Reviews tagging 'Death of parent'

How to Bite Your Neighbor and Win a Wager by D.N. Bryn

56 reviews

margaret_k30's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful medium-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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Murder, and Death of parent

Moderate: Medical trauma and Medical content

Minor: Child abuse, Alcohol, Body horror, Confinement, Gore, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Bullying, Death, Sexual content, Suicide attempt, and Grief

alikazam's review against another edition

adventurous funny lighthearted sad fast-paced

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

4.0

I thought I was signing up for a little silly spicy vampire book and then also got like... commentary on marginalisation, othering, allegory for other various types of medical exploitation?!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Injury/Injury detail, Forced institutionalization, Death of parent, Homophobia, Blood, Self harm, Hate crime, and Abandonment

Moderate: Addiction, Confinement, and Medical trauma

wardenred's review against another edition

emotional mysterious medium-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

3.5

I wager my life that you’re going to keep yours.

I feel like the book has never quite come together for me. There are many aspects of it that I liked. Wes and Vincent had a lot of cute moments together. There was some interesting discussion about consent and monstrosity. I really liked the progression of Wes’s feelings, how he started his friendship with Vincent so that he could get his hands on a vampire to bring to the evil pharmaceutical company that probably killed his mom, then developed genuine affection for this specific vampire, but oops, the things with the company were already in motion and it wasn’t possible to just backtrack. There was some really cool tension in the second half of the book over it all, and I liked those tense moments just as much as I enjoyed the various slice-of-life-ish scenes about bonding over videogames and too spicy noodles. Speaking of games, I really liked the sheer nerdiness of the characters. And then there was Wes’s awesome long-distance friendship with Kendall: the strings of messages between them were often great additions to the story, and honestly, everyone needs a friend who will call you out on your shit and push you to make better choices.

So, yeah, a lot of good stuff, but I had so many questions about the worldbuilding around it that it was actually distracting. On one hand, the book is all about the co-existence between vampires and humans, but on the other hand, the vampires’ overall position in the society is soooo unclear. It just keeps boiling down to, “They are very different and keep getting oppressed for it,“ but like, is it a universal situation and does oppression always take the same forms? What about the vampire communities, where are they, how do they function? What is the exact legal status of vampires, are there any regulations around turning people into vampires, what are the laws and regulations about hunting/donor blood? Seems like everyone knows vampires are out there, mostly dislikes them, and also just calmly accepts that one of them might break into anyone’s house in the middle of the night and give you anemia? It all feels like they’ve just recently emerged from the shadows and the world is still adapting, except the book explicitly states it’s been centuries. 

Likewise, the whole situation with Wes’s mom’s disappearance and the plot with the pharm company could use some fleshing out. Especially the company thing. I might look up the reviews for book 2 and see if other readers feel like it was expanded on and resolved more later, then decide based on that if I’m continuing with the series.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood and Violence

Moderate: Murder and Death of parent

Minor: Homophobia, Racism, Self harm, and Suicidal thoughts

its_vendetta's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful inspiring mysterious tense medium-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

SO good!! THE PINING. My only complaint is that it felt a little short like I wanted more of them!! The plot was very intriguing and I like that

the city’s plot doesn’t get resolved and that it continues into the next books with more characters.

It makes it more realistic yet hopeful at the same time. Loved reading about these silly guys 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Death of parent, Homophobia, Forced institutionalization, and Confinement

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Grief, Murder, and Gore

Minor: Kidnapping, Police brutality, Stalking, Torture, Self harm, Death, and Bullying

sophiesmallhands's review against another edition

emotional funny sad medium-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

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Xenophobia, Blood, Murder, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Hate crime, Death of parent, Sexual content, Homophobia, Gore, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Alcohol, Ableism, and Self harm

20sidedbi's review against another edition

dark emotional funny hopeful reflective sad slow-paced

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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm, Blood, Violence, Terminal illness, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Kidnapping, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Police brutality, Abandonment, Ableism, Panic attacks/disorders, and Sexual content

Minor: Torture

bree_h_reads's review against another edition

DNF 26%

I will say if I was more a fan of what feels like the setup for a dark romance, I could probably enjoy this book. Unfortunately I do not and the basis for the relationship starting marred the aspects of the book I enjoyed.

This book was genuinely funny, there were plenty of places in the first 26% that made me laugh. I also really liked the character dynamics I saw in this section of the book. Everyone played off each other well and it established character really well. I also liked the way that the book tried to handle some of its themes and tackle modern issues. I also liked the world building and found it really interesting.

However each of these moments I enjoyed the book was coloured by the romance’s setup. The idea is that Vincent (Vamp Boy) is a starving vampire that can’t afford to buy blood. So Vamp Boy breaks into people’s houses to drink their blood w/o knowledge or consent. He ends up breaking into Wes’s (Not Vamp) house several times bc Wes is hot and has really yummy blood and is sometimes thinking about hooking up with him. Meanwhile Not Vamp is getting close to Vamp Boy so he can sell him to an evil pharmaceutical company that he knows will be experiment on and maybe kill Vamp Boy so Not Vamp can get a job there. He wants the job so he can destroy the company for killing his mom.

Despite both of them having questionable morals the book feels like it keeps screaming to justify it and refuses to admit the two aren’t good people. On top of that just being a very gross foundation for a relationship the book just didn’t gel with me.

I also found the writing EXTREMELY repetitive but that’s a forgettable complaint compared to the romance setup.

If dark romance is your thing, this will probably appeal to you. It’s just not for me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, and Blood

Moderate: Classism

Minor: Racism and Grief

melodyseestrees's review against another edition

emotional lighthearted tense medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Murder, Blood, and Forced institutionalization

Moderate: Grief, Self harm, Death of parent, and Sexual content

Minor: Panic attacks/disorders, Homophobia, and Suicidal thoughts

vrrrmm's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark hopeful lighthearted mysterious slow-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death of parent

sir_melons's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful lighthearted reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, and Violence

Moderate: Death, Murder, and Death of parent

Minor: Self harm, Homophobia, Abandonment, Alcohol, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, and Religious bigotry