Reviews tagging 'Confinement'

The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward

172 reviews

veelaughtland's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• 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

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Suicidal thoughts, Mental illness, Torture, Death, Physical abuse, Child death, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Blood, Alcohol, Suicide, Animal death, Animal cruelty, Self harm, Body horror, Child abuse, and Death of parent

apollo0325's review

dark mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

3.0

Just finished but going to come back to this review and maybe adjust star ratings (currently a 3)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Drug use, Confinement, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Child abuse, Gaslighting, Violence, Animal death, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Medical trauma, Physical abuse, Blood, Child death, Animal cruelty, Emotional abuse, Self harm, Suicide, Death, and Mental illness

Moderate: Alcoholism and Medical content

There are a lot of potentially triggering material

including the description of a hanging (suicide), injury/burn descriptions, child abuse, starvation, death, death of a child (dead child's body described), and as a MAJOR PLOT POINT, dissociative identity disorder (I do not have DID so I cannot speak to the authenticity of it - the author's afterword describes her research on DID).

If you're afraid of snakes, one of the narrators has a severe fear of snakes and will constantly describe snakes.

nicesideburns's review against another edition

mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.0

The 3 is a nice gesture but overall im disappointed with the book. 

If you need to rely on DID to add to your horror/thriller as a non DID haver then the story is null. There are parts where it even romanticizes the concept of DID. It was uncomfortable to read. It was obvious that author was infatuated with this disorder despite interviewing DID havers. It feels like this whole novel wasn't ran through them and labeled as a gift for the community.

Upsetting this has literally been broadcasted as a horror/thriller disturbing novel on booktok and reviews despite it being said its "not"

Literally everything fell apart when things pointed to this fact. Had DID been removed this would've been more promising. Im thoroughly disappointed.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Animal cruelty, Emotional abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Mental illness, Animal death, Child death, Blood, and Confinement

mcnewm's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense 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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism and Body horror

Moderate: Child death, Child abuse, Confinement, and Suicide

zeldazonks's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional medium-paced

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

3.0

It got to a certain point when I was listening to this, that I thought I had it figured out but I was still curious enough to finish and see how everything played out. Well, more fool me, because this book took me completely by surprise on 2 or 3 occasions. Towards the end it was quite tough to get through, so check trigger warnings.

I will also say that I'm not 100% convinced about the mental health representation/portrayal in this. While in the afterword the author does clarify more about the disorder and the research they did into it, the fact of the matter is that you are led to believe a very specific narrative about Ted through most of the novel and while the book does catch you off guard, and challenge the preconceived notions you have about predators and good vs bad people, I just don't think the book carries it off well enough to completely avoid perpetuating stereotypes or harm. This was interesting and quite unique, but I think it almost undermines it's own point in how obviously you're walked down the garden path for the majority of the book. I respect the bold choices - the pov of a cat for example, and

I think I'll be mulling over this one for a little bit, but I don't know that it managed to fully pull off what it was trying to do. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Homophobia, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Grief, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Pedophilia, Child death, Mental illness, Kidnapping, Child abuse, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Animal death, Torture, Suicide attempt, Stalking, Animal cruelty, Alcohol, Death, Confinement, and Blood

bxnnny's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

this is quite the sleeper hit. a bit of a slower start, somewhat hard to get into, but once you're in it, you can't stop. everything coming together piece by piece by the end is truly enthralling. every detail matters so pay attention! definitely go into it as blind as you can. heavy content warning with this one though.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Physical abuse, Self harm, Child abuse, Confinement, Domestic abuse, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Suicide attempt, Animal cruelty, and Animal death

Minor: Addiction, Grief, Panic attacks/disorders, Death of parent, and Stalking

pretty heavy content warning.

mental disorders a main theme.

xkwright's review against another edition

challenging dark hopeful mysterious sad 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Medical trauma, Child death, Alcohol, Mental illness, Physical abuse, and Confinement

Moderate: Abandonment

Minor: Animal cruelty and Animal death

bellajosephine's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

It’s so hard to review this book without spoiling it, but if you like tense books with complicated characters and storylines please read this. This is my favourite book or even story I’ve ever heard/read, and I can’t wait to read what else Ward has written. 
This story was so overwhelmingly emotional and beautifully written, there are so many plot twists and reveals, I doubt anyone could accurately predict what will happen. The last 1/3 of the book had me in tears. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death, Death, and Confinement

Minor: Hate crime

simp4sneks's review against another edition

mysterious 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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Suicide attempt, Grief, Panic attacks/disorders, Mental illness, Self harm, Alcoholism, Blood, Child death, Confinement, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Suicide

librarymouse's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional slow-paced

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

4.0

I really enjoyed The Last House on Needless Street! There were a few false starts before I finally made it past the halfway point, and was hooked. I adore the gay and religious cat, Olivia!

this is one of the most sincere representations of disassociative identity disorder that I've ever seen! I'm really glad Ted didn't end up being a villain. It was interesting to have gotten Ted's point of view of events only to have those events later rewritten as explained by the consciousness that actually experienced them. I want more information about Ted's mom, tbh. Making Ted both a suspect and one of his mother's victims filled in the hanging questions in the story wonderfully. I also wanted more of an explanation on why the bug man is the way he is and what exactly he did to warrant the temporary loss of his license.
Rob feels like a good addition to the story, and I like the hints of possibility that Ted is gay.
The ending of this book was unexpectedly tender and comforting.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Death, Grief, Kidnapping, Death of parent, Suicide, Emotional abuse, Alcohol, Confinement, Mental illness, Gore, Violence, Vomit, Child death, Torture, Medical content, Medical trauma, Animal cruelty, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Blood, and Child abuse