Reviews tagging 'Death'

Daphne by Josh Malerman

12 reviews

jillreads55's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Murder

cloudii_rain's review

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.5

All I will say that this book should not have been this long and especially for the ‘payoff’ at the end, bc, what WAS that? 😟 

It’s alright, and I liked how it talks about anxiety a lot !! But it just dragged on and on and on, and again, the ending was just, disappointing at best. :(

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Kidnapping, Body horror, and Panic attacks/disorders

devynreadsnovels's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Panic attacks/disorders

Moderate: Murder, Cannibalism, Child death, Torture, Mental illness, Alcoholism, Body horror, Stalking, Violence, Cursing, Blood, Kidnapping, and Death

Minor: Car accident, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Drug use, Confinement, Bullying, and Gun violence

louisegraveyard's review

challenging dark emotional informative mysterious 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Death of parent, Gun violence, Violence, Body horror, Physical abuse, Car accident, Child death, Cursing, Death, Gore, Cannibalism, Kidnapping, Mental illness, and Panic attacks/disorders

orasmis's review

dark funny tense medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Gore, Murder, Death, and Mental illness

Moderate: Bullying, Alcoholism, and Alcohol

jourdanicus's review against another edition

dark reflective 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? It's complicated

Hmm, this book was more interesting than scary or horrifying to me. I don't have a very vivid visual imagination so the gory character deaths didn't do much to me. But the metaphor of the monster being anxiety, that was interesting to me.

Some of the plot points were a little confusing but maybe that was just me not paying close enough attention. I also felt like the ending was a bit rushed, maybe for the sake of tension, but that fell through as I didn't feel that much tension had been built up to that point.

I'd definitely recommend this to anyone who loves basketball and horror, lol. We love a niche sub-genre. I'm interested to explore more by this author and see if anything else he wrote falls more into my wheelhouse.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Body horror and Panic attacks/disorders

Minor: Child abuse, Death, Car accident, Child death, and Injury/Injury detail

markedwithanm's review

dark hopeful mysterious fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Grief, Blood, Body horror, Bullying, Cannibalism, Car accident, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Kidnapping, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, and Violence

seawarrior's review

4.0

Reviewing this several months after I first read it, so I don't remember details. I thought that Daphne was mostly a well-constructed allegory for how anxiety often feels relentless and never-ending. The characters were fairly simplistic, but they're mostly there to die anyway. The uniqueness and thrill of this slasher story are what make it worth reading. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Panic attacks/disorders, and Injury/Injury detail

soobooksalot's review

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Drug use, Death, and Murder

connorjdaley's review

dark emotional mysterious 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? Yes

4.0

This author has been an auto buy for me since reading Bird Box (although I don’t always read them immediately). I didn’t get it on release day, but I’m into the timely release. 

I strangely read this before/at the same time as/during/ two other reads (Wild Things by Ian Thomas/ Goosebumps: Hall of Horrors: Claws by R. L. Stine) that also starred young kids/teenage girls. It’s interesting to see how all of the author’s portrayed them and the differences. Malerman’s features high school characters from the girl’s basketball team, and it was nice to see him have them act/speak age appropriate. One thing that surprised me though was that it’s meant to be current, but there wasn’t anything indicting the generation in any way in terms of slang. 

This book very heavily leans into basketball. It bleeds into the plot, the settings, the characters, everything. As someone that doesn’t really care for it, it made it kind of hard to get into the story for me. While I understand that reading is a way to learn and experience perspectives we do not live ourselves, it just doesn’t work for me in that way. IE. I’ve never been a teenage girl living through the trauma of a horror novel, therefore that’s a perspective I can get behind. However, entire pages about free throws is not the same in my opinion, although I’ve never been a basketball player either. 

After reading the afterward where the author speaks to his love of basketball I can accept it though. He also speaks of his experience with anxiety, as this novel goes pretty heavily into bad anxiety, anxiety attacks, and panic attacks. I myself suffer from some pretty bad anxiety, and although what the author is describing does not match my personal experience, knowing it entails a bit of his personal experience makes it more enjoyable. 

One writing technique that the author uses that I thoroughly enjoyed was doing away with normal chapters. The novel does feature typical breaking points, but there is not a single conventional chapter in its entirety. At first I think it took me a while to get into in terms to pacing, as well as making a few points confusing, but it lead to one hell of an explosive ending. 

Another good entry from the author. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Panic attacks/disorders, Cannibalism, Cursing, Death, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Gore, Kidnapping, Child death, Murder, Body horror, and Violence