Reviews tagging 'Grief'

As I Descended by Robin Talley

3 reviews

theirgracegrace's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

As I Descended is a diverse, queer but still tragic retelling of Shakespeare that does not hold back from the horror. María and Lily are the school's rising stars, if only Delilah Dufrey wasn't in the way. When they have a séance with their best friend Brandon, they unleash a supernatural force that inhabits their Southern boarding school. And the ghosts say that blood will have blood...

I adore how Robin Talley recontextualizes the setting from the nobility of early medieval Scotland to a group of queer teens at a Southern boarding school, and how the themes do not change. It legitimately is impossible to tell if the characters are hallucinating the supernatural occurrences in the school, or if they are really happening. The relationships between the characters mirror those between their Shakespearean counterparts, but they also are their own people and show the effect of fate and the supernatural on their psyche.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Car accident, Child death, Drug abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Alcohol, Suicide attempt, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicide, Chronic illness, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Cursing, Death, Homophobia, Bullying, Addiction, Blood, Drug use, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Outing, Racism, Confinement, Alcoholism, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Medical content, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

Moderate: Fatphobia, Ableism, and Violence

Minor: Domestic abuse and Body horror

lilifane's review against another edition

mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

3.0

I just learned that this is a lesbian Macbeth retelling. 
Yeah, I didn't recognize it. But a lot makes more sense now.

Although I liked how many queer characters there were, I really didn't like anyone. They were all annoying and their relationships weren't very believable. I was really confused if anyone actually liked anyone. 

But I did really enjoy the spooky parts of the story. Those were written really well (compared to the rest of the book) and unsettling. So I liked it as a queer teenie ghost story. And I wish we got more ghosty scenes and more information on all those school mysteries. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Toxic friendship, Drug use, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Homophobia, Panic attacks/disorders, and Suicidal thoughts

Minor: Slavery

sarah984's review

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.0

This is a YA retelling of Macbeth set in a prestigious private high school. I was really impressed with the ways that the author managed to tie Macbeth into the modern-day setting (though naming the football field Dunsinane was a bit much), and some of the scares with the ghosts were great.

However, most of the characters were pretty shallow (they definitely felt like identities first and characters second), the plantation stuff felt unnecessary since nothing was ever really done with it, and the ending was kind of silly. Also, this may be shallow but the main character Maria was called "Ree" by all her friends and it really annoyed me. What kind of nickname is that? Who would use that to shorten Maria??

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Blood, Biphobia, Death, Drug abuse, Grief, Homophobia, Medical content, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Suicide, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Child death and Slavery