reviews with content warning for Body horror - The Death of Jane Lawrence

Reviews tagging 'Body horror'

The Death of Jane Lawrence by Caitlin Starling

98 reviews

roniboi's review

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.75

This book was odder, bloodier, and more disorienting than I thought it would be picking it up. I don't know exactly how to feel after finishing it. I just know it was well written. It was clearly thought out well. Yet I hesitate to say that I entirely enjoyed it. I suppose the events that unfolded in the latter half of the book were not my cup of tea, not meaning the gore or anything. I suppose I am less of a speculative fiction girlie than I originally thought. For someone who enjoys fantasy, I suppose I enjoy it a certain way if that makes any sense. I really can appreciate the grip the story had on me which is why it still gets such a high rating. I don't think it deserves any less.
The best part of the book for me was Jane which was shocking to me because I almost NEVER like the main character. I just felt I could relate to her on certain things and she was honestly just more compelling than most main characters with all her flaws, insecurities, and strengths.

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mlovesbooks's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.5

It almost lost me near the end but a good read!

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shaunna_elaine's review

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.0

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luceeefur's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

All anyone really needs to do to get me to read something is include 'Crimson Peak' in it's description.

I really enjoyed this book. It was a great example of Gothic story telling, and I almost felt as though I was going mad with the characters towards the end. The romance between Jane and Augustin worked well with the plot and the setting. The anticipation of things about to go very bad was there early on in the novel, and ramped up appropriately for the genre.

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dreamofbookspines's review against another edition

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dark slow-paced

3.0

Truly town between 2.5 and 3 stars. It felt like the author did not use enough space to execute her concept, which left most of the meat of the book crammed into the last few chapters. But also, cool concept.

Although. Great Breltain. Really?? 😒 The place names really sucked.

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loujanae's review against another edition

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challenging dark mysterious

Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

A gothic horror? A gothic romance? A gothic anything should be dripping in atmosphere. It should be flooded with tension and a living, breathing setting. I should have felt dread from the escalating tension of the romance, the mystery, the occult. This didn't have anything in common with a gothic novel. It was all tell, no show. Characters showing up to info dump a plot, and disappearing when no longer relevant and useful to the author. Every chapter sat us down and explained more and more without actually saying anything of note. Overexplained, underdeveloped. I think I'm one of the few people who actually "understood" what was going on in chapter zero, (if it can truly be understood at all, no shade at all to everyone who couldn't grasp what was going on, I don't blame you!) and that ending was still a confusing and convoluted mess. There were so many ideas here that were SO interesting. But there was absolutely zero follow through on those interesting ideas.

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