Reviews tagging 'Incest'

Winchelsea by Alex Preston

8 reviews

meganmarymay's review

adventurous medium-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? No

3.5

I found it hard to connect with Goody and there didn’t seem to be a real closeness that the reader could have with her as a character. I found the plot interesting and what carried me to finish the novel more so than seeing the end to Goody’s story. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual violence, Gun violence, Murder, Terminal illness, Violence, Incest, Alcoholism, and Pregnancy

Minor: Sexual assault, Rape, Trafficking, Death of parent, and Misogyny

danbamkiwi's review

adventurous fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Violence and Incest

njh_books's review

dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.0

I was not sure what I was expecting but this was not it. Still, I read it in less than 72 hours soooo was very enticing.

It is for sure not for anyone who is squeamish. It does include a lot of graphic descriptions of violence and body parts/blood and injuries and death.

The different narrators threw me for a bit at first, just since we had "Goody", but really it was (surprise) Arnold as the narrator for the first 240 pages. The intimate friendship between Goody/William and Johnstone was interesting to see from an outside perspective, but also I think one could've not included that section and everything would have still worked/made sense without it. I did enjoy Arnold's section at the end and Goody coming back in to cut him off, though I wish the epilogue was longer because I'd be intersected to see how her life was as Goody again (and with Lily.

I'm glad Lily and Goody got their happy ending, but Lily put Goody through the wringer after Arnold's injury and poor Lily suffering on her wedding day. It was nice to see that she came back to herself or her new self towards the end of the pregnancy/after the birth. The women in this book really get the absolute worst of the lot.

As I said with another book earlier this year (looking at you A Secret History), I could've done without the incest, though one could argue it's not technically incest, but the whole having been raised together as brother and sister did make it a bit incesty... 

 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Gore, Sexual violence, Blood, Sexual content, Sexual assault, Pregnancy, War, Violence, Torture, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, and Death

Moderate: Racism, Racial slurs, Rape, and Incest

Minor: Child abuse, Abandonment, and Child death

teri_b's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

Winchelsea takes us to a corner of Britain that is off the beaten roads, and yet also Winchelsea does have its pirates and its history of social uprisings.
Having read this book, I got the audiobook from my local library, I found a broadened understanding of British history and how wild and free life was, at least imagined in this book a couple of hundred years ago. It wrote the characters directly into the landscape and the place/places where they lived and grew up. Amazing.

The narrators of the audiobook are superb and brought the story further to life.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Murder, and Death

Moderate: Incest

thelaurasaurus's review

adventurous dark medium-paced

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

2.0

A bit of a mess. There was too much crammed in for a book of this length. While it's interesting to see some diversity which you wouldn't normally expect from a novel set in the 18th century, there are essentially two characters doing the heavy lifting to make this happen. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Murder, Pregnancy, Physical abuse, Incest, Rape, Death, Racism, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Abandonment, Suicide, Death of parent, and Animal death

phatamy86's review against another edition

I HATED the sexual relationship with her adopted brother and the fact that she KEPT referring to him as ‘brother’ there after. Plus the kiss with her father before she knew who he was - unnecessarily gross to put it bluntly!! 
Thereafter I just started losing interest in the story!! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Incest

georgie_mb's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

3.5

Pr Product as part of Canongate’s February readalong

This started out with a really good premise, being a historical thriller about smugglers with a strong yet flawed female lead, however it didn’t grip me as much as I wanted it to. 

Somethings were drawn out too long, I didn’t really feel connected to any of the characters or their reasonings. The ending definitely picked up but it wasn’t enough to give it a huge boost in my rating. 

I originally had an issue with the opening letter statement about the fact that the author was a man writing a woman’s story as it ended up tainting parts of the storytelling for me, but the ending cleared that up a bit. I do think it was unnecessary and a bit forced. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Blood, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Sexism, Sexual harassment, Slavery, Torture, Abandonment, Death, Death of parent, Gore, Body horror, Colonisation, Alcohol, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Incest, Pregnancy, Rape, Sexual content, Violence, and War

shiveryteacup's review

adventurous mysterious medium-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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Sexual assault, Death of parent, Incest, War, Death, Gun violence, Grief, Rape, and Slavery