Reviews tagging 'Violence'

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

168 reviews

brycestevenwilley's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad slow-paced

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

4.0

Better than I thought it would be, beautifully written and interesting themes, but just a little too long at times, I didn't really need the 5 page description of the Alps.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Murder

Moderate: Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide

Minor: Abortion

onlyonebookshelf's review against another edition

dark reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Violence, and Murder

julianfromme's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective slow-paced

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence

emmalouisereads's review against another edition

dark mysterious slow-paced

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

3.25

Never has there been, and never will there be, a more pathetic person than Victor Frankenstein. What on earth did he do to Mary to make her write him so unlikable?!

Forget everything you thought you knew about Frankenstein. Dead bodies sewn together? Forget it. Stupid monster? Forget it. 

This is a story of a man who arrogantly does something incredibly stupid for vain reasons and then sleeps, runs away and faints pathetically while everyone around him suffers the consequences.

Oh my wretched life! 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Ableism, Child death, Violence, and Murder

hayleystagg's review against another edition

mysterious sad 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? No

3.0

The story of Frankenstein’s monster is absolutely nothing like I expected

I certainly didn’t expect him to be able to speak fluent French, German (though could have been Swiss), and English. He could also write! And identify birds from there sound. He is certainly not the trope

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Content Warnings

Minor: Violence and Murder

linnylionheart's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

2.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Body shaming, Child death, Confinement, Death, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Grief, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Gaslighting, and Abandonment

Moderate: Mental illness, Terminal illness, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Animal death, Drug abuse, Gun violence, Suicide, Forced institutionalization, Blood, and Colonisation

Minor - execution of an innocent person

kingcrookback's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

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

Somehow, in all my years of hearing about Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and having friends who really enjoy the novel, I never knew that this was an epistolary novel. But in any case, being an epistolary novel, it's an excellent exercise in detecting and questioning the narrators' unreliability and biases in their storytelling.

I don't have much to say regarding whether I think this was "good." Of course it's good. It's an enduring and oft-discussed classic for a reason, and that reason isn't merely the fact that it's the first science fiction novel or that it was written by a woman. It's a fascinating and complex study of hubris, humanity, and obsession. Being the person that I am, I really fixated on the themes of humanity that Shelley spins around the Creature--specifically how the Creature's descent into immorality aligns not with his physical monstrosity/deformity/disfigurement (as tends to be the case with monsters and villains with deformities/disfigurements) but rather with the internalization of his lived experiences. (In this vein, I also found it fascinating to put Frankenstein in conversation with Richard III, where Richard's disability/deformity is meant to be read as a physical manifestation of immorality.)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Murder

Moderate: Body horror, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, and Death of parent

parisreads's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-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? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Death, Panic attacks/disorders, Violence, Death of parent, and Murder

Minor: Islamophobia

tanisha_112's review against another edition

adventurous 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? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Violence

Moderate: Blood

Minor: Suicidal thoughts and Death of parent

marinasslibrary's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

Proof that "books written by women" was  true even 200 years ago

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Death, Violence, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, and Murder