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maya_7's review against another edition
This book isn't for me st this time
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Torture, and Violence
steph1225's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
slow-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
Content Warnings
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child death, Death, Gore, Incest, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Grief, and Cannibalism
aroguemonster's review against another edition
The prose and graphic nature weren't really appealing. I only kept reading because it was here, but I'm returning it to the library so I can get something else to read.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Gore, Homophobia, Infidelity, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Slavery, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Death of parent, and Murder
clawrence345's review against another edition
Was not for me. Too graphic and felt almost as though the author was purposefully trying to be as explicit as he could about sex.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse, Death, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, and Violence
clawrence345's review against another edition
Was not for me, couldn't connect to the story
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Violence, and Blood
heat_her's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-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
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Cursing, Death, Gore, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual content, Slavery, Violence, Blood, Grief, and Murder
_inge_'s review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
fast-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
This is the first book in a trilogy. It is a challenging read which requires close attention to figure out metaphors and to keep track of what is being said by which character about whom. On top of that, some characters switch shape and name or they go from friend to foe and vice versa.
The narrator is unreliable, as the whole story is told as some sort of interrogation or testimony. To what end is not clear from this book. Therefore, characters that are said to have perished might actually turn up alive again in the following books. What part of the story was a lie and how far is it from the truth?
I'm sure I'll read this book again and I've already marked which characters to pay closer attention to from the beginning next time. It's not always clear which characters will turn out to be an important part of the plot further on, and which ones only play a part in a couple of chapters.
The narrator is unreliable, as the whole story is told as some sort of interrogation or testimony. To what end is not clear from this book. Therefore, characters that are said to have perished might actually turn up alive again in the following books. What part of the story was a lie and how far is it from the truth?
I'm sure I'll read this book again and I've already marked which characters to pay closer attention to from the beginning next time. It's not always clear which characters will turn out to be an important part of the plot further on, and which ones only play a part in a couple of chapters.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Violence
Moderate: Child abuse and Sexual violence
Minor: Sexual content
If you don't like violence, beware. There is a bunch of explicit violence including against women, children and elders. There are also a lot of metaphors for quite horrific things which may catch unawares one the true meaning hits.booksthatburn's review against another edition
I’m uncomfortable with the sheer number of descriptions of things that somehow involve people’s bodies in a sexual manner even when nothing sexual is even happening. It felt like everything was couched in terms of a male/female binary. The thing that made me stop was one character’s casual description of circumcision and female genital mutilation as equivalent and positive things to do to children’s bodies. It’s possible that the overall stance of the book doesn’t condone this (authors are not their characters, after all), but I’m too distressed to read more and find out.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Misogyny, Sexual content, Violence, and Blood
Minor: Child abuse, Child death, and Drug abuse
CW for misogyny, drug abuse (not depicted), confinement, blood, domestic violence, violence, sexual content, child abuse (not depicted), child death (backstory), death.skitch41's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
This is one of those books that I think I am going to have to read again in the near future. I both loved and hated this book at the same time. Loved it because the ending was particularly good and brought many things I didn't fully understand into view. I also loved it for just how different this book is. It's just a fascinating world Mr. James has created. However, I hated this book because it was so easy to get lost, which I did very early and never really recovered. Part of that is my fault as I didn't always devote the time and attention to it I should have. But part of it is also the way Marlon James has written this book. Over 600+ pages, chapters could be incredibly long and even tedious. And yet, key plot points could happen very quickly. So, if you lose your focus on this book for just one minute, you could miss a whole bunch of incredibly important information. And it certainly doesn't help that there are so many characters that come in and out of this tale that it is hard to keep a track of them all in your head. Because of that, you may find yourself constantly referring back to the cast of characters at the front of the book, like I did towards the end. In short, this is a book I struggled with mightily for a month and I think i will have to revisit it sometime soon to get a better understanding of everything that happened.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, and Murder
stagehand_bookworm's review against another edition
I got about one chapter in, then came to a point in the digital book where it looked like I was missing a page (the sentence at the top of the "next" page started in the middle of a phrase). I might return to this book if/when I can borrow a physical copy, because it was intriguing, just not worth reading on with the potential for confusion a missing page and that missing information would cause.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Sexual content, Violence, and Blood