Reviews with content warning for Alcoholism - Wuthering Heights

Three stars means I liked the book! (tbh as i mull over it in the coming weeks, it'll probably grow higher)

Okay okay okay, so this needs a rant.
So I tried reading this book a few years ago, got ten pages in, and said nope. I just opened it again, and it took thirty pages of me Hating it, but I kept going anyways. I think I had a slow-burn relationship with this book.

If you're not used to reading classics, the language took a While to get used to.

Anyways, actual thought time: even for five-star books, it's very very rare that I care about how a book will end. But for some reason, this book had me Gripping the pages; needed to know how it ended and what becomes of the characters.

So even for how much I honestly didn't love 90% of the characters (they all pretty much annoyed me) and how I didn't care about certain plotlines, the tidbit of me caring how it ended stood out dramatically.

I also loved that it followed an entire family for like two generations. Stories like that, where you build a World, not just a couple moments, are my favorite, and I don't think I've ever actually read one before in a book.

I will say, my favorite characters were

Catherine (junior), Nelly, and most importantly, Heathcliff. I have no idea why, but even when Cathy Jr. and Nelly were annoying me, even in his absolute worst moments, Heathcliff had this depth to him that even if I hated, I cared for. He was the perfect villain (or anti-hero, in my case)

.

Alright, that was my rant. Would highly recommend if you're into classics, eh if you're not.

Content Warnings

redheadorganist's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad 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

4.5

Content Warnings

books_because_why_not's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad slow-paced

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

2.75

To start off, I found the characters in this book to be insufferable. They were interesting, but awful people. I only liked two characters in the entire book, but they were not even the main character. It is fine to have characters who have flaws, but many of the characters were just terrible and had hardly any redeeming quality. At least, I want one main character to be likable, that’s all I ask.

Also, this book put me in a really bad reading slump. I started this book in Early 2022 and finally got around to finishing it midway through 2023.The writing is very flowery and hard to understand in the present day. I had to look up summaries for chapters because I could not follow along. Brontë uses eye dialect (basically writing words misspelled to show how they were literally spoken) to convey Joseph’s yorkshire accent. This, however, made reading any of Joseph's dialogue absolutely unreadable.

The story was fine I guess. It did not really capture me as a reader because it was kind of slow going. Many people describe this book as a romance, but I felt like this is not true to what I read. A lot of times character’s were physically assaulting each other. In my opinion, this story is more about Heathcliff’s revenge rather than a love story.

I really did not like this book and if you have similar tastes as me, I would avoid this book. I’m not saying “Wuthering Heights” is awful, it is considered a classic after all. It is just not my cup of tea and is the worst book I have read this year.

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canyi's review against another edition

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dark tense slow-paced

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

3.5

Read as part of a buddy read among friends so it’s more recreational/ to mock it as a romance. But my final opinion is that its not a romance to mock because

it’s not a romance but more of a horror, the true romance is not the “main” couple, they’re the source of the horror. The true romance in this book is the end couple, I guess you could look at it as a romance that blossomed from the pure evil doings of Heathcliff but it really doesn’t feel like it’s the main point.

Personally I prefer to read books where I like or enjoy the main characters so honestly it wouldn’t be my go to pick. However once I got past that I found it was actually a really easy/ captivating read once I acknowledged (not a major plot spoiler)

that it was not a romance but more of a horror.

.

Despite the slow moving plot I felt compelled to finish it, at least just because I wanted to see if

Heathcliff is ever stopped

. Although I was inclined to give this a one star because I absolutely despised most of the characters, I don’t think I was supposed to like them. Honestly it’s easier to hate a character you’re supposed to hate than not liking a character you’re supposed to like.

3.5 stars because it wasn’t a bad story

just terrible people, although I will admit the rating would be lower if it didn’t have a somewhat happy ending.

Content Warnings

elisabethshanahan's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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