Reviews tagging 'Biphobia'

The Death of Vivek Oji by Akwaeke Emezi

18 reviews

badmom's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content

Moderate: Homophobia, Transphobia, Death, Religious bigotry, Emotional abuse, and Grief

Minor: Biphobia, Blood, Bullying, Domestic abuse, Infidelity, Medical trauma, Miscarriage, Outing, Sexual assault, Violence, and Alcohol

lilcoppertop's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense 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: Ableism, Biphobia, Blood, Body shaming, Deadnaming, Death, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Grief, Hate crime, Homophobia, Incest, Infidelity, Lesbophobia, Misogyny, Outing, Physical abuse, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Torture, Toxic relationship, and Transphobia

peachani's review against another edition

challenging emotional mysterious sad tense 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? No

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Confinement, Grief, Religious bigotry, and Sexual content

Moderate: Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Incest, Infidelity, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Transphobia, Violence, and Xenophobia

Minor: Biphobia

egmamaril's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Death, Religious bigotry, Transphobia, Violence, Sexual content, and Biphobia

Moderate: Animal death and Sexual assault

Minor: Death of parent

skudiklier's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad fast-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

5.0

This book was stunning and heartbreaking and beautiful and painful and surprising. I read it for a book club that isn't meeting for several weeks (I always read book club books too early accidentally haha), but this time I'm glad because I want to think about it a lot before I'll know what to say. I'd definitely recommend it though, it's very good.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Animal cruelty, Biphobia, Blood, Xenophobia, Violence, Vomit, Transphobia, Toxic relationship, Sexual content, Sexism, Religious bigotry, Physical abuse, Murder, Misogyny, Islamophobia, Infidelity, Infertility, Incest, Homophobia, Hate crime, Grief, Domestic abuse, Death of parent, Death, Deadnaming, and Bullying

Moderate: Abortion, Body horror, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Murder, Eating disorder, Cursing, and Rape

Minor: Ableism

lennie_reads's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Thanks to NetGalley and Faber & Faber for my ARC.

I read Pet earlier this year and was utterly amazed so I knew when I saw this on NetGalley I had to request it. And now after reading this I know I need to read everything Emezi has ever or will ever write. 

Once I started this I ended up reading it in one sitting; it's addictive. It's also visceral, gritty, raw, dark, uncomfortable, extremely upsetting and so so powerful. 

It's hard to explain this book without giving away spoilers but the basic premise is that Vivek's body is found by his mother after he has been left on his doorstep wrapped in material. 

From here we travel back in time to before Vivek's parents have met and the story builds from there.

I guess you would probably class this book as a mystery but not necessarily 'what happened to Vivek?' but 'who was Vivek and why did this happen?'.
We have different POVs from family members & friends, who build the story around Vivek, whilst also delving into their changing attitudes towards each other and life itself. I feel that Emezi is perfectly happy letting you make your own mind up about the characters and all of them are delightfully and distressingly complex. Also, for one reason or another, most of them have been pushed to the extreme - religious bigotry, internalised homophobia, over protectiveness, stigma against mental illness and more. 

There is a huge focus on relationships in this book and it's a testament to Emezi's skills that you can route for a couple when  there are a lot of complicated issues surrounding them. 

This book delves into taboos, the life of niger-wives, found family vs blood family, embracing who you are and how devastatingly cruel life can be. 

CW: Rape, incest, Mental illness, Transphobia, homophobia, death, religious extremism, physical abuse, violence, infidelity, death, rape, sexual assualt, sexual favours, hate crime, grief, domestic abuse, deadnaming 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Biphobia, Deadnaming, Death, Domestic abuse, Grief, Hate crime, Homophobia, Incest, Infertility, Infidelity, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Rape, Religious bigotry, Sexual content, and Transphobia

natverse's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

How do I give this more than five stars? Beautiful writing, beautiful story. Is it possible to be pre-sad about a sad, but satisfying ending? You already know what's coming, but the reading journey there was so well done. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Biphobia, Blood, Body shaming, Bullying, Domestic abuse, Grief, Homophobia, Infidelity, and Infertility

Minor: Animal death and Toxic relationship

julidrw124's review against another edition

emotional mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Biphobia, Transphobia, Homophobia, Physical abuse, and Infertility