Reviews with content warning for Gun violence - You're Not Supposed to Die Tonight

Reviews tagging 'Gun violence'

You're Not Supposed to Die Tonight by Kalynn Bayron

123 reviews

lizacorn's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

4.5

This was a great take on the slasher genre. Really enjoyed the Easter eggs and premise. Could have spent more time at the top of the book but the focus was on the action which tbh made sense

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judassilver's review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.25

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nicole_zx's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.0

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bree_h_reads's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

2.5

I was really excited to get into this book. I loved Cinderella is Dead, and know the author is good at what she does. Even though they’re different genres I had full faith in her abilities. However, I think this is one of the few books that would be better suited to a visual medium like a movie, show, or graphic novel.

I think it had a relatively decent start and I was really excited to see a group of horror savvy teens navigate a horror story. There were already some hints of it at the start with the way Charity would think about not going into potentially sketchy places to avoid falling into horror movie tropes. One of her best friends is a huge horror movie nerd and constantly talks about not recreating horror movie scenarios in real life. I thought it had some funny moments and I found (most) of the characters enjoyable and likeable.

I was, however, let down a bit by the pacing. I thought the book was a bit slow at the beginning and it wasn’t until much later in the book things started to pick up and we got to proper tension and action. There was cop-out in the “spooky thing hunting the characters down” department which I wasn’t sure how I felt about. Some things felt over established like the lack of cell service, but there were some well built to moments like the stuff with the owls. It just didn’t make up for the dragged out beginning and the rushed ending. Having the proper horror and action not really kick in until maybe the last 60% just didn’t benefit the story. I didn’t expect the entire book to be action and avoiding the monster, but I expected more to happen. The first 60% was mostly establishing the characters and setting the scene for why they were alone at the camp for the final night. It didn’t feel like there was a proper build of dread and tension, or any proper hinting at what was happening.

The characters too just fell flat in some places. While I liked most of them, it doesn’t benefit the story to have a main character repeatedly avoiding the action. Also if the characters are established as being genre savvy and clever about avoiding the pitfalls of horror tropes (especially when that’s one character’s whole thing) I expect that to follow through into the rest of the story. I expect them to be genre savvy and not fall into pitfalls of horror like splitting the group, going into dark shadowy places, ect. I think a story about a group of people that are very aware of horror tropes and try to avoid them, but get got anyways would be interesting! But when you setup the characters to be that way and then don’t deliver it’s disappointing. This could also be a consequence of me not being very in-touch with modern trends or teenagers (I’m an old lady at heart) the dialogue felt like it was written by an adult trying to sound like a teen and just didn’t deliver.

Finally, the ending. I don’t mind a vague ending, I think they can be fun and done well! That’s not the issue. The issue is the four back to back plot twist with only half of them even decently built to. The first one felt completely out of left field, the second made sense and I had predicted it, the third was equally out of no where and felt thrown in, and the last I had begun to suspect a little bit and made sense when revealed. It just completely soured the book for me and took what would have been a 3 star book down to 2 stars.

I think this book has a lot of potential and could be really good! Just not as a book. If it were a movie and the pacing touched up slightly I think I would eat it up.

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queer_bookwyrm's review

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adventurous dark mysterious 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? No

4.0

4 ⭐ CW: Violence, blood, gore, violent death, human sacrifice, dead animals, murder, gun violence, cursing

You're Not Supposed to Die Tonight by Kalynn Bayron is a YA horror, perfect for fans of slasher horror films. Let me be clear, I'm not the biggest horror fan. I'm a bit of a wimp and don't care for the gorey stuff, but I did enjoy this short read with a black lesbian MC and final girl.

We follow Charity, the final girl of Camp Mirror Lake's full contact terror simulation. Charity's summer job is to be the final girl and oversee the simulation of scaring the pants off the guests that pay to be on the site the movie was filmed at. When a couple of staff go missing (assumed to have just quit), Charity invites her girlfriend, Bezi and their friend Paige to come help with staffing the simulation. Soon Charity and her friends find out something fucky is up with Camp Mirror Lake when some lady comes in swinging a gun around. Things get really weird and really gorey until we get to the end where my response, out loud, was "well shit ".

This was a great scary book for spooky season! It has all the vibes. It's kind of meta in the way that it's about a terror simulation based on a movie similar to Friday the 13th, but then actual murder starts to happen, but the characters don't have genre blindness. They know about the horror movie rules. I do love how Bayron has subverted the final girl trope, and given it to a queer girl of color.

As previously stated, I'm not a fan of gore, so I could have gone without that in here, but the suspense did keep me on my toes, and made me blow through this in two days. I was surprised that all the twists were not predictable. The end left me feeling like something else is about to happen, just like a good horror movie makes you feel like it's not quite yet.

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klpage's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

This isn’t my usual genre but I really enjoyed this. This was dark, perfect for this season.

It had a dark and tense atmosphere and it genuinely felt like a horror film.

I had a couple of predictions about some characters but some twists did keep me off guard!

Highly recommend.

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patchy_at_best's review against another edition

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challenging dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.0

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enyltiak's review

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adventurous dark mysterious 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? No

4.5

As a horror fan, I truly enjoyed this book so much. I don't read a lot of slashers (yet!) but reading this felt like watching an 80s horror movie and I couldn't put it down. The twists and turns are exciting and harrowing, and I actually felt a sense of dread from the prose that I don't usually experience with this kind of story.

I will admit that the Owl Society felt a little cheesy to me and broke some of the tension, but the action managed to bring some of that back, and I really didn't expect the twist with Kyle. And, honestly, I think some of that cheesiness enhanced the 80s horror movie vibes!

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warlocksarecool21's review against another edition

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dark funny mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.5

While I did have fun with it, I have mixed feelings about this book. I don’t usually read horror books like this. The closest I usually get is gothic fantasy or like mystery thrillers.

Regarding what I liked, I enjoyed the characters, I thought they were funny and really moved the story along. I think the author did a good job building up the suspense and urgency of the story as Charity and Bezi tried to survive. It was also nice to have sapphic rep, even though it wasn’t the focus of the story.

I think up until the last like 70% I would have given it a 4 stars, but the reveal of what was going on tanked it for me. I just, had a hard time taking it seriously. I know nothing about it is supposed to be realistic but I was just taken aback I guess.

Like a murderous cult of owl worshippers that sacrifice people to get magic powers 😭😭😭😭 I feel like I had so many questions about where the magic came from, and the power of the land that they were on that I wish had been built up more throughout the book. I understand the author wanted us to be in suspense about what was happening but I feel like with the motivation behind the killers, the idea of the land holding dark magic should have been built up a bit more. I think it’s just because the story never indicated that there was any kind of fantastical element to it so I was not expecting it.

I also was kind of mad about who ended up dying at the end, it kind of just seemed like it was for massive shock value. I can see how it was like trying to be self-aware and subvert common horror tropes, but I don’t think I enjoy the horror genre enough to appreciate it. Maybe all of those things sound like good horror to you but the ending was not it for me. I think if you have read/watched horror books and movies before and are familiar with a lot of the tropes you might find this fun, but I wanted it to go differently.

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stitchbooks22's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.0

Picked this up as I wanted to read some spooky books in the run up to Halloween. I really enjoyed this until approximately the last 10% of the book. The writing was great and I was enjoying this horror story. I also liked a lot of the characters, such as Charity and Bezi.

It is short and fast paced so I flew through it. But the ending was a let down and unsatisfying for me after everything that had happened already.

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