Reviews tagging 'Child death'

The Crossing Places by Elly Griffiths

31 reviews

janelleesch's review

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Kidnapping, Child abuse, and Child death

Minor: Animal death

asourceoffiction's review against another edition

dark emotional tense medium-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

4.0

I think I'll be very interested to read the whole Ruth Galloway series. This first book is a great, well written thriller. I love the archaeology side of the story and Galloway and Nelson are a great pair of characters to follow.

The setting is so desolate and beautiful, I loved every scene on the Saltmarsh. The way Ruth is drawn to it no matter how lonely or eerie it feels says a lot about how complex a character she is.

There are a lot of red herrings thrown around throughout the plot, designed to add suspicion to everyone. But unfortunately I guessed the ending pretty early on and didn't really waver in my verdict. But it doesn't happen often and it didn't take much away from the book! There were also a few touches I didn't predict to keep me guessing right to the end, and I love some of the little set ups that are in place for the next book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Kidnapping, Child death, Child abuse, Confinement, and Murder

Moderate: Police brutality

professorbadger's review against another edition

dark mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Diverse cast of characters? No

4.0

Often the books that I enjoy most are those with a strong sense of place, the kind that transport you while you’re reading and leave you with a slightly unsettled feeling of “traveling back home” once you’re done. This book was set in the salt marshes near Norfolk (the English one, not the VA one) and gave me that feeling of being there in person in the marsh. 

Many of the bad reviews here seem to be based on certain elements of the story rather than the writing itself — eg, there was a weird through line of talking about the main character’s weight (I assume the author wanted more weight diversity in novels but didn’t do a great job of carrying that out) and also several instances of infidelity. Writing-wise, the pacing and plot and character seemed well done. The main character had a strong presence, enough that I would like to read more in her series and see what she gets up to next. My library has 20 other e-books by the same author and most have wait times, so I’m hoping that’s a sign that it’s all uphill from here. So, in short, it wasn’t a perfect book but enjoyable enough, and I’m looking forward to checking out more in the series. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Infidelity, Kidnapping, and Animal death

Moderate: Fatphobia and Child death

emilyexley's review

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Kidnapping, Murder, Child death, and Animal death

dckathleen's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

It's a good mystery. Dr Ruth Galloway is called upon to help identify some bones found after a second child has gone missing. We learn about Ruth and her background and we meet her friends and colleagues while the tension builds around the missing children. All of this is good, but I'm deducting a full star for her constant remarks about her weight. She calls herself fat in a number of ways, including being concerned that a seatbelt might not fit around her or that some sort of sensor might go off and so on. I found it to be distracting and unnecessary. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Fatphobia

foldingthepage_kayleigh's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional 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? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Kidnapping, Child death, Confinement, Infidelity, and Animal death

Minor: Religious bigotry

kakeyame's review against another edition

dark emotional informative mysterious sad tense 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? It's complicated

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Body shaming, Child abuse, Animal death, Gaslighting, Murder, Fatphobia, Grief, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Police brutality, Pregnancy, Violence, Child death, Blood, Death, Medical trauma, Religious bigotry, Toxic friendship, Mental illness, Torture, Emotional abuse, and Kidnapping

your_true_shelf's review against another edition

dark mysterious medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death

Moderate: Kidnapping, Animal cruelty, and Child abuse

gemin1reader's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

3.5

I really enjoyed the mystery, found myself racing to the end to discover who had done it and would read more of the series, but I was frustrated by a few things - namely the fatphobia and focus on the main characters weight which felt a bit Bridget Jones and completely unnecessary? 

Nearly all the male characters in this book were completely unbearable too, although that did eventually make sense in the context of the story. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Kidnapping, Child death, and Murder

Moderate: Fatphobia and Abortion

lesyich's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious fast-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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, and Child death