Reviews tagging 'Kidnapping'

The Deep by Nick Cutter

37 reviews

remie's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Death, Fatphobia, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Torture, Toxic relationship, and Confinement

Moderate: Grief, Incest, Kidnapping, Mental illness, and Pedophilia

bookwormjazz's review against another edition

dark medium-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

5.0

Now, I love walking along sun-soaked beaches, relishing the cool kiss of the ocean as small, foam-capped waves wash onto the shore and over my bare feet. But that’s about as deep into the ocean as I like to go. Like a lot of people, I have thalassophobia, which is a fear of deep, dark bodies of water, such as oceans. Hell, there’s a canal running behind my neighbourhood and there’s a very specific stretch of it that I despise walking past, simply because the shadow of the overhead bridge makes the water an inky, ominous black. When I walk under that bridge, I literally break out in gooseflesh if I so much as glance at the water. I start imagining all the things that might be lurking beneath its surface and what would happen if I slipped and fell in and felt a cold, dead hand wrap around my ankle, dragging m- Ahem. Sorry. Back to the ocean. The deepest depths of the ocean are mostly unexplored and the creatures that live there can often seem as alien as anything we might find elsewhere in the universe.

In summary, I find the ocean terrifying, so when everyone in a horror group I’m a member of on Facebook was talking about Nick Cutter’s The Troop, I found myself more intrigued by his book The Deep. It’s not very often I find a horror book centred around something that I’m truly scared of, but The Deep is a rare exception.

I’ll preface this review (yep, I’m finally getting to it) by saying that this isn’t a book for those who have an aversion to body horror. There’s a fair bit in The Deep, but despite my own aversion to it, I absolutely loved this book. As well as having thalassophobia, I also have claustrophobia, so a book set on a cramped research station eight miles under the ocean sounded like my own personal horror novel heaven. Moreover, The Deep‘s protagonist Luke finds himself trapped in the research station. Horror novels and movies that are set in a single, small location from which the characters can’t escape are some of the best in my opinion. It’s fascinating seeing how a book or movie’s cast of characters react to such a situation. The Deep‘s characters are on either ends of the spectrum in terms of how they react to the horror gradually working its way into the research station and, ultimately, their minds. Luke desperately tries to escape, his cold, apathetic brother Clayton remains entirely consumed by his research and other characters just seemingly give in, letting the entity tear them apart mind, body and soul. While reading The Deep, I often found myself wondering how I would act if I found myself in such a hopeless situation. Would I fight tooth and nail to see the sunlight again, or would I just quietly accept my fate? I like to imagine that it’d be the former, but I honestly don’t know. How much can a person endure until they crumble under the weight of the horror and pain that they’re being subjected to? I guess that’s a question a lot of horror writers ask themselves when penning their latest story.

My only quibble with The Deep was the ‘Gets. I felt it could have been expanded upon more. It was very much just a plot device to get people to the bottom of the ocean. That’s just my personal opinion, though. It didn’t in anyway diminish my enjoyment of the book. The book ended on something of cliff-hanger, so I’m hoping there might one day be a sequel. Saying that, though, sometimes it’s good to let readers decide for themselves what happens after they turn that final page. For me, it’s a way of making sure that a book stays with its readers for a long time to come.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror

Moderate: Kidnapping and Child abuse

recollections's review against another edition

challenging 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? It's complicated

3.5

"the emergency lights flickered, then died. darkness fell like a guillotine blade."

this is a fever dream!! what the fuck was that ending!! (i actually really liked it but the middle dragged for me eh)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Body shaming, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gaslighting, Gore, Grief, Incest, Kidnapping, Medical trauma, Murder, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Torture, and Violence

thegr8estangell's review against another edition

dark tense medium-paced

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

3.0

This book was a wild ride. What's real? What was in his mind? What was that ending? What is going on. I liked the book, the slow decent into madness. The creative gore was a bit farfetched at times, but not bad. I REALLY don't like animal deaths in books, so I was not a huge fan of that. Sometimes the timeline got really confusing. What was a flashback? What was real life? Did this story even really end? The ending left a few too many loose ends in my opinion. But, it was a well written book. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Animal cruelty, Blood, Body horror, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Gore, Incest, Kidnapping, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Torture, and Violence

queer_venus's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

I can't stress enough how desperately Mr Cutter needs to seek out therapy. I've never been driven to feeling physically sick from a book before. I've had fainting spells that have hurt less than reading this book. One time I trapped my nail in a car door and I watched it rot and fall out aged 8 and that experience scarred me less than this book. If given the choice to die or read this book again- I would already have my tickets booked for Sweden. What the fuck is wrong with this author, something truly terrible must have happened to him 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Body shaming, Cancer, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gaslighting, Gore, Grief, Incest, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Torture, and Violence

amberinbookland's review against another edition

mysterious tense slow-paced

1.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Murder, Death, Violence, Self harm, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Physical abuse, Mental illness, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Gore, Excrement, Dementia, Cursing, Confinement, Body horror, and Blood

the_escapist's review against another edition

dark sad tense medium-paced

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

3.25

I was here for the deep ocean setting, claustrophobia, and slowly losing sanity – that part was done really well. But a huge element features monstrous creations and really graphic gore, which I’m fairly indifferent about.

I thought the first half was great (tense, fast-paced, good with characters, nice balancing backstory with what's going on presently, slowly amping up dread...), the second half less so. It seemed to get slower and more samey. Or maybe it's just a taste thing because that type of horror just doesn't really capture my interest (I'm not squeamish or particularly bothered by it, it just doesn't really make me feel anything).

The ending wasn't bad, but I think it would've been far more effective if the last few chapters were cut.

Reading this taught me that I have a fairly high tolerance for terrible things happening to humans in fiction, but not animals. 

For what it was aiming to be, this book did a pretty good job overall. But it didn't match my taste and what I wanted from it and I found the latter half considerably less intriguing and engrossing.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Confinement, Death, and Gore

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Cursing, Death of parent, Dementia, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Grief, Incest, Kidnapping, Medical content, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, and Violence