Reviews tagging 'Murder'

We Need to Talk about Kevin by Lionel Shriver

61 reviews

_christinadevin's review against another edition

dark emotional sad 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

3.0

This was an interesting one. I didn’t love the ‘telling’ style at all points, but the mystery and growing dread you experience is pretty well done. Overall though, im horrified haha

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Hate crime, and Mass/school shootings

fiona_245's review against another edition

dark emotional inspiring reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.25

Wonderful book, nice prose, and extremely reflective - especially in child-rearing and building a family. Although it was quite difficult for me to push through, with constant searching for word meanings on the dictionary, and getting lost in the prose, I still managed to digest the message and the emotions and thoughts Eva dealt with in her suffering.

• It really did stick to my mind that you could be good parents but you have a child who'd turn out bad.
• There's a lot more reasons not to bear a child other than expecting he/she will turn out to be a killer.
• Motherhood is a real work. I can't just judge easily how a parent is handling his/her child, though if it's extreme enough, like straight out torturing a child then 'course I'll judge him/her.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Murder, and Ableism

megelizabeth's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character

3.5

I'm glad I finally got around to reading this, having had it sitting on my shelves for ages and having heard so much about it over the years. It's a slow, dense read, and not at all an enjoyable one, but definitely a fascinating one overall. The ending also really surprised me, and it's definitely well-written and cleverly thought-out as a whole. The main thing that stopped me giving this a higher rating is that, while the protagonist is clearly deliberately unlikeable, there were times where it wasn't clear whether particular awful things were purely Eva or instead were reflective of the author's views. I also really struggled to see any real love or connection between Eva and her husband, which made that element of the story (and it's quite a big one) super hard to care about or link with everything else.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Ableism, Child abuse, Blood, Death, Child death, and Racism

Moderate: Animal cruelty

Minor: Genocide

pierreadsbooks's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Death, Violence, Toxic relationship, Pregnancy, Adult/minor relationship, Murder, Mass/school shootings, and Child death

Moderate: Bullying and Medical content

Minor: Sexual content and Animal death

goblinghost_39's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective medium-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Murder, Violence, Death, Mental illness, Blood, Mass/school shootings, Pregnancy, and Gun violence

iiisabelle's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Mass/school shootings, and Murder

Moderate: Child death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Death, and Cursing

Minor: Sexual content, Injury/Injury detail, Animal cruelty, and Genocide

ellilo's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Sexual content, Mass/school shootings, Murder, Body horror, Child death, Child abuse, Gun violence, Hate crime, Physical abuse, and Pregnancy

annabeserk's review against another edition

challenging dark tense slow-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder

mmccombs's review against another edition

dark sad tense slow-paced

2.5

What a heavy and kind of obnoxious book! I did enjoy the mood and the way it was organized, but it was just entirely too long. It felt like a slog to get through, I did not need Eva’s opinions on literally everything, we know she’s kind of the worst so let’s keep it moving! Lots of r-words and racist and homophobic and fatphobic things in this book, too. Which again, Eva and her family are not good people so all of those things made that more obvious, but after a while it just got old.  I think the heart of this story is a compelling one, but I just didn’t care for much of the execution.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mass/school shootings, Violence, Murder, and Child death

klwpvfc's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective 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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Mass/school shootings, Mental illness, Sexual content, Murder, Bullying, Death, Gun violence, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Child death, Adult/minor relationship, Death of parent, Toxic relationship, and Violence