Reviews tagging 'Emotional abuse'

The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux

29 reviews

displeased_ghoooost's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious 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

4.25


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giulianalb99's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense 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? Yes

3.75

Tenía bastantes ganas de leer este libro ya que me propuse a principios de año leer unos cuantos clásicos.
La verdad es que la trama me ha parecido muy buena pero muchas veces se me ha hecho un poco pesado y lento. Aunque eso no quiere decir que la pluma del escritor es una pasada, para mi gusto le sobran páginas.

La verdad es que hay muy pocos personajes de la historia que me hayan gustado y no he llegado a simpatizar con casi ninguno: Raoul me ha parecido bastante pesado y siento un amor/odio hacia Christine que no sabría ni cómo explicar. También me hubiera gustado que hubieran pasado más cosas en la ópera ya que me ha parecido que ahí no están casi nunca (sólo al principio y al final).

Por los temas que trata, me parece que es un libro que todo el mundo debería leer (aunque no esperéis una historia de romance bonita, porque este libro es básicamente horror y tragedia).

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livelaughomo's review against another edition

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

3.0


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fishbones's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0


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linnylionheart's review against another edition

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dark sad tense fast-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

3.0


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mengzhenreads's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious 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

4.0

You can feel the emotion pouring from every crevice of this book. Definitely different from the musical, but just as original, moving, and dramatic.

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charity_ix's review

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No

4.0

My first classic! I was intrigued by the first chapter alone and knew I was going to love this book. The penguin classics edition was also super easy to read and the notes gave me so much insight into the world this book takes place in. I was very invested throughout the book and it was so intense at times. Some parts did feel very long and at times I felt like the pacing was slightly odd, but in the end, it was fine. The epilogue tied everything together for me and it just felt perfect. Erik as a character was written so well and even the descriptions of him gave me chills. Overall, this is the perfect book if you want to start reading classics or if you just want to read a whimsical story of The Paris Opera in the 1800s. 

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smithreads's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny informative reflective tense medium-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

4.0


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maeverose's review against another edition

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dark mysterious slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Diverse cast of characters? No

3.0

Whelp. That sure was a book.

My rating is mostly for the unintentional comedy of how ridiculous the book is. I know some parts are supposed to be funny but I think I was laughing at the wrong parts. I also just love the idea of some guy secretly living in an opera house and messing with people. Sadly though I was bored most of the time while reading this. I liked Raoul and Christine well enough (though they were both extremely naive), Erik was very different than I thought he would be (I didn’t know anything about his backstory and I had no idea he’d be so talkative and weird. I thought he’d be more brooding lol). I found it hard to imagine the descriptions of the opera house, especially when they went underground, though that’s likely a fault of the translation.

Speaking of the translation, I don’t know if my edition (paper mill press) is just a bad edition but there were quite a few typos and a lot of things were worded awkwardly, and I don’t think it was just the writing style, it seemed like a bad translation. Maybe I’ll have to do some research and see if there’s a better one.

I really wanted to like this but I think I might just not get along with classics that well. Every time I read a classic I feel like I would like it better if it had been written today. Same time period, story and characters, just a more modern writing style (and less misogyny, racism and ableism… although this story relies so heavily on the ableism I’m not sure how you’d write it without it…). I don’t mind the old language so much but I don’t like the overly dramatic repetitive dialogue that classics often have (this one had a lot of that). I don’t like how repetitive in general classics tend to be. Which is sad because I want to like classics. The stories themselves are sometimes interesting but then the writing and dialogue ruin it for me :/

That ending though… Erik really went to all that trouble… just to break down over a forehead kiss and decide to let Christine marry Raoul after all. THEN DIE. OVER SAID KISS. Dude..

Also, I can’t imagine a room of mirrors being that convincing that you’d have to have prior knowledge of what it is to know it’s not actually a forest. YOU’D SEE YOUR OWN REFLECTION. COME ON.


I think this is probably much better experienced via the actual musical rather than the book. I’ve never seen the musical but now I want to.

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natgoe's review

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

4.5


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