Reviews tagging 'Eating disorder'

Horrid by Katrina Leno

13 reviews

leexpenandpages's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad 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

3.75

πŸ“ SYNOPSIS:
Struggling with all-consuming rage, Jane North-Robinson feels chilled by more than just the autumn air when she and her mother move to her mother's childhood home, where Jane must dig up her mother's secrets to understand what is happening.
πŸšπŸ“šπŸŒΉπŸŽ’πŸͺ¦πŸ‘»πŸ‘©β€πŸ‘§πŸŽƒπŸ˜­

πŸ‘πŸ» RECOMMENDATION:
πŸ’› READ IF you've got nothing else, if it works for a reading challenge, etc. 

πŸ’¬ FAVORITE QUOTES:
β€’ Pg. 201
do books taste like roses?
β€’ Pg. 209-210 (TR: Mental illness, depression)
A flash of the earth with everything destroyed except this house, the last building standing, and Jane within it, trapped inside its walls, not really caring anymore whether she made it out or not.
β€’ Pg. 214 (TR: Mental illness, compulsive behaviors)
She imagined the words dissolving off the paper and sinking into her bloodstream. She imagined her body filled with words. Made up of them. Words instead of blood, words instead of organs.

πŸ‘“ FORMAT: 
πŸ“–

πŸ“‘ COMMENTS:
β€’  The main characters are complex and flawed. Jane's friends are heartwarming and supportive.
β€’ Jane is frustrating slow to figure out what happened, leaping to illogical conclusions for the sake of continuing the mystery.
β€’ I mostly agree with the Booklist quote on the back, which reads, "Leno blends Agatha Christie and Shirley Jackson for a narrative that ranges from unsettling to genuinely terrifying." (I did not find the narrative terrifying but otherwise agree.)
β€’ The book starts a little too slow, and it ends a little too quickly, but the middle is well-paced.
β€’ Race is poorly represented. Some of the characters seem like they were originally intended to be POCs but were changed to white or the author used POC aesthetics. The black characters are black only in description of skin tone.

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quercine's review

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dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense 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

4.0

Incredibly unique style and really vivid writing. The setting, atmosphere, and emotions are all very richly detailed, and once things got going I couldn’t stop reading. There are lots of layers to symbolism and metaphors, as well as to the relationships between characters. 

The ending was unexpected and shocking, and left me sort of just staring into the middle distance for a while. I hated it as the conclusion for characters I had grown to love but loved it as a piece of writing.

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khakipantsofsex's review against another edition

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dark mysterious medium-paced

4.0


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anna_elizabeth's review

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dark tense medium-paced

4.75


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allisonsmith120's review

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dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

4.5


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kris386's review

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dark mysterious 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? Yes

2.0


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achay91's review against another edition

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mysterious sad fast-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? Yes

4.5


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issiwerro's review

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

4.0

What an ending! Utterly evil and horrid and I loved it, 3.5 stars.

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lish_e's review

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

3.0

 β€œAnd when she was good,
 She was very, very good,
 But when she was bad, she was horrid.”
 
Jane’s habit of eating pages was interesting, and the cover is absolutely gorgeous. 
But it had some elements that are often used (girl moves to a different town, into an old house that has a dark history everybody knows but no one talks about) and so the plot twist wasn’t a surprise to me. Still, it was a pleasant read and the build-up to the climax was good. 

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bottlesofale's review

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dark mysterious reflective sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

So we follow Jane as she moves back to her mom’s childhood home after a tragedy. Things start moving about in the house and tbh I would have fled in a heartbeat, but she sticks around and starts to unravel some dark family history that holds a mirror to her face.



I definitely loved the suspense also the illustrations?!?! and the art in the novel?!?!! Check out my full review on my blog:bottlesofale

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