Reviews tagging 'Murder'

There There by Tommy Orange

101 reviews

moriahleigh's review

dark emotional informative reflective medium-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? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Gun violence, Blood, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Death of parent, Murder, Abandonment, and Alcohol

Moderate: Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, and Pregnancy

Minor: Cancer and Car accident

chloe_hazel's review against another edition

dark informative reflective 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? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Mental illness, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Xenophobia, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Abortion, Murder, Alcohol, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

greatexpectations77's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

God, I devoured this book. So intense, so real, so complex. If you're thinking about reading this book, just do it. An important book about Native communities and just all communities. How we've failed our neighbors on a systemic level since the inception of this country that was built on stolen land.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Cursing, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Violence, Blood, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Cancer, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Mental illness, Misogyny, Death of parent, Murder, Alcohol, Colonisation, and Classism

Minor: Ableism, Bullying, Child death, Drug abuse, Pedophilia, Racism, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Religious bigotry, Abortion, and Pregnancy

emlm4's review against another edition

dark informative reflective 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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Racism, Rape, and Murder

lilacwhisker's review against another edition

dark emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

Beautiful look into many different Native people’s lives. Surprisingly it didn’t take long to get used to and remember the characters (my personal favorite was Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield’s!!) and the stories were all great.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gun violence, Mental illness, Mass/school shootings, Murder, Alcohol, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body shaming, Cancer, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Domestic abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Blood, Car accident, Death of parent, and Pregnancy

Minor: Ableism, Animal cruelty, Abortion, and Abandonment

mekowaletti's review against another edition

challenging 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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Violence, Xenophobia, and Murder

Moderate: Ableism, Body shaming, Rape, Sexual assault, Pregnancy, Abandonment, and Colonisation

hendrixpants's review against another edition

challenging dark informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Mass/school shootings, and Murder

Moderate: Rape and Sexual violence

lanid's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional reflective tense

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Alcoholism, Body shaming, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Genocide, Gun violence, Terminal illness, Violence, Grief, Murder, and Abandonment

sydapel's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad medium-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? Yes

5.0

One of those books that will just haunt you in a way that feels both comforting but leaves a deep ache. Even with a tragedy you can see slowly approaching, it's the characters that grab onto you and leave you thinking long after you've finished the book. These characters will deeply change the way you think about indigenous people in America and what as a culture they have been through. Definitely check trigger warnings but this is not one to skip. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Death, Gun violence, Violence, Xenophobia, Mass/school shootings, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Child death, Drug abuse, Genocide, Hate crime, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Blood, Murder, Pregnancy, Cultural appropriation, and Colonisation

chaosandwildflowers's review

challenging emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.0

The idea of this book is so phenomenal; it's a character study focused on the diverse range of life experiences within the Native American community, while simultaneously drawing attention to the fact that a growing number of Native Americans now live in cities - not on reservations. It explores various themes, including self-discovery, identity, self-loathing, heritage, parental expectations, toxic/abusive relationships, forgiveness, etc etc etc. The book also tells different character perspectives in different styles, including every thing from first to second to third person POVs, past and present verb tenses, and various other tone shifts used to distinguish characters from one another.

One of Tommy Orange's greatest strengths is in his writing and his understanding of the human psyche. The writing truly is beautiful, even feeling poetic in some places, and though the cast of characters is vast, he takes time to explore each of them in at least a little bit of depth.

However, I do think the book tried to do too much in too little space. Some characters feel extremely similar, making their chapters feel repetitive, and the sheer number of characters made it difficult to really delve into more than a few of them. I believe this book should have either streamlined its plot to fit the space or allowed itself more pages to really explore the themes. I also felt like the story ended very abruptly, with a few loose ends and unexplained plot points.

Overall, I would absolutely recommend this book. Hard stop. I think it's important to read, especially in our current society. But I'd also suggest that readers go into it expecting to focus more on the characters than on an extremely coherent plot. Solid 3/5 stars!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Cursing, Death, Gun violence, Mass/school shootings, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Alcoholism, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Grief, Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Alcohol