Reviews tagging 'Abandonment'

The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward

66 reviews

terrestrial_river's review against another edition

dark tense slow-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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Child death, Addiction, Death, Alcohol, Physical abuse, Alcoholism, and Murder

Moderate: Blood, Child abuse, Death of parent, Suicide, Animal death, Animal cruelty, Injury/Injury detail, Panic attacks/disorders, and Adult/minor relationship

Minor: Medical content and Abandonment

fencernick's review against another edition

dark hopeful informative mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child abuse, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Abandonment, Kidnapping, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Body horror, Death, Emotional abuse, and Injury/Injury detail

tesslw's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional tense

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Loveable characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

TWs; child abuse, animal abuse, animal death, kidnapping, neglect, murder
I am critically aware that my opinion on this book is very much the minority as I know so many people absolutely loved this book… however, for me this was probably the biggest reading disappointment of the year. 

This book is a story of a child gone missing - vanished during a day out at the lake, and a sister (Dee) who has sworn to find her. It’s also the story of Ted, who lives in a house on Needless Street (the (the last house, in fact - fancy that!). Ted is painted as a bit of an odd-ball and a hermit, but he loves his cat, Olivia, and his young daughter, Lauren who live with him. 

I actually really enjoyed the first third (or maybe even half?) of this - which also seems to stand at odds with popular opinion. There are multiple POVs, the narrative is very fragmented and it’s all incredibly ambiguous; all these things speak to me, so I was all on board. However from here, it all fell apart. The narratives became increasingly monotone and grating,  the pacing was way off - and I had one REALLY big issue that I just couldn't get past, but I’ll have to include it in a spoiler flagged section as it really is integral to the plot and I can’t mention it without ruining basically the whole book. Only that I found it largely unhelpful, undermining and sensationalist. 

SPOILER INCOMING!

So. The main ‘twist’ being that Ted, the main antagonist, suffers from DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder; previously referred to as Multiple Personality Disorder) really did not sit right with me. I have a serious issue with writers using mental health disorders that they do not suffer from themselves (even if they have ‘read all about them!!’) as plot devices; especially when the plot involves them being the main character trait of the villain in a thriller / horror novel? It’s 2022, can we please stop doing this now. Simultaneously fetishizing complex mental and psychological disorders whilst simultaneously villainising those who actually experience and inhabit them is so unhelpful and does not contribute to ‘mental health awareness’, but rather to the stigma and fear around them. 

Whilst Ward tries to justify this use of DID within the plot by stating in an authors note that she essentially realised that she wanted to write Ted as having this diagnosis after stumbling across a video (having never heard of the disorder before) of someone explaining their experiences with it. In this moment she realised that all the characters she had been trying to write were voices from one body, and this fit for Ted because she realised he didn’t seem like a murderer because she regularly ‘found pockets of compassion for him’. Whilst it is clear that she has since done a significant amount of reading and had conversations with individuals with lived experiences, the whole thing just seemed disingenuous and doesn’t sit right with me.

I’m glad to have read it so I can join in with conversations about it but I don’t believe I’ll be reading anything else from this author unfortunately!  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

Moderate: Kidnapping, Physical abuse, Child abuse, Abandonment, Animal cruelty, and Murder

cassie7e's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

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

5.0

So. Many. Layers!
Also now I need more suspense stories wirh the cat as a POV character!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse

Moderate: Animal death, Alcoholism, Alcohol, Suicide, Grief, Drug use, Death of parent, Child death, Torture, Toxic relationship, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Violence, Self harm, Physical abuse, Panic attacks/disorders, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Kidnapping, Injury/Injury detail, and Death

Minor: Homophobia, Abandonment, and Murder

aardwyrm's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

3.0

It's fun to read, and the genre is full of works that are great atmosphere 90% of the way through and then don't stick the landing. If you just want spooky eeriness, it's not a bad choice. It's just ultimately got nothing it's actually about. The setup seems to promise a situation where lots of cliche genre stuff seems to be true, and then the big twist is all the cliche stuff is in fact true, just obfuscated. It's definitely going for twisty and intricate, but a twist and just changing the story partway through aren't really the same thing. Exactly the sort of book I think ought to have a warning sticker you can optionally peek under so you can know before you get invested if the supernatural is just a bad metaphor. When the big reveal is nothing interesting has really happened, then it's hard to care about what comes before. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Physical abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Suicide, Violence, Panic attacks/disorders, Torture, Classism, Domestic abuse, Gaslighting, Misogyny, Murder, Self harm, Alcoholism, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Homophobia, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Ableism, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Body shaming, Death, Death of parent, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Stalking, Suicide attempt, Abandonment, Animal death, Body horror, Suicidal thoughts, and Vomit

tifcochran's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Confinement, Child death, Murder, and Abandonment

Moderate: Animal death, Alcohol, and Animal cruelty

honeywine's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

1.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Kidnapping, Self harm, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Blood, Child death, Dysphoria, Grief, Torture, Murder, Death, Domestic abuse, Medical content, Medical trauma, Physical abuse, Body horror, Child abuse, Drug abuse, Gaslighting, Gore, Violence, Stalking, Suicidal thoughts, Abandonment, Confinement, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Suicide, Suicide attempt, and Toxic relationship

themaddbeanie's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense slow-paced

• 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

0.5

Readers will be like, "What a crazy twist!" when the author lies to you for 250 pages and then decides to tell you the truth at the end.
Yeah, someone's mental illness is not your horror story. You can't just steal a real disorder and turn it into a "freak show" for others to gawk at. Disrespectful

 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Torture, Abandonment, Child abuse, Grief, Bullying, Injury/Injury detail, and Physical abuse

Moderate: Addiction, Medical content, Confinement, Death, Animal cruelty, Child death, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Kidnapping, Animal death, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Blood, Body shaming, Fatphobia, Gore, and Grief

Minor: Panic attacks/disorders, Addiction, Body horror, and Vomit

I feel like this could potentially be very upsetting for people with certain mental illnesses or those who have experienced abuse.

kjm_x's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad tense fast-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

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Abandonment, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Animal death, Bullying, Confinement, Death of parent, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Mental illness, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Stalking, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Torture, Violence, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Blood, Body horror, Body shaming, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Medical trauma, Murder, and Physical abuse

katkinslee's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense fast-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? It's complicated

5.0

This book was such so brilliant. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Self harm, Child abuse, Suicide attempt, Violence, Kidnapping, and Suicide

Moderate: Abandonment