Reviews with content warning for Grief - Rouge

Reviews tagging 'Grief'

Rouge by Mona Awad

85 reviews

suchallie's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

3.0

Generally I liked this. I felt like the lore was clearer/stronger than All’s Well and Bunny. I didn’t get as lost or skip over the dream/magic nonsense sequences like I did in those. I was worried the skincare trope would be overly ick but it transitioned out of that quickly after it was established. I wanted more from the ending though!

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avokaitotoast's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

4.5

Another hit from Mona.

I was worried after reading and loving Bunny that this would disappoint or be too similar and feel like a reach to hold on to the hit that Bunny was. Thank god it wasn’t.

One thing I‘ll say — Mona Awad writes horror in an atypical way, so don’t expect crazy gore or shock horror or crazy suspense. She has a very elegant way of making beautiful things grotesque and absurd.

Another thing — this is marketed as a fairy tale re-telling. Don’t go into this book looking for that. There are elements of fairy tales but it’s so subtle (which imo is the best way to do a re-telling).

Go into this book thinking about mother-daughter relationships and how grief can drastically warp your sense of self and change how you think and feel about the people you thought you knew.

It did take me a while to get into the book (Awads writing style is veryyyyy slow burn), but once I was a few chapters in I couldn’t put it down.

Can’t wait to read her other books, and I’ll look forward to whatever she writes next!

Content Warnings Explained
Trafficking:

Plot involves people joining an exclusive skin care cult, some members seek it out themselves and some are recruited. Members are essentially brainwashed and it’s revealed that they are meant to be pseudo-cannibalised (if you read it you’ll get it) by the cult leaders

Psychosis:

Main character has massive memory gaps but slowly remembers through out the novel. She hallucinates heavily and is violent because of these hallucinations.

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ashlesschaps7's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious tense slow-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

3.5

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elizabeth_lepore's review against another edition

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dark mysterious 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

4.0

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scrubsandbooks's review against another edition

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dark mysterious 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

4.0

Truth be told, I found Bunny to be a much better read but this was still something unique and sucked me right into the mystery. I am in absolute awe in Mona Awad's writing. I especially loved the commentary about the beauty industry's power over consumers like it's a damn cult and I'm now sitting here and embracing all my flaws because it could be worse. I could end up in a fever dream like Belle and almost not get out of it.

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withlivjones's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

5.0

Oh. My. God. I haven’t read a book as good as this in a long time. Awad takes the best parts of all her previous novels and combines them in this book. Beautiful prose writing that makes you feel like you’re losing your mind just like the protagonist, and a really emotional discussion of grief and mother-daughter relationships that left me in bits. This book will live rent-free in my head for a long time.

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drownedsewerrat's review against another edition

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Tom Cruise subplot was gross. Also why do we have to keep relisting the skincare routine just leave it in a note somewhere at the top of the book. Kept throwing new subplots in without making progress on literally any of the other ones already happening.

Content Warnings