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Reviews tagging 'Child death'
Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart: And Other Stories by GennaRose Nethercott
5 reviews
seashellgigi's review
Found the second set of the short story about the teeanage girls killing a classmate too disturbing and disgusting
Content Warnings
Graphic: Stalking, Child death, Bullying, Violence, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Torture
river_jean_sterling's review
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gaslighting, Gore, Murder, Body horror, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, Bullying, Child death, Death, and Emotional abuse
chanlo1994's review
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
I loved the imagination behind these stories. It's very creepy, which isn't something I would have normally read. I also liked the story told in the second person. You don't see those too often. Very beautiful writing and prose.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Abandonment, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Blood, Bullying, Animal death, Grief, Body horror, Death, and Child death
Moderate: Child abuse, Death of parent, Suicidal thoughts, Addiction, Cannibalism, Toxic relationship, and Infidelity
Minor: Sexual assault
am_aycock's review
dark
funny
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
For fans of Welcome to Nightvale, Twilight Zone, or the Brother's Grimm, Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart captured mine and devoured it whole.
GennaRose Nethercott is like a lantern in the night, illuminating our need for human connection, loss, and love through ephemeral tales of the macabre and the strange. Whether we are a group of murderous teenage girls or a boy made from string, each short story encapsulates a unique aspect of human nature, leaving you raw and wanting.
As I read, I imagined Nethercott changing hats in preparation of writing each story. While her writing style is clear and consistent, each tale is so distinctive, existing solidly catty-corner to our own world, that I finished feeling inspired and impressed at her range. Its variety makes this collection fresh and unique while harking back to folklore we heard as children. Her prose is lilting, well-crafted, and reminds me of stories told by the fire while the dark waits to pounce.
Funny, heartbreaking, dark, and lovely, this collection of short stories is perfect for the fantasy, soft sci-fi, or urban fantasy loving adult. Fifty Beasts asks us to look deep within our own warped hearts and find our truth, whatever that may be. I found myself searching for small moments of magic and absurdity in my own life as I dreamed of a world in which an infinite staircase may entice me to my doom.
Thank you to Vintage Anchor via NetGalley for an advanced copy of this work.
GennaRose Nethercott is like a lantern in the night, illuminating our need for human connection, loss, and love through ephemeral tales of the macabre and the strange. Whether we are a group of murderous teenage girls or a boy made from string, each short story encapsulates a unique aspect of human nature, leaving you raw and wanting.
As I read, I imagined Nethercott changing hats in preparation of writing each story. While her writing style is clear and consistent, each tale is so distinctive, existing solidly catty-corner to our own world, that I finished feeling inspired and impressed at her range. Its variety makes this collection fresh and unique while harking back to folklore we heard as children. Her prose is lilting, well-crafted, and reminds me of stories told by the fire while the dark waits to pounce.
Funny, heartbreaking, dark, and lovely, this collection of short stories is perfect for the fantasy, soft sci-fi, or urban fantasy loving adult. Fifty Beasts asks us to look deep within our own warped hearts and find our truth, whatever that may be. I found myself searching for small moments of magic and absurdity in my own life as I dreamed of a world in which an infinite staircase may entice me to my doom.
Thank you to Vintage Anchor via NetGalley for an advanced copy of this work.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Violence, Bullying, Drug abuse, Gore, Child death, Toxic friendship, Body horror, Cursing, and Death
starrysteph's review
adventurous
emotional
funny
mysterious
reflective
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
Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart does indeed live up to the title: these stories will tag along behind you like ghosts, altering you ever so slightly as they tuck themselves into your ribcage.
They’re delightfully bizarre. These are tales you would hear in an old tavern or whispered down a chain of cleverly cruel young girls (with a hint of witchiness) or hidden in the pages of a dusty old book found at the back of your grandmother’s shelf. They feel familiar - like old bits of folklore - but are also devastatingly new.
Each story investigates our contradictions, slipping into the surreal to make sense of our present reality. They’re about loss and love, and monstrosity, and sacrifice, and rage.
The prose is delicious. And the tone between stories shifts in an always-intriguing way. Sometimes it’s witty, aloof and winking at you with knowledge of the future. Sometimes it’s serious, agonizing over the fates of the characters. Many times it lingers between the two.
The stories include a warning of magically violent young women and their initiation of the new girl, an epistolary tale involving a friend’s betrayal and a peculiar sheepskin, a young woman who hollows herself out for a man and reshapes herself to his liking, and the titular bestiary which has a lot going on beneath its initial descriptions.
There were one or two stories that didn’t grasp me in quite the same way, but that’s how collections always go for me. And the bulk of this grimoire (it feels like a grimoire, doesn’t it?) will sit with me for a very long time.
CW: child death, murder, animal cruelty/death, war, body horror, blood, gore, self harm, bestiality, infidelity, drugs, vomit
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(I received an advance reader copy of this book; this is my honest review.)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder, Drug use, Child death, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Vomit, War, Body horror, Blood, Gore, Self harm, and Infidelity
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