Reviews tagging 'Infertility'

Sorrowland by Rivers Solomon

6 reviews

plantybooklover's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective medium-paced

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

5.0

 This book is a challenge. It is beautifully written, complex. It's a total mash up- Sci Fi, Fantasy, Horror.   
Overview:  Vern escapes a cult known as Cain -Land as a pregnant teen. She births twins in the woods and chooses an extrordinarily difficult path to raise them while avoiding those from the compound who pursue her. Vern develops supernatural powers and features and must work to understand and control them. 
  This book- though under 400 pages packs a punch to the gut.  I was struck by the massive amount of references to both great black literature, and intense black American traumatic events.  While I caught a lot of them, I'm sure I missed more.  
   I would have enjoyed reading this slower, with a group, but... I finished it up for the Trans Right Readathon. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Toxic relationship, Drug abuse, Racism, and Sexual content

Moderate: Sexual harassment, Blood, Sexual violence, and Gore

Minor: Animal death, Drug use, Religious bigotry, Medical content, and Infertility

strawberrytheauthor's review against another edition

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

I have never read a book like this. I have been wanting to get into more eerie books and this totally scratched that itch for me. If you are a fan of spooky but not horror this is definitely for you. There is a lot of gore and body horror stuff that left me thoroughly unsettled. It reminded me of “The Metamorphosis” by Franz Kafka. The whole story was dark and brooding with little flecks of hope and the writing made the characters and setting come to life. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Gaslighting, Grief, Lesbophobia, Alcoholism, Homophobia, Torture, Blood, Body horror, Death, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Toxic relationship, Adult/minor relationship, Confinement, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, Murder, Pregnancy, Child death, Cursing, Gore, Violence, Addiction, Colonisation, and Gun violence

Moderate: Child abuse, Cursing, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Abandonment, Suicide, Racism, Police brutality, Infertility, and Misogyny

Minor: Sexual assault, Rape, Kidnapping, Cannibalism, and Racial slurs

penofpossibilities's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense

• 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

4.75

GOD i did NOT heed the trigger warnings and I honestly don't even have an excuse like I knew this was a horror novel and still picked it up. don't make my mistake and please be safe. Anyway this BOOK!!!! /pos
absolute fucking masterpiece

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Ableism, Alcohol, Cannibalism, Animal death, Domestic abuse, Violence, Suicidal thoughts, Body shaming, Child death, Colonisation, Death, Forced institutionalization, Gaslighting, Genocide, Grief, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Police brutality, Blood, Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Body horror, Cursing, Child abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Confinement, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Lesbophobia, Religious bigotry, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Homophobia, Sexual content, Slavery, Mass/school shootings, Pregnancy, Self harm, Stalking, and Torture

Moderate: Addiction, Drug use, Cultural appropriation, Vomit, Trafficking, Rape, Excrement, and Medical content

Minor: Suicide, Racial slurs, Transphobia, Infertility, Terminal illness, and Cancer

graphic: cult

uranaishi's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Sexual content, and Sexism

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Misogyny, Police brutality, Racism, Kidnapping, Murder, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Self harm, Toxic relationship, and Violence

Minor: Suicide, Infertility, Mass/school shootings, Rape, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, and Transphobia

breadwitchery's review against another edition

dark emotional 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Homophobia, Sexual content, Body horror, Violence, Pregnancy, Adult/minor relationship, Gaslighting, Emotional abuse, Self harm, Animal death, and Racism

Moderate: Religious bigotry, Child abuse, Gun violence, Pedophilia, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Fatphobia, Police brutality, Transphobia, Alcoholism, Cursing, Infertility, Suicide, Racial slurs, Misogyny, and Ableism

booksthatburn's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• 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 received a free review copy in exchange for an honest review of this book. 

Haunting and visceral, SORROWLAND is the story of a Black intersex teenage mother and her children after leaving a religious compound for the woods. It has a subtle kind of intensity where each passage is bearable, but any literal description of the plot tends toward a catalog of horrors. 

This book has such a beautiful way with language. The words weave and roll; mesmerizing whether describing turning a deer’s sinew into bowstring, the ever-changing wonder of Vern’s children growing up, or the strange and monstrous changes taking over her body. Since it is a horror story about a mother, I’ll clarify that her relationship with her children is not a source of horror. The way the children are described is full of love, exasperation, and endearment, usually in equal parts, wrapped in the tension between protectiveness and fostering their growing autonomy. It’s about a person fostering their own sense of agency as they care for someone else, as they have people to protect.

The worldbuilding inhabits a strange space where many relevant facets of US history are alluded to or perhaps even briefly described, but because one character or another is hearing of them for the first time, the narrative gives space and understanding to pull the reader in if they are similarly unfamiliar. In many ways the true horror is how little of the book requires the speculative elements in order to be terrifying, for often the mundane details are the most grotesque. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gun violence, and Violence

Moderate: Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Blood, Child abuse, Child death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Homophobia, Infertility, Kidnapping, Medical content, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual content, Suicide, Transphobia, and Pregnancy

Minor: Cancer

CW for ableism, homophobia, transphobia, interphobia, kidnapping, medical content, sexual content, infertility, cancer (not depicted), blood, gore, violence, gun violence, emotional abuse, physical abuse, domestic abuse, adult/minor relationship, child abuse, self harm, body horror, animal death, suicide, parental death, child death, death. TW for mention of AIDS (brief).