Reviews tagging 'Sexual assault'

Kill Switch by Penelope Douglas

72 reviews

nineinchnails's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious slow-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? Yes

3.0

this book was definitely too long imo. i loved damon and winter's characters and i think they were well written but a lot of the content felt like filler to me (especially with the flashbacks they felt a little repetitive and redundant) so it felt like a drag getting through the middle of the book. the last chunk definitely kept my attention well but i don't know if it's enough for me to rate the book higher,  since the book is so SO long. i don't think i would've minded the length much if there was more development in the present and i think the constant flashbacks worked against this story since i felt like i never got a chance to root for their relationship outside of their flashbacks. when i finished the book, i wasn't really sure why they liked each other (enough to warrant this being a romance novel) during the time the book was actually set but i found their individual characters lovable and interesting enough to root for them anyway, so i'd say it was a success overall!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, and Rape

Moderate: Stalking, Suicidal thoughts, Emotional abuse, Kidnapping, Bullying, Car accident, Ableism, Death of parent, Sexual harassment, Pedophilia, and Self harm

Minor: Pregnancy, Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail, Addiction, Animal death, and Animal cruelty

jadyn_renee62's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.25

this was a great book and perfect for the series summary of this book is below which spoils the book but this is only for people who forget what happens and want to continue the series BE AWARE

at the end damon and winter are together and damon’s kills his dad but all his money goes to his sister banks and damon has no money so he starts architecture, and he always doesn’t get arrested because the cops have someone protect him because ppl hated his dad also damon regrets everything he did and his mom touched him as a kid but his dad revels that it wasn’t his mom but a hooker and his real mom is rikas mom so they’re sibling and winters dad is still hiding and will is struggling a lot with drugs and drinking and damon is very protective of him cuz they had a very special connection

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Adult/minor relationship, Violence, Toxic relationship, Sexual assault, Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail, Bullying, Torture, Alcoholism, Emotional abuse, Addiction, Suicide, Pedophilia, Mental illness, Child abuse, Car accident, Alcohol, Ableism, and Suicidal thoughts

Moderate: Blood, Drug use, Alcohol, Bullying, Car accident, Death, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Gun violence, and Murder

agnesreads2042's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm, Violence, Kidnapping, Suicidal thoughts, Blood, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Sexual assault, Gun violence, Child abuse, and Death

princess413's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Read warning content. This was a harder one to read, darker than the first 2. Slower paced also. I considered stopping a few times but I was to intrigued so kept going despite darkness crossing boundaries and the slower pace. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Emotional abuse, Self harm, Stalking, Sexual assault, Pedophilia, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Rape, Murder, Incest, Adult/minor relationship, and Bullying

booklloveer101's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional inspiring mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Toxic friendship, Adult/minor relationship, Sexual harassment, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Bullying, Child abuse, Cursing, Drug abuse, Incest, Misogyny, Murder, Addiction, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Gaslighting, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Rape, and Sexual assault

enchantingannie's review against another edition

dark emotional

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Sexual harassment, and Suicidal thoughts

Moderate: Self harm

Minor: Abortion

ashleygreenslibrary's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

5.0

After everything we learn about Damon in the previous books, I was so ready for him to have his own story, redemption, love. I had no idea how Penelope would do it but she knocked this one out of the park. Damon and Winter are now one of my favorite couples ever.

Everything that Damon went through growing up, all the terrible things he’d done, to get to see how he felt about Winter the whole time and how she was always a place of peace for him.

Ugh. Even aside from them, the action and the story just keeps getting better with every book, I don’t know how she does it.

My ONLY gripe is I hate that at the end Winter’s dog Mikhail is never mentioned again in the wrap up/epilogue 🤣

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm, Sexual assault, Violence, and Physical abuse

emilynied's review against another edition

dark emotional tense medium-paced

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

1.5

I'm sorry, I just don't get this book and it's MMC. Winter was the best part of this for me, so I'll start with her. I really loved the blindness representation and I think the author did a good job of making the story from her narrative realistic and still interesting. She isn't diminished as a role in the story because of her lack of vision and she was still capable of being part of the action and having an entire character arc revolve around her. I loved the descriptions of her dancing and feeling the music and sounds around her and I can't fault her for bringing a literal sociopath to his knees :)

I understand why readers enjoy dark romance and fictional romance so much - it's because it's not real. If it was real, we would probably all be questioning our sanity. I usually don't mind books like these, but I don't get the hype around Damon Torrance, I really don't. His background is dark and the things that he went through are horrible - it explains why he's so messed up in the brain. BUT, I don't think it justified most of the things that he did in the past and present timelines of this book. He tries to kill his best friends in the first book, in the second book he terrorizes all of them and now he's just forgiven. There are, of course, lingering effects and we do see that in this book, but I don't think it's enough. We start the story super abruptly with him getting control of Winter, her sister and her mother just out of no where in his quest to force Winter to be with him and I just think that's gross. He puts her in these weird situations and in my mind, controls her (not letting her leave the house, having security follow her around...). I was so turned off by the first part of this book because of that. I just couldn't fathom how we could go from this to a potential love story. 

But, it did happen. I will say, I was kind of convinced towards the end of the book because he felt like a different character and everyone just *forgot* about all the shit he did. The character development just wasn't there for me to explain the switch up. Also, I feel like there was so much of Damon in Kai/Banks' book, but none of them are super prevalent in this book - I would have loved to see more of the present dynamic between him and Banks after it's revealed that they're siblings but that was definitely lacking here. 

As far as the storytelling techniques, I think I'm getting a little tired of this series' flashbacks. They are about 50% of the book and particularly in this story, reading the past chapters was so exhausting because they just felt like fillers? I don't know exactly how to explain it but it feels like the present narrative is just waiting for the big reveals in the past, and until that happens, there's a lull in the story which got pretty dull. The present chapters relied too much on the past chapters in my opinion, which also contributed to the eh reading experience. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Death of parent, Sexual assault, Death, and Sexual harassment

kk_123's review against another edition

1.5

the only reason this gets +0.5 is because i liked the backstory. i hate damon as a person and i will never understand how someone can excuse all the things he has done just because he’s "so broken". i’m depressed, sh, have ed, anxiety is off the roof and yeah, it’s not that bad compared to what was happening to him but here i am not trying to sa someone or manipulating people left and right. just because you’re traumatized doesn’t mean you get away with traumatizing other people.

anyone who can forgive him what he’s done is just as bad. don’t ignore it just because he is fictional. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Adult/minor relationship, and Rape

sevendoteight's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense fast-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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Mental illness, and Sexual content

Moderate: Sexual assault, Stalking, and Rape