Reviews tagging 'Toxic relationship'

No Gods, No Monsters by Cadwell Turnbull

4 reviews

dancers_and_dragons's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.75

Turnbull does an excellent job of handling multiple points of view, but be warned that if you do not like books where points of view are thrown around a lot, you are not going to enjoy this book. The twists of third person to first person was well-layered, and finding out

who Calvin (the narrator) was definitely kept me curious, though I wish we had learned his name before, as it felt a bit like a self-insert framing of the book and I was quite confused for a while.

The book made me a bit rabid in my curiosity to find out what was going on, and still dragged a little with certain points of view. I did feel, as the book went on, that they made more and more sense (especially when people started getting connected to each other and I wasn't just listening to one person over here and another person over there, but actually had stories coming together). I enjoyed most of the characters, too, and found their stories and motives compelling. Still, though we see many sides and many stories around the same theme, we're kept in the dark about a lot of things as the reader. It made sense from a narrative perspective, but for me this is why I ranked it lower than 4 stars. I wanted to know why things were happening, and wish we'd gotten a better picture of the grand scheme of things a little earlier in the book, so I could put things in perspective.

Ultimately, I'm definitely looking forward to reading the rest of the books in this series, but it was a challenging read in a way I wasn't expecting. I definitely need a little mental break from confusing books for a while, though! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, Animal death, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Gun violence, Hate crime, Blood, Cannibalism, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, and Classism

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Misogyny, and Dementia

Minor: Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Suicide attempt, Pregnancy, and War

wordsareworlds's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-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

This book was absolutely riveting. Loved how Turnbull played with PoV and brought so many different perspectives in on community, how we work together to make it, and how growth is not a one-and-done event. The breadth of characterization and focus on culture drew me in, and wanting to see how the seemingly separate threads would come together kept me hooked. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Violence, Police brutality, Mass/school shootings, and Murder

Moderate: Panic attacks/disorders and Transphobia

ronan_lesh's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense medium-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? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Police brutality, and Murder

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Toxic relationship, Death of parent, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Child abuse

ceilidhwilliams's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense fast-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? No

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Body horror, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Gun violence, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Kidnapping, Mass/school shootings, and Cannibalism

Minor: Animal death, Child abuse, Drug use, Self harm, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Police brutality, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, and Fire/Fire injury