Reviews tagging 'Murder'

Young Mungo by Douglas Stuart

225 reviews

worldwidewebb's review

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

4.25

Beautifully written, but incredibly difficult to read. I wanted to cry, I wanted to throw up, and I wanted to throw the book away and not finish it. Gorgeous, shattering glance into breaking norms in a world of poverty and violence. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Rape, Violence, and Sexual violence

brittonmc1221's review

dark emotional reflective sad

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Outing, Alcoholism, Blood, Death, Drug use, Hate crime, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Rape, Religious bigotry, Adult/minor relationship, Bullying, Child abuse, Homophobia, Murder, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, and Abortion

laurahartfield's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Child abuse, Death, Murder, Sexual violence, and Violence

Moderate: Racial slurs

Minor: Vomit

atkloehn's review

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Murder, Child abuse, and Homophobia

smera90's review

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

4.75

The characters are all developed thoroughly and are very complex. There are some chapters that are difficult to read but the story is very engaging and well developed. There are moments of anger, anxiety, tenderness, abandonment and so many more complicated emotions and experiences. Some awful and some beautiful. I recommend but it’s not for the faint of heart 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Abortion, Alcoholism, Violence, Homophobia, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Murder

salad_town's review

dark reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.25

I burned through this book (I wouldn’t say it was a fun or easy-read though!) purely because the immersion was spot-on, if there’s one thing this author does flawlessly it’s drop you into 90s council estate Glasgow and make you feel every part of it.

In the same vein - The characters in Young Mungo leaped off the page, they are all messy and likeable and hateable all at once.

The bad parts - Honestly this book is just a bit relentlessly sad to the point that some of it just feels unnecessary. Mungo truly can’t catch a break.

A beautifully written dive into poverty and homophobia and complicated family ties that makes you ache for every character. If a bit overly grim at times.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Murder, and Sexual assault

petyapav's review

challenging dark tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abortion, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Pregnancy, Rape, Religious bigotry, Violence, Sexual assault, Physical abuse, Bullying, Alcoholism, Hate crime, Pedophilia, Sexual violence, Addiction, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Homophobia, Murder, Alcohol, Death, and Injury/Injury detail

torismazarine's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Murder, Sexual content, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual harassment, Toxic relationship, Emotional abuse, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Rape, Gaslighting, Religious bigotry, Blood, Classism, Cursing, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Abandonment, Kidnapping, Outing, Violence, Abortion, Addiction, Animal death, Bullying, Child abuse, Hate crime, Sexual violence, Homophobia, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, and Police brutality

forestfloor's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

4.75

I honestly don't know how to start this review... I've just finished reading. I feel gutted and hollowed out. It's beautifully heart wrenching. 

Reading this made me feel like I had a cord tied to my diaphragm and someone was continually tugging at it, there's something terribly tender about it. The characters come to life with a brutal realism and the descriptive prose is absolutely gorgeous, like I was reading a film. It's praise when I say that I wanted the plot to leave Mungo alone a bit, only a reflection of how deeply the writing pulled me to care for him. 

The plot starts off slow and as the mystery of what got Mungo from the "before" timeline into the "after" setting unravels, the pace picks up. It's tense and I think it's a really good structure for the story. However, the main thing that stops me from giving this 5.0 stars is that there's not a lot of clarity or warning about how the plot jumps between timelines and different character's points of view. I think that honestly, just formatting with that little squiggle some books use between two paragraphs would've solved that for me. 

I also wished that it would've held on just a little longer before ending. Just enough to know for sure that Mungo could follow that set of splinted, beckoning fingers to safety. Instead, the ending is a bittersweet, trembling thing, a silver through a cloud that promises of sunshine and the clearing of rain, but could just as easily be covered again by a drab blanket of grey. I do think that the ending suits the story, no matter how selfishly I wanted to see Mungo and James definitively safe, on a bus together. 

I also have to say, just to be clear, that this is a heavy read. I saw it described as a gay, Glaswegian, Romeo and Juliet and I can't emphasise enough how much that refers the violence of the play, as well as the romance. Definitely read the trigger warnings before deciding to pick this book up. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Abandonment, Rape, Alcoholism, Murder, Pedophilia, Outing, Religious bigotry, Drug abuse, and Homophobia

Moderate: Abortion and Classism

Minor: Racial slurs and Eating disorder

oscarlavista's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

Reading Young Mungo was like slowly moving your hand closer and closer to a hot stove; You know it's going to hurt, it's probably going to leave a mark, you might cry, but at the end of that you're going to have learned something even if it was the most painful way to learn. It's tense, stomach knotting writing that was an unbelievable joy to read even if it hurt the entire time. 

It's simply a masterpiece. I've not read anything like this before and I will probably never read anything like it again. It's the best worst time I've ever had. Now I'm off to have a good cry 😢

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Homophobia, Domestic abuse, Bullying, Classism, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Abortion, Pedophilia, Confinement, Cursing, Hate crime, Violence, Abandonment, Alcoholism, Death, Drug abuse, Religious bigotry, Addiction, Animal death, Sexual violence, Rape, Murder, Alcohol, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Animal cruelty, and Child abuse

Minor: Incest and Self harm