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ginbat's review
5.0
Graphic: Torture
Moderate: Fatphobia, Death, Body horror, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Gore, Confinement, Body shaming, Excrement, Bullying, and Addiction
Torture at the very end but it’s pretty hardcore:scifi_rat's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Prose: 4★
Pace: 4★
Concept/Execution: 4★/4.5★
Characters: 4★
Worldbuilding: 4★
Ending: 3.75★
Graphic: Body horror, Body shaming, Torture, and Violence
Moderate: Gore, Grief, Suicide, Gaslighting, Physical abuse, Suicide attempt, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, Panic attacks/disorders, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Suicidal thoughts, Excrement, Fatphobia, Kidnapping, Medical content, Cursing, Confinement, Death, Terminal illness, Bullying, Chronic illness, Death of parent, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, and Vomit
Minor: Addiction, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Misogyny, Murder, Sexism, Blood, Cancer, and Animal death
mikarala's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Basically, Mr. Kong is a bored office worker who stumbles across some top-secret files kept by a researcher at his company on "symptomers", or people experiencing weird mutations or beliefs or something. These range from people with trees growing from their fingers to people who believe they're aliens to people who simultaneously live in two bodies. Although there is the skeleton of a plot, it's not really the main focus. Many chapters in this book simply describe Mr. Kong's odd encounters with these symptomers, often as a sort of mini-parable within the larger work. Sometimes the author is kind of hitting you over the head with very obvious lessons for modern life, such as the torperers who sleep for months and years because they've realized the importance of dreaming or the time skippers who realize how much time they've wasted obsessing over tedious work problems. Other times I'm not sure what the fuck the message is supposed to be, but it definitely contributes to the overall weirdness of this book.
Needless to say, I enjoyed the mindfuck. I think I'm going to be reflecting on the abruptness of the ending for a long time. While there were some elements I didn't really enjoy (some of the symptomer cases kinda gross me out, there's a torture scene, and I feel like there's some odd and not really necessary thoughts about penises), overall I have a very positive opinion of these kind of offbeat fairy tales for coping with life in the 21st century.
Graphic: Gore, Body shaming, Fatphobia, and Torture
plomm's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
Graphic: Gore, Death, Body horror, Blood, Eating disorder, Excrement, Medical trauma, Injury/Injury detail, and Torture
irodori_megu's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Graphic: Addiction, Kidnapping, Gore, Eating disorder, Body shaming, Alcoholism, Violence, Fatphobia, Torture, Emotional abuse, Blood, and Alcohol