Reviews tagging 'Cancer'

Inmitten der Nacht by Rumaan Alam

13 reviews

lauracollins096's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore and Vomit

Moderate: Blood, Death, Cancer, Racism, Classism, War, Genocide, and Body horror

Minor: Islamophobia, Addiction, Child abuse, Violence, Sexual assault, Religious bigotry, Suicidal thoughts, Child death, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Body shaming

ifoundcallie's review against another edition

dark reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.75

I feel like if you read this book as a literacy fiction novel with a lens towards social commentary in America, it is stunning. The layers and layers of metaphor on discomfort and humanity—so good! The author’s craft leads readers through a sociological exercise where they is forced to grapple with what it means to be part of the human race, particularly in the context of individualism in Western culture. The fact that the author took ALL OF THAT, and weaved it within the unraveling of a literal apocalypse (of which specifics are vastly unknown)….So. Damn. Good. I had chills multiple times and ran out of ink in my highlighter. 

Very reminiscent of Stephen King, particularly “Under the Dome”. If you liked that, you’ll love this. For people SOLELY looking for a thriller or commentary on race/social class, turn elsewhere…this book intentionally subverts the expectations of those genres. 

I love how the omniscient narrator stingily portioned out information, which shamefully left me feeling the same desperate NEED for information that the book was critiquing! 

There are a few times in this book where the writing could use some trimming/adjusting towards purpose—the heavy emphasis on certain carnal images felt self-righteous and cheap for the rest of the story. Honestly, this is the only thing that keeps this book from being a “perfect” book for me. This pitfall is reminiscent of Stephen King’s writing, again, which makes sense knowing that the author reread Pet Semetary while editing this book. I can only read so many descriptions of bored and worn out married couples “tumbling into the only comfort: of flesh smacking against flesh” or teenage male characters and their detailed descriptions of “spit-in-hand, spurting release”, or adult men who are dumbstruck by their unexpected “large load of vitality and youth long gone”. I felt disappointed every time the book swung back to these tropes, faithfully. Yawn.

There are many passages/chapters in this novel that blew me away and can easily stand on their own as brilliant pieces of art. I would love to sit and analyze some of the turn-of-phrase, allusions, and imagery handpicked by this intelligent author. I was giddy with annotation, and this book rewards you for paying attention to these nuances of craft. Overall, I’m so glad I was recommended this book. It itched an “am I spiraling and paranoid or is the world ending” scratch that is often not done well. 

Bravo, Rumaan Alam.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Blood, Confinement, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Alcoholism, Alcohol, Sexual content, War, Excrement, Cursing, Vomit, Racism, and Classism

Minor: Suicide, Gore, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual violence, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Medical trauma, Incest, Gun violence, Colonisation, Torture, Car accident, Child death, Misogyny, Hate crime, Genocide, Homophobia, Dementia, Cancer, Xenophobia, Violence, Religious bigotry, Lesbophobia, Fatphobia, Body shaming, and Suicide attempt

GRAPHIC dental related body horror, multiple descriptions of semen and masturbation

lizzym126's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense medium-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing

Moderate: Addiction, Sexual content, Suicide, War, Cancer, Confinement, Death, Alcohol, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, and Racism

Minor: Murder

kelleywithanextrae's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail and Blood

Minor: Vomit, Suicide, War, Cancer, Death, and Pandemic/Epidemic

cheye13's review against another edition

challenging dark tense fast-paced

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

3.0

I can see why this is a divisive book. Personally, I found it middling.

I found the character dynamics interesting - complex and conflicted enough to be worth following, but not contentious enough to be simply unpleasant. The book's strength lies in the roundedness of the characters (at least the adults).

It does feel unfinished, like a sentence missing a period. I'm not entirely sure what the message of the story is. It could have one message if a catastrophe weren't confirmed to the reader, and it was a sort of modern Monsters Due on Maple Street. It could have another if we (the reader) knew the intent or nature of the crisis. It'd have yet another if we saw just one plot point further into the story.

Not an unpleasant reading experience, but unclear what to take away.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Vomit, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, and Sexual content

Moderate: Death, Xenophobia, Classism, and Racism

Minor: Cancer and War

body horror mainly regarding teeth; some brief asides detail gruesome deaths unrelated to the main characters; racism is of the casual/ignorance variety rather than intentional cruelty

princessdana36's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

2.5

This book is crazy. The pretentious language holds up the meaning of this book. Plus there’s a whole chapter of someone’s grocery list. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Blood, Cancer, Body horror, Child death, and Islamophobia

emory's review against another edition

challenging dark sad medium-paced

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

4.75

A horrifyingly amazing read, with a terribly inaccurate summary on the back! I was expecting a run of the mill thriller but was beyond satisfied with the shockingly relevant horror of two families facing what might be the end of the world. 

The writing, while seeming unnecessarily ornate at the beginning of the novel (before the narrative reaches its point), is gorgeously poignant and haunting. My only complaint is the writing sometimes tilted into purple, with words clearly added only to show off the vocabulary of the author ("alee" to describe the inside of a Starbucks?), and the strange fixation and return to sex and what sex could metaphorically represent for these characters. Annoying, but not damning, and worth slogging through for the story itself. 

The use of dramatic irony of knowing what is really happening while the vividly human portagonists stumble through figuring out what is going on, their dynamics with and what they owe to one another, and what course of action they have to take carries the novel to it's gut wrenching relevance and takeaway. A story couldn't be more frightening in the current climate of knowing how bad it is, knowing society's place perched on the edge of disaster, that something's about to give. Alam's masterful prose wanders through the particular scenario of a family finding out you can never really look away.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Cursing, Confinement, and War

Minor: Child death, Animal death, Car accident, Blood, Murder, Racism, Cancer, Excrement, Genocide, Sexism, and Suicide

The book is about an apocalyptic scenario that is very realistic and claustrophobic.

sarah984's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective slow-paced

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

2.0

There were some things here that had the potential to be interesting - the "guess who’s coming to dinner" scenario with the white people who desperately want to believe they're not racist (or that they don't SEEM racist, these characters are preoccupied with seeming) but resent the class/race divisions not going the way they would expect, the mundane weirdness of living through a disaster, some of the things with the animals. However, the prose is extremely dense, full of short sentences, weird metaphors and unpleasant sexuality, and in the end it just kind of felt like a chore to read it. It also drove me insane that they spent all that time complaining about not knowing anything but refused to listen to the radio.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content and Vomit

Moderate: Alcohol, Cancer, Confinement, Excrement, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, and Racism

Minor: Animal death, Child death, Islamophobia, Suicide, Terminal illness, and War

There is a scene involving a person’s teeth falling out.

madarauchiha's review against another edition

dark mysterious fast-paced

2.0

 ❤️ 🧡 💛 💚 💙 💜  my about / byf / CW info carrd: uchiha-madara 💜 💙 💚 💛 🧡 ❤️

Like. A whole lotta nothing happens. Not really creepy or horrific. If I look at reviews and see fives I might be mad and confused. I'll admit it, I don't get this book at all. It's incredibly horny to the point of hysterical laughing. Um if I wanted to read legal minors jerking off I'd fire up a oh three dot org. Just kidding I'm normal so I would not seek out child porn written by thirty yo fandom freaks. 

The writing and themes were interesting, I just don't think the pay off was worthwhile.

My reading time .82 hours. Meh.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Vomit, Alcoholism, Gore, and Sexual content

Moderate: Death, Sexual content, Drug use, and Racism

Minor: Suicidal thoughts, Cancer, Vomit, and Animal death

vlntnmz's review against another edition

emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

2.0

Why the author put so many sex references in the senteces when there was no ponit for it?
'

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Gore, Sexual content, and Vomit

Minor: Cancer, Medical content, Murder, and Suicide