Reviews tagging 'Emotional abuse'

The Dead Take the A Train by Richard Kadrey, Cassandra Khaw

16 reviews

autumnrevisited's review

adventurous dark funny hopeful 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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Drug use, Drug abuse, Addiction, Cursing, Gore, Gun violence, Alcohol, Blood, Death of parent, Body horror, Cannibalism, Classism, and Death

Moderate: Emotional abuse and Domestic abuse

jessicafee86's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious tense fast-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

5.0

I heard someone describe Cassandra Khaw's writing as gorgeously, gooey horror and this book is a perfect example of that. This is the only book I've ever read that has felt weirdly hopeful even while I'm digging through endless piles of intestines and bowel for pages on end. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Cannibalism, Death, Murder, Gore, Physical abuse, Suicide, Blood, Torture, Cursing, Self harm, and Violence

Moderate: Gun violence, Emotional abuse, Domestic abuse, and Grief

garyosu's review against another edition

dark funny tense fast-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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Addiction, Alcohol, Cannibalism, Alcoholism, Blood, Drug abuse, Body horror, Fire/Fire injury, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Excrement, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Murder, Self harm, Toxic relationship, Stalking, Vomit, Suicide, Violence, and Torture

pencilled_robin's review

adventurous dark mysterious tense

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

 liked the characters.

Julie and Sarah made such a cute couple - I was rooting for them all the way.

Also, more St. Joan please! 

The authors have a talented way with words, and there were several times where I had to stop and marvel at how well they phrased something. However, the endless descriptions of cruelty and gruesome, painful deaths did get wearing after a while. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Self harm, Murder, Suicide, Death, Suicide attempt, Torture, Blood, Body horror, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, and Violence

Moderate: Misogyny

Minor: Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, and Cannibalism

pm_me_book_recs's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny tense fast-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

3.5

 I really liked the conceit, but some of the writing took me out of the story. I don't know if it was one of the authors, or if it was supposed to be part of a character, but SOMEONE kept using super obscure words without any leads to their meanings. I'm the weird kid that read the thesaurus for fun, and there multiple times it was necessary for me to drop the book and research what the heck was trying to be conveyed. It also made the character feel very edgy in an already bluntly "I'm a badass GIRL who does inappropriate BOY stuff, like swear and do drugs. YEAH."

Anyways... aside from that, the story is a really cool concept! I enjoyed the urban aspect and the corporate greed analogy, the magic system, tying things together with deep seated trauma, the come-uppance, and the demons felt so creepy and insidious! I want to add that there is excessive substance abuse and alcoholism, which I did not mind because of the context with trauma and depression (been there), but some of the dialogue surrounding it was borderline edge-lordy...

Super LGBTQ friendly, surprisingly heartwarming in that department considering the horror/thriller focus. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Murder, Torture, Death, Self harm, Stalking, Suicidal thoughts, Cursing, Drug abuse, Addiction, Blood, Medical content, Alcohol, Gore, Gun violence, Misogyny, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, and Physical abuse

readyourbookshelf's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny tense medium-paced

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

4.0

I absolutely loved this book. . . What the fuck is this book about? 

The plot of this book is completely disjointed and wild and somehow was compelling all the way through.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Addiction, Body horror, Alcohol, Cannibalism, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Suicide, Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Gore, Self harm, Violence, Emotional abuse, Murder, Death, and Excrement

mercourier's review against another edition

dark funny tense medium-paced

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

4.0

If you don't like body horror this book might not be for you. The gore gets visceral. It's fun, a queer modern take on Eldrich horror. I found some the plot to be a little too twisty. But I liked meeting all the weird characters and seeing their demises. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore and Torture

Moderate: Emotional abuse and Domestic abuse

rachaelwho's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny hopeful lighthearted mysterious medium-paced

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

4.25

Lots of fun. Slightly darker Buffy without the sexism, or maybe Hellboy with more femmes. The characters were a bit flat, and Sarah is annoying, but I didn't really care. It's basically a really good comic book. Wish I'd known it was going to be a series when I started it, and it doesn't resolve major plot points. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Cursing, Death, Body horror, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Drug abuse, Murder, and Self harm

Minor: Domestic abuse, Gun violence, and Emotional abuse

bethgold530's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional tense fast-paced

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

3.5

This is a solid mix of urban fantasy and cosmic horror. It was very enjoyable but also very weird, like next-level Lovecraft. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Torture, Mental illness, Drug use, Excrement, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Cursing, Drug abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Murder, Self harm, Addiction, and Blood

archaicrobin's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny mysterious slow-paced

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

1.0

I am a huge fan of Khaw’s horror fiction, her prose is dynamic and visceral while still remaining beautiful at the same time. Nothing But Blackened Teeth is one of my favorite horror novellas of all time. 

I was expecting this dreadful type of horror when I started this audiobook and quickly realized this was not the haunting book I expected, but the genre of action/horror.  

 The narrator was over the top, with a different voice for each character which did help distinguish between the 50 different people in this book, but that did not make up for how annoying the voices could be. The narrator was over the top because the characters were edgy, hardcore, comic book characters that seemed more like caricatures than actual people by the end of the novel because the pacing is so off and there are so many of them. 

I’ll admit I’m a character reader, if I’m reading over the top horror I need to care about the characters in some way to find it interesting and I just could not relate or care about any of these characters because there were just too many of them. 

Essentially, this book had too many characters, too many pov switches, too many ideas, too many cliches, and too many plot points all thrown into one novel. It feels like you need to go into the story already knowing so much about this world and its characters which I don’t feel like we really get. Instead we get an other scene introducing ANOTHER new character in some edgy, gore filled way.  It’s just too much for me.

I will not be continuing this series because the books are not something that interests me. I continue to look forward to future work by Khaw but won’t be recommending this one. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Toxic relationship, Murder, Physical abuse, Sexism, Death, Violence, Alcoholism, Body horror, Addiction, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Confinement, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, and Injury/Injury detail