Reviews with content warning for Death - 11/22/63

Reviews tagging 'Death'

11/22/63 by Stephen King

87 reviews

sofiam19's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense slow-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: No

Adding “jimla!” To my regular vocabulary

Content Warnings

amorita's review against another edition

3.0

challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Content Warnings

childofsummer's review against another edition

4.0

adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: N/A

Loveable characters: Yes

Content Warnings

jana_17's review against another edition

4.75

adventurous challenging emotional informative reflective slow-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

Content Warnings

jennalistens's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous 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

Content Warnings

tmking02's review against another edition

4.75

adventurous emotional 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: No

Content Warnings

applesodaperson's review against another edition

4.5

adventurous emotional tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

I have not read many Stephen King book (I think this is only my second one), but holy cow this is my favorite so far, and I can’t imagine something else topping the insanely expansive scale of this book. I know it sounds cheesy but the best word to describe this book was epic. I can’t even imagine the amount of research that would have had to go into writing this book, even just for the historical accuracy, let alone the speculative sci-fi elements.

This was quite a long book, and I would say that it had two main parts that it switched between. There was the spy/time agent stuff, and the small-town life/romance stuff. And even though I didn’t hate Sadie as a character or anything, I consistently found the espionage sections way more engaging and interesting. I just wanted to hear more about him stalking Oswald and planting bugs, and found myself waiting for his romance and school teacher life to end.

Probably my favorite part of this whole book was the way it portrayed the past as its own character. He kept referring to it as the “obdurate past”, and made it clear that it actively tried to stop people from changing it at every opportunity. For example, by the time Jake gets to the building where Oswald shot JFK from, he is so physically destroyed and injured from all the things time has thrown at him. I just loved how he described it as trying to break through a stocking where you have to keep pushing until it rips. It was a very cool literary device that made his task seem a lot more challenging.

I also liked that even though he portrays a very idyllic picture of the 50s and 60s, he still makes a point to mention how ingrained racism was in society back then.

I honestly still don’t know how I feel about the ending. I can’t really put my finger on it but something about it didn’t feel totally satisfying. It kind of made me feel like everything up to that point was a bit useless, because it didn’t amount to any change in the world. But at the same time, I don’t think the ending was bad or terrible.

Something I do think was bad though was the tie-in to It that he put in there. It just felt like a meaningless cameo that really took me out of the story. Plus, it felt even more out of place because this book and It are two separate genres.

Overall though this book was absolutely incredible.

Content Warnings

joanne_nel's review against another edition

4.5

adventurous challenging emotional reflective sad slow-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

Content Warnings

weenydrake's review against another edition

3.0

adventurous

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Diverse cast of characters: No

King did an excellent job of bringing the past to life (for me, someone born in the late 90s), and his prose is very digestible. I’m a bit of a contrarian, and therefore not much of a King fan, so I was turned off a bit by the length of this book, the many detours from the main plot, and the romance that seems to be the intended heart of this novel.

Content Warnings

shmamshilling's review against another edition

4.5

adventurous dark emotional informative mysterious 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: No

I thoroughly enjoyed this read and felt it was a perfect balance of suspense, soft/mild horror, historical fiction and romance. I really quickly fell into a comfort with the characters and found them relatable, as well as enjoying the plot unfolding alongside the person-driven stories. The ending ripped me up and had me wishing for many versions with alternate realities.

Content Warnings

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