Reviews tagging 'Death'

The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

142 reviews

contemporarymeepsie's review against another edition

dark informative inspiring sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

The Mercies is a fictional retelling of the real life storm of 1617 off the coast of Vardo, Norway and the subsequent witch trials that followed in the years after. We follow the stories of Maren Magnusdatter, a young woman of Vardo who lost her father, brother and fiancé in the storm, and Ursula Cornet, the wife of the dreaded Commissioner Absalom Cornet who played a big part in Vardo's witch trials.
Initially I struggled to get in to this book. I think I didn't associate with Maren as a character and I found the writing style hard to get in to. Regularly having to reread sentences to understand their meaning. But once Ursa was introduced, I found a character I liked and gradually as the story picked up pace I lost myself in the plot. The friendship that blossomed between Ursa and Maren is so well described and thoroughly genuine that I couldn't not love this book by the end. Every choice each character makes feels real and believable for that character. Every character had a realistic fully formed personality. Kudos to Kiran Millwood Hargrave for her first adult novel as I believe it was a success, and although I struggled to begin with, I do believe it was worth pushing through and I'm excited to see what she writes next. This is a book I have already recommended to a friend.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Rape, Racial slurs, Miscarriage, and Racism

Minor: Pregnancy, Blood, and Torture

crustbuckette's review against another edition

The book was very depressing and dealt with subjects I found difficult to read.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Sexual assault, and Death of parent

hannahri0's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional sad 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? No

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Domestic abuse, Death of parent, Misogyny, Murder, Religious bigotry, Sexual violence, Torture, Racial slurs, Violence, Death, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Hate crime, Racism, and Sexual assault

Minor: Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Miscarriage

vouija's review against another edition

dark emotional sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Racism, Sexual assault, Misogyny, Xenophobia, Gaslighting, Fire/Fire injury, Religious bigotry, Death, and Emotional abuse

jenferlizbeth's review against another edition

dark 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? No

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Miscarriage

hopeadinfinitum's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative 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? No

5.0

A difficult book that tears at your heart even as you can’t put it down. This book made me Feel Things with capital letters, angry and sad and hopeful and thoroughly gutted like a fish. There’s a lot of content warnings to take into account and they shouldn’t be taken lightly, but this book is so worth a read.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Miscarriage, Domestic abuse, Grief, Alcohol, Misogyny, Xenophobia, Rape, Racism, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Religious bigotry, Racial slurs, Death, and Sexism

Moderate: Animal death, Pregnancy, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Torture, Violence, Colonisation, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, and Murder

jcinf's review against another edition

dark emotional sad slow-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

3.5

I should have read the content warnings before starting this, because I’m getting tired of reading about abuse toward women 🫠

That said, I did enjoy this book for the most part. 

I’ll have to dock some points for the audiobook tax — aka: the times I forget to pay attention and listen. So take my star rating with a grain of salt. 

I enjoyed reading about this time period and this particular historical event and culture. It’s something I knew nothing about, so I like that I got to be introduced to a new topic. 

I also didn’t realize this would be LGBTQ+ because I started listening to this book on Libby and didn’t start tracking on StoryGraph until a little later. So that was a pleasant surprise for me when I found out it was queer.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Rape, Sexual assault, Domestic abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Physical abuse, and Sexual violence

Minor: Alcohol

cuppa_t's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Sexual violence, Animal death, Death, and Violence

Moderate: Sexism

ruthmoog's review against another edition

challenging reflective sad slow-paced

3.25

This kicks off right away with a racial slur that's continued throughout the book... the historical note at the end really hits hard because the racial element is a side note to the stories of the women in the book, and it's just harrowing tbh. And the Samí are still being sidelined by Norway today.

Having said that, all the action happens in the last few chapters. After the storm at the beginning - the very interesting premise! - it plods slowly through the life of a timid protagonist... Over half way through the book I felt like nothing had happened.

But given that it's based on actual events in Vardø ther 's only so much you can do to stay true to the story of a village devastated by a storm.

edit: after reading other reviews I would note, I had no idea this was based on true events or about witch trials when I started, I only knew about the storm leaving a village of women be ind

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Death, Religious bigotry, Sexual violence, Torture, Fire/Fire injury, Racial slurs, and Murder

Moderate: Colonisation and Genocide

Minor: Lesbophobia, Pregnancy, and Racism

Drowning

jmitchell20's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

This was a reread. I've been recommending this book to everyone I know for years so I wanted to check it was still as good as I'd remember, and it is! 
The writing is beautiful and the story is heart-wrenching. Read it over two miserable February days- the perfect backdrop. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Rape, Death, and Miscarriage

Moderate: Domestic abuse