Reviews with content warning for Torture - A Children's Bible

Reviews tagging 'Torture'

A Children's Bible by Lydia Millet

23 reviews

sarahjulianna's review against another edition

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challenging dark reflective tense fast-paced

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

4.0

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cryptofauna's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional inspiring reflective tense fast-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? No

5.0

oh my god oh my god. i give anything that makes me cry five stars. just the right amount of pretentious. extremely well written, amazing thoughts about god, characters i felt extremely connected to even though in the grand scheme of things you don’t get to know all of them that well. incredible. i think there are definitely some issues if i dig deeper into it but i have to abide by my cry = five stars rule until i’m more emotionally vulnerable i guess. finished it all in one sitting

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tifftastic87's review against another edition

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dark mysterious slow-paced

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

2.0

A Children's Bible follows a group of teenagers and their younger siblings in what is essentially a multi-family vacation gone wrong. Giving a plot synopsis is difficult as the story is told from an unreliable narrator who also doesn't really know what is going on. We start off with the parents being uninvolved and the kids kind of being on their own, that is a continued thread we follow. What happens in the second half is a climate disaster in terms of a flood that leads to apocalypse style events where we have raiders and bandits and various illnesses. All of these are told from the first person rambling perspective of a, likely 17ish-year-old, teen.

The characters are incredibly two dimensional. We don't know enough about them to really care as the narrator is telling us back conversations and she doesn't really like anyone other than her younger brother, who is maybe around 10? The only real character we get info about is the younger brother, Jack, who gets a bible as a gift and sees it as a metaphor for everything happening.

The themes in here are kind of unclear, or heavy handed. It was clear there is a climate crisis and we can blame the older generation and the wealthy for that. However, the conversation never really happens anymore than at a childish level of "you did this!" There was a current of biblical stuff which was... unusual?

Lastly, there was only one character who was described as having "olive toned skin" and he was the character that took the most abuse from the plot. There was a lot of fat-phobia as well that was just unnecessary.

Content Warning that isn't an option in the drop down

death during child birth and closed door sexual interactions among miners

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