Reviews with content warning for Child death - Picnic at Hanging Rock

3 girls and a teacher from an Australian private academy disappear after climbing up to the titular Hanging Rock during their school picnic. No bodies are ever found, and the event haunts everyone remotely connected to it, some more tragically than others. There's a hint of something supernatural about the whole thing, but it's never confirmed. While the truth of the mystery was published decades later, I don't thinks it's needed. It'd less about the mystery and more about how their absence affects their world. A little slow, but really interesting, and weird enough to be right up my alley.

Content Warnings

picnicatthehangingtree's review against another edition

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dark mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.25

Beautifully written and atmospheric

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s_l's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

I liked it and it was pretty interesting, and emotionally it did have a clear ending
I don't think it was built correctly for the ending it had (which - yeah, there was another chapter that got cut, I guess the plan was a bit different), and it's more about the life of people around the disappearance rather than the actual mystery itself but it was still a nice read

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edamamebean's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious sad 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

4.75

I’ve been wanting to pick this up for at least three or four years. It was just as good, if not better, than I hoped it would be. Lovers of open-shut mysteries won’t like it very much, as it leaves you with more questions than answers, but those questions linger long after the last page. This one will definitely stick with me and I won’t be surprised if I end up reading it again someday.

Content Warnings

rebeccafarren's review against another edition

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dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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mfrisk's review against another edition

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mysterious tense slow-paced

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

2.0

I wish I liked this read more than I did. The backstory of the book itself and even the movie and tv series to me are far more interesting and add more depth to the story. This book has beautiful writing and is very visual in nature but this and the mystery itself is filled down by all the side plots and elements I didn’t care about. I wish this had been a novella and that the focus was narrowed to less characters. In essence this book had a good base idea to it but the pacing was incredibly slow and didn’t take the idea much further.

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vif's review against another edition

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dark mysterious fast-paced

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

4.0

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