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Reviews tagging 'Child abuse'
Leigh Howard and the Ghosts of Simmons-Pierce Manor by Shawn M. Warner
4 reviews
3y3z0ny0u's review
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
As far as stories go, this is certainly unique. A teen tries to solve her family's while she is adopted by distant relatives who live in a mansion and run a multi-billion dollar company, and there are ghosts.
I liked the story and plot more than I liked the writing style. Other readers have pointed out a few grammatical errors, but beyond that, the writing felt unfinished. Weird chunks of time would disappear versus other actions being laid out explicitly step-by-step. The ending felt extremely rushed to me, like the author needed to wrap up in time to meet a deadline and spent all their creative energy on the exposition and work up to the big reveal.
I liked it enough to finish but I wouldn't really recommend this book to friends.
I liked the story and plot more than I liked the writing style. Other readers have pointed out a few grammatical errors, but beyond that, the writing felt unfinished. Weird chunks of time would disappear versus other actions being laid out explicitly step-by-step. The ending felt extremely rushed to me, like the author needed to wrap up in time to meet a deadline and spent all their creative energy on the exposition and work up to the big reveal.
I liked it enough to finish but I wouldn't really recommend this book to friends.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Suicide, Murder, Self harm, and Child abuse
worldexplorer's review
adventurous
challenging
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
So, I'm not really sure how to review this and add my positives and negatives without spoilers so I'm going to put my whole review under spoilers. I don't know if anyone really shares my view and the author seems so sweet but I have to be honest. And check the trigger warnings, I've tried listing all that were even mentioned briefly once because there are a lot in this book.
I'll start with the positives. The story was intriguing and I felt the pace of the book was quite fast which kept interest. I was pleasantly surprised how nice Myra was, and the fact that Leigh understood from the start that Myra was honest and nice to her. I'm glad Tristan was mostly nice and understanding although he did have moments I was a bit worried he would turn. The story naturally built up Leigh's relationships with the family where you could believe that she felt she loved them and saw her own feelings change to feeling more at home.
As for the negatives, I'll start with the first thought I had when I started reading. Leigh's character jumped out at me as 'not like the other girls' type with her dressing in baggy clothes, short hair, feeling odd wearing a dress. I think it hung on a razor's edge of being one of those 'other girl' tropes but I was glad Leigh never actually thought or voiced any negatives towards women that are more feminine/like all the 'other girls', and only had opinions on e.g. dresses for herself and her own preferences. I also need to mention, when it said she was sixteen I was shocked. The cover image is like a women in her mid twenties at least, but for a small author I get he probably just got images online he paid for and didn't have art made specifically for the book.
Relating to her age, some bits made me uncomfortable. There is two times where an adult - Ty, her father's friend and a cop plus the ghost Big Bodie - referenced/joked spanking her behind and Ty even includes putting her over his knee. A sixteen year old girl. It just didn't sit right with me. Speaking of Ty, I don't remember if it was explicitly mentioned but I believe he is meant to appear as black and the language he uses is more grammatically incorrect e.g. 'ain't' and if my memory is correct he is the only character that speaks like this. He also repeatedly refers to Leigh as 'baby girl' and near the end in five pages worth he calls her it four times and within down half a page to the next page halfway down, he calls her it three times I believe. Overkill, quite cringey and again he's the only character to speak to her like this.
Similarly, the only explicitly non-white person - the Latino handyman - has racial stereotypes. His nickname is literally 'Nacho'. And I know a lot of Latinos will use some common Spanish words in conversations - at least in the media I've seen - but it felt quite forced and a bit unusual even calling himself a 'pollo'. I was glad that he was made into a lovely person and then...plot twist he's actually in with the cartels and ready to kill Leigh. Sigh.
Miss Tree, her therapist, made me so angry. At first I was thinking how she is in no way able to try and control Leigh like she did ethically like stopping her from eating her breakfast, saying ALL the wrong disgusting, unethical things that would get her banned in an instant but that Tristan just kept siding with her even when she spoke horrible of Leigh openly. And then surprise, other than Ty the other character introduced that isn't part of the family is also bad. And the fact that the reveal is her name sounds like 'mystery' was just so cringey and tropey. I'm sorry Shawn, you seem so lovely.
And lastly, the advertising - I'm not sure if it was specifically advertised as this or just people describing it online as this - the ghost(s) with dissociative identity disorder didn't really ring as DID to me. It was only two, a young, innocent and older, hard version of the same person and their actions are completely separate, although I get in this world the ghosts can like exist separately for every alter/personality.
So, yeah. The storyline was interesting and kept me reading and I liked Leigh and Myra with a bit of Peg and Tristan but I felt uncomfortable at parts throughout the book, cringed at others and the ending just felt a bit lacklustre and nothing new with who killed her parents. I don't know if it's just me that picked up on these things but I've only seen really positive reviews so I wanted to add in my two cents if anyone else felt like me and was wondering if they were the only one. But keep writing, Shawn!!
I'll start with the positives. The story was intriguing and I felt the pace of the book was quite fast which kept interest. I was pleasantly surprised how nice Myra was, and the fact that Leigh understood from the start that Myra was honest and nice to her. I'm glad Tristan was mostly nice and understanding although he did have moments I was a bit worried he would turn. The story naturally built up Leigh's relationships with the family where you could believe that she felt she loved them and saw her own feelings change to feeling more at home.
As for the negatives, I'll start with the first thought I had when I started reading. Leigh's character jumped out at me as 'not like the other girls' type with her dressing in baggy clothes, short hair, feeling odd wearing a dress. I think it hung on a razor's edge of being one of those 'other girl' tropes but I was glad Leigh never actually thought or voiced any negatives towards women that are more feminine/like all the 'other girls', and only had opinions on e.g. dresses for herself and her own preferences. I also need to mention, when it said she was sixteen I was shocked. The cover image is like a women in her mid twenties at least, but for a small author I get he probably just got images online he paid for and didn't have art made specifically for the book.
Relating to her age, some bits made me uncomfortable. There is two times where an adult - Ty, her father's friend and a cop plus the ghost Big Bodie - referenced/joked spanking her behind and Ty even includes putting her over his knee. A sixteen year old girl. It just didn't sit right with me. Speaking of Ty, I don't remember if it was explicitly mentioned but I believe he is meant to appear as black and the language he uses is more grammatically incorrect e.g. 'ain't' and if my memory is correct he is the only character that speaks like this. He also repeatedly refers to Leigh as 'baby girl' and near the end in five pages worth he calls her it four times and within down half a page to the next page halfway down, he calls her it three times I believe. Overkill, quite cringey and again he's the only character to speak to her like this.
Similarly, the only explicitly non-white person - the Latino handyman - has racial stereotypes. His nickname is literally 'Nacho'. And I know a lot of Latinos will use some common Spanish words in conversations - at least in the media I've seen - but it felt quite forced and a bit unusual even calling himself a 'pollo'. I was glad that he was made into a lovely person and then...plot twist he's actually in with the cartels and ready to kill Leigh. Sigh.
Miss Tree, her therapist, made me so angry. At first I was thinking how she is in no way able to try and control Leigh like she did ethically like stopping her from eating her breakfast, saying ALL the wrong disgusting, unethical things that would get her banned in an instant but that Tristan just kept siding with her even when she spoke horrible of Leigh openly. And then surprise, other than Ty the other character introduced that isn't part of the family is also bad. And the fact that the reveal is her name sounds like 'mystery' was just so cringey and tropey. I'm sorry Shawn, you seem so lovely.
And lastly, the advertising - I'm not sure if it was specifically advertised as this or just people describing it online as this - the ghost(s) with dissociative identity disorder didn't really ring as DID to me. It was only two, a young, innocent and older, hard version of the same person and their actions are completely separate, although I get in this world the ghosts can like exist separately for every alter/personality.
So, yeah. The storyline was interesting and kept me reading and I liked Leigh and Myra with a bit of Peg and Tristan but I felt uncomfortable at parts throughout the book, cringed at others and the ending just felt a bit lacklustre and nothing new with who killed her parents. I don't know if it's just me that picked up on these things but I've only seen really positive reviews so I wanted to add in my two cents if anyone else felt like me and was wondering if they were the only one. But keep writing, Shawn!!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder, Death, Death of parent, Mental illness, Physical abuse, and Kidnapping
Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Forced institutionalization, Gore, Gun violence, Self harm, Suicide, Suicide attempt, and Blood
Minor: Misogyny, Eating disorder, Child abuse, Torture, and Vomit
inkerly's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.5
Like most readers, I discovered this book on TikTok. I like supporting indie authors and I think for starters, huge accomplishment to anyone who writes a book and gets it published. At 17 or 70, that is beautiful and I love TikTok brings us together in sharing that with others
This book gave me Nancy Drew vibes mixed in with a good Ghost story. I think this book caters to people who like reading Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys, etc because the writing style and choice of language/characters feels deliberately similar to those series. For good and for bad (there were some cringe moments where I went “an old white man definitely wrote this” and I felt should have been fine tuned by an editor and there were moments I think should have been highlighted more. Balance😁!)
Here’s the thing though. It didn’t feel like a true mystery book. I mean the MC Leigh does do sleuthing but I can’t say that any of it amounts to her getting close to her goal: solving her parents Murder. The perpetrators are given to us in the second to last chapter. And I found the reveal and the way in which the bad guys are dealt with to be quite laughable if ridiculous.
The ghost aspect I liked. I would have wanted to know more about how the ghost entities “work”. The book synopsis would have you believe there’s multiple ghosts Leigh encounters but really it’s two ghosts (who are technically One ghost). It would have been nice if some loose ends were filled and there was more emphasis on the Ghost(s)
Overall, content warnings heeded, I think this is a fine book any middle or high schooler might find fun to read. Maybe not someone who is into mystery or supernatural elements, but someone who just wants to dip their toe in. I’m sure a sequel would be well received.
This book gave me Nancy Drew vibes mixed in with a good Ghost story. I think this book caters to people who like reading Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys, etc because the writing style and choice of language/characters feels deliberately similar to those series. For good and for bad (there were some cringe moments where I went “an old white man definitely wrote this” and I felt should have been fine tuned by an editor and there were moments I think should have been highlighted more. Balance😁!)
Here’s the thing though. It didn’t feel like a true mystery book. I mean the MC Leigh does do sleuthing but I can’t say that any of it amounts to her getting close to her goal: solving her parents Murder. The perpetrators are given to us in the second to last chapter. And I found the reveal and the way in which the bad guys are dealt with to be quite laughable if ridiculous.
The ghost aspect I liked. I would have wanted to know more about how the ghost entities “work”. The book synopsis would have you believe there’s multiple ghosts Leigh encounters but really it’s two ghosts (who are technically One ghost). It would have been nice if some loose ends were filled and there was more emphasis on the Ghost(s)
Overall, content warnings heeded, I think this is a fine book any middle or high schooler might find fun to read. Maybe not someone who is into mystery or supernatural elements, but someone who just wants to dip their toe in. I’m sure a sequel would be well received.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder, Child abuse, Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, Self harm, and Death of parent
winchella's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
A good debut. The copy I read has a few things that could be easily fixed by publishers for future writing. I believe people are being a little hard on this guy since it got hyped up so much. There's a few things I would change but overall I enjoyed the story and the main character felt real.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Cursing, Death, Gun violence, Mental illness, Murder, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Death of parent, Self harm, Blood, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicide, Suicide attempt, and Vomit
Minor: Violence, Sexual content, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Kidnapping, Eating disorder, Forced institutionalization, and Child abuse
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