Reviews tagging 'Blood'

Fairy Tale by Stephen King

70 reviews

febronia87's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious tense medium-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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Medical trauma, Grief, Death, Gun violence, and Gore

Moderate: Alcohol, Addiction, Blood, Classism, and Alcoholism

Minor: Bullying, Sexual content, and Incest

steveatwaywords's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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? It's complicated

4.25

It felt good to be in the discomforting arms of Stephen King, again, and this is one of his old-school fantasy-adventure tales with the customary unexpected grit. If you have appreciated tales the like of The Talisman or The Eyes of the Dragon,--even, to a degree, 11.22.63-- this is a good choice.  If you're looking for something closer to the darkness of It or Needful Things or something heavier in character development like his Finders Keepers, Insomnia, From a Buick 8, or Hearts in Atlantis, there is somewhat less to satisfy.  This is roller-coaster King having a good time writing, throwing in odds and ends from his (our) childhood because he can, taking open shots at Disney and contemporary politics because it's fun. Enjoy the adventure, wince at the satisfying squelches of flesh, and say hello to the dog. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Bullying, Alcohol, Blood, Gore, Gun violence, Violence, Car accident, Sexual content, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Emotional abuse, Grief, Physical abuse, Death, Death of parent, Torture, and Toxic friendship

boerow's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional inspiring mysterious tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Gun violence, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, and Gore

Moderate: Death of parent and Alcoholism

Minor: Cannibalism

spaceykate's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

despite my initial misgivings about this being a s.king book, i actually found myself really enjoying it. there are a LOT of references - some oblique, some literally spelled out and quoted (from fairy tales to modern movies to even a name drop of obama) - but i'm a nerd who absolutely loves linking things to other things i already know, so i got over it. although s.king reaaaaally drawing out the jack in the beanstalk and rumpelstiltskin metaphors for 600 pages did get a tick tiring.

part of me was a little "meh" about

an outsider coming in to save the royal family / the world from physical disabilities and his greatest success was not having any disabilities plus being a good ol' midwestern farm boy who was good at football, combined with certain individuals having to "overcome" their disabilities to reach true character potential... it just felt a little eeeeeh to me as someone who has struggled with hearing loss, like damn guess i need a perfectly "whole" human to save the day or to magically somehow overcome my disability to kill my demons /eyeroll

. i really liked charlie's whole "i'm a dark boy" internal narrative because 1) it was funny. this kid is like, 17. from bumfuck illinois. it's not hard to rise to the top when you've only got like 150 kids in your graduating class. and he's so fucking serious because he had to grow up too fast and it's like goddamn whiplash to read a book about a kid who would be your age in your timeline dealing with this shit but also talking about touching boobs. lmao and 2) finally! an idiot (affectionate) protag who thinks they're an antihero! much better than the alternative. it definitely endeared me to his character more that he thought he didn't deserve any of this opportunity to experience and save another world beneath ours, that his past made him unworthy and he had to hold up an imaginative bargain that was never decided upon except in his soul. 

i feel a little cheated because the cover definitely looks like a dragon eye and we didn't really get a dragon in this book (fight me, that one scene was not equivalent - it was an eldritch being) but! i forgive s.king.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Death of parent

Moderate: Body horror, Grief, Blood, Physical abuse, Car accident, Alcoholism, and Murder

Minor: Animal cruelty and Ableism

i need to make this absolutely clear: the dog does not die in this book. IT GETS KINDA DICEY in a few spots but the dog survives the whole book.

kyrstin_p1989's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

Fantastical. Magical. Unbelievable. Amazing. Wondrous. Delightful. While this isn’t a book I would normally chose, I absolutely fell in love with a young man named Charlie and the pet he didn’t choose but came to love anyway. Too complex for me to even give a synopsis of, I’d just say if you want to read a book about adventure, read this one. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Alcoholism, Animal death, Classism, Confinement, Cursing, Animal cruelty, Slavery, Addiction, Abandonment, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Self harm, Torture, Toxic relationship, Toxic friendship, Blood, Excrement, Grief, Body horror, Cancer, Murder, Rape, Bullying, Death of parent, and Violence

onehiphippo's review

adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, and Death

Moderate: Death of parent

kelisabeth's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Car accident, Confinement, Fatphobia, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Racism, Classism, Genocide, Gore, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Police brutality, Slavery, War, Vomit, Alcohol, Blood, Body horror, Bullying, Cursing, Death, Death of parent, Excrement, Addiction, Alcoholism, Grief, Gun violence, Hate crime, Torture, and Violence

naomi_k's review against another edition

adventurous emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Blood, Body horror, Car accident, Death, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, and Violence

Moderate: Cursing, Medical content, Vomit, Terminal illness, and Torture

Minor: Animal death, Cancer, Cannibalism, Genocide, Confinement, Emotional abuse, and Slavery

modepo's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

i think stephen should have written fairy tales from the very beginning these reimaginings are beautifully done. he still can’t write about women but  i’m  a sucker for stories of a boy and his dog :) 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Blood, Death of parent, and Violence

nyree42's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark hopeful mysterious sad tense medium-paced

4.0

My first ever Stephen King. Picked it up due to... you guessed it... the title, since I love fairy tales and fantasies and "other world" stories.
Well, it delivered exactly what I was looking for, and now that I know that a work of Mr. King was quite enjoyable, I will peruse his catalogue to find out if he has written anything else that might be to my taste.

As for my review... the plot of "Fairy Tale" was a bit slow at times; he is quite a verbose author who seems to like to thoroughly flesh out the character's life and the world around them, but that was fine. I still enjoyed all of it, even if sometimes I put the book down for awhile once I'd gotten to one of the more "drawn-out" parts.

It's not a "scary" tale; just creepy when talking about the villains, the evil, and the bad things that happened to people, but it remained "down to earth" and hopeful even in the face of darkness.

I will be hoping that it is adapted into a mini-series! That or two films (need at least two so that important things aren't rushed over). My preference would be a nice, "true-to-the-book" TV mini-series adaptation though. Amazon Prime or HBO, let's do this! (Sorry, can't bet on Netflix, they might ruin it.)

Reading age: would recommend for, at the youngest, age 16 and up. (Note that it contains violence, some gore/death/injury-depictions, frightening/tense situations, some sexual mentions and lewd jokes and swearing, so it's not child-friendly.) 

Since it's about a teenager, there is something that teens would get out of it; yet it's written for adults and with an adult perspective, so if you're in your 20s and up it will probably be more meaningful. I've passed my 20s and it still hit home for me, making me remember what it was like to be an adolescent - although Charlie Reade was a lot more cool than I was at that age.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Blood, Bullying, Death, Kidnapping, Body horror, Alcoholism, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Addiction, Alcohol, Confinement, and Cursing

Moderate: Sexual content, Torture, Slavery, and War