Reviews tagging 'Suicidal thoughts'

The Discomfort of Evening by Lucas Rijneveld

86 reviews

msmagoo502's review against another edition

challenging dark funny hopeful sad 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? Yes

3.75

This book was challenging and triggering. It was also written very well and it really takes you into the mind of being around the age of the character but some of the things were just incredibly difficult and terrible to go through and it's very sad the life they live full stop I'm having a struggle inside to decide what did I just read? Did I like what I just read? Was it in fact good? And My outcome is yes it's a good book technically. But it's dark.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Incest, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Excrement, Grief, and Toxic friendship

Incestual undertones

heron_m's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad slow-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child death, Death, Mental illness, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, and Grief

Moderate: Bullying and Antisemitism

regoddard99's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Death, Incest, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Grief, and Abandonment

james1star's review against another edition

dark tense medium-paced

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

1.25

I hated this book so much and honesty wouldn’t recommend it at all. I wish I’d had DNFd it earlier but wanted to finish as it was read as part of my Bookish World Cup (videos on my YouTube channel if interested). 

Plot: not much to say here, it’s a character driven novel where little really happens. We’re following ten-year-old Jas via first person as she lives on a dairy farm in rural Netherlands with her family. Coming up to Christmas, Jas is worried her rabbit will be killed so wishes God take another… her oldest brother for example. This does occur after he drowns and what ensues is an exploration of grief on the family and her interactions with her younger sister Hanna and older brother Obbe. 

Rijneveld does do a decent job at showing how grief takes over the lives of Jas’s parents with the mum becoming reserved, stops eating and increasingly suicidal. The dad turns very cold with both neglecting their remaining children to fend for themselves. This dark portrayal and decent into mental deterioration is very apparent and depicted relatively well. The writing is decent enough as well but as the book develops any positives became far outweighed by the negatives.

My main issue with this book is there’s just far too much grossness involved which become boring over time and just horrible to read. Rehashing depictions of bodily functions and products (snot, faeces, urine, bile, vomit, etc) are not only disgusting but I don’t understand why there’s so much of it. Reading about animal abuse and death are things I hate at the best of time but when there’s no justice served… nope!! I despise this so much, it’s a thing that attaches to me strongly and I can’t shift the feeling of disgust and anger. What’s worse is there are no consequences for these actions and it’s a terrible portrayal of such situations. A lot of the book also doesn’t make entire sense to me, specifically the interactions between Obbe and his sisters. He is a repulsive character in my opinion and the way he thinks and acts are really unfathomable that adds to my dislike of the book. In a similar vein, all the siblings don’t act in a way appropriate, it’s like Rijneveld put in all these horrific things over and over to impact the reader… but it just disgusts me. The family are part of a community with the children going to school so they’re not totally isolated which makes their actions more questionable. There’s a lot of hypocrisy prevalent as well, a note I picked up on was the anger the family feels to those culling the cows later in the book where they’re literally dairy farmers who abuse, exploit and eventually murders cows in the process… didn’t sit right with me there. 

I might have more to say but don’t care to waste any more time on this book that I hated so yh. Read it if you want but I wouldn’t. Any messages and what Rijneveld wanted to achieve, for me they failed and I will not be reading their new book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty and Animal death

Moderate: Body horror, Child abuse, Death, Incest, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Excrement, and Religious bigotry

Minor: Child death, Eating disorder, Gore, Mental illness, Vomit, Antisemitism, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail

fictionalsarah's review against another edition

challenging dark slow-paced

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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child death, Death, Incest, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, and Suicide attempt

biggaywave's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Body horror, Child death, Death, Gore, Incest, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Rape, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Excrement, and Antisemitism

nilanilanila's review against another edition

dark emotional sad

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Incest, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Grief, Suicide attempt, and Sexual harassment

emzilia's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-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? Yes

4.0

This is an incredibly dark and disturbing novel, but the graphic content is juxtaposed by the poetic and beautiful writing from the perspective of a traumatised, hurting, child. It captures the way we used to think as children and would make logic connections to the things around us. For Jas, however, her sense of the world is informed by tragedy and disfunction. 

This is a beautiful novel because it is written beautifully, but the story is anything but. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Child death, Death, Gore, Incest, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Grief, Death of parent, and Abandonment

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Eating disorder, Toxic relationship, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail

sheryl_macca's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional slow-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

5.0

This one is disturbing and uncomfortable to read but it's written so beautifully that it becomes palatable, enjoyable even. Not for the feint of heart but so poignant.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Child abuse, Child death, Emotional abuse, Incest, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Excrement, Vomit, Grief, and Suicide attempt

bomenvernietiger's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad slow-paced

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

4.5

Disgusting. <3

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Incest, Miscarriage, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Excrement, Antisemitism, Grief, Religious bigotry, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Confinement, Cursing, Infidelity, Misogyny, Violence, Medical content, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Pedophilia, and Vomit