Reviews tagging 'Xenophobia'

Lone Women by Victor LaValle

14 reviews

shelbyc's review

adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-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? It's complicated

5.0

Having grown up on the prairies of Montana (where this book is set in) the author did an excellent job of portraying the vastness of it. As well as the never ending wind. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Gun violence, Murder, and Gore

Moderate: Sexism, Racism, Xenophobia, and Racial slurs

Minor: Sexual violence, Sexual content, Slavery, and Sexual harassment

kristicanread's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional informative mysterious sad 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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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Xenophobia, and Transphobia

Moderate: Murder

jashanac's review against another edition

4.0

Summary:
Historical western horror. Adelaide is traveling out to Montana after a life-altering event happens, resulting in the death of her parents, leaving her alone to carry the family burden with her now. She tries to survive while keeping the secret, but things don't necessarily go as planned and others end up getting hurt. She learns whether or not the community members will help her or if they will be her undoing.

Re-Readability:
I did really enjoy this, but I don't know that I'd ever find myself wanting to re-read it.

Characters:
I really liked the characters here, though sometimes I felt like there wasn't as much development as I'd maybe have liked. But with Adelaide and some of the more important side characters there was enough. I just didn't feel any particular connection to any of them, where I was engrossed in them. 

Plot:
I enjoyed the pacing throughout this, aside from a little bit toward the end where we were skipping forward a fair amount, but it made sense I suppose, because the action was ramping up. It was kind of weird to me that Adelaide originally had the one story about her secret and then later it was revealed that it was very different (and made more sense) -- I gathered that maybe she was suppressing the truth in her mind, but that wasn't really clarified.

I was also a little bit confused about why the women in the end

completely destroyed the entire town, when there were still 20 or so people who lived there and in the surrounding area... kind of seemed like overkill to destroy all of it?

Expression of female rage maybe?

Overall though, I liked the mystery and my interest was kept throughout the story. The horror elements weren't too scary for me and I enjoyed how everything ended up.  

Themes/Discussions:
Racism. Xenophobia. Women looking out for one another. Female friendship and comradery. The burdens people carry. Changing our perception of our horrific truths. Loneliness. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Blood

Moderate: Racial slurs, Racism, and Xenophobia

victoria29's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious reflective sad 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? It's complicated

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Sexism, Misogyny, Religious bigotry, Xenophobia, and Racism

kaiyakaiyo's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful informative mysterious reflective 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

5.0

I really liked this! 

Ominous build-up, creature horror, found family, realistic portrayals of racial dynamics on the “frontier”, heartwarming ending; the author put it all in here without it feeling too jumbled or heavy. 

will definitely be reading more by this author; the prose was lovely!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Racism, Racial slurs, Child abuse, Transphobia, Deadnaming, Child death, and Animal death

Moderate: Animal death, Homophobia, Lesbophobia, Gun violence, Xenophobia, Ableism, Suicidal thoughts, Sexism, Murder, Misogyny, and Colonisation

bedtimesandbooks's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Racial slurs, Xenophobia, Murder, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Animal death, Child death, Death, Transphobia, Sexism, Blood, Cursing, and Pregnancy

Minor: Suicidal thoughts

axel_p's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious 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

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Content Warnings

Minor: Ableism, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Colonisation, Confinement, Deadnaming, Death, Death of parent, Gore, Grief, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Lesbophobia, Misogyny, Murder, Pregnancy, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Slavery, Transphobia, Violence, and Xenophobia

sierraburrell's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

3.5

I wasn’t sure why I’d read immediately after I finished this book. I was drawn in by the premise of the book, but it turned out a bit different than I’d imagined. I did enjoy it, and learned about a piece of history I didn’t know anything about. The interesting part was that the dialogue felt modern. I mean I don’t know how people spoke or how their thoughts came across a page, but it felt like Adelaide was in 2023 at times. I liked some of the characters, but understood who the villains were early on. They still exist, and will ask for progress only for themselves because they’d rather be closer to the most powerful than make things universally better for marginalized groups. This review is longer than I intended it to be, but I liked the book. I’ll probably read more from this author but prefer to dive in without reading the synopsis. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence

Moderate: Xenophobia, Racism, and Racial slurs

librarianjennifer's review

adventurous challenging dark hopeful mysterious tense fast-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? It's complicated

5.0

I was so surprised by this book! Loved this fantastical, female-centric, Western horror story. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Gore, Transphobia, Injury/Injury detail, Animal death, Lesbophobia, Racism, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Child death, Murder, Xenophobia, and Homophobia

sarah984's review against another edition

dark informative reflective 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

5.0

I really liked this book - the history is interesting and the characters are well drawn. I didn't think the horror was that scary and a few parts were a bit silly to me but overall this is a great story about family, revenge, and the meaning of forgiveness.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Death of parent, and Deadnaming

Moderate: Confinement, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Xenophobia, Colonisation, Grief, Racism, Transphobia, Violence, Gun violence, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Child abuse, Classism, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Ableism, Abandonment, Child death, Alcohol, Domestic abuse, Racial slurs, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Homophobia, Medical content, Pregnancy, Slavery, and Misogyny