Reviews tagging 'Gore'

Hummingbird Salamander by Jeff VanderMeer

6 reviews

mgmotley's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious medium-paced

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

2.25

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Infidelity, Body horror, Death of parent, Gore, Grief, Blood, Death, Physical abuse, Violence, Child abuse, Kidnapping, Murder, Stalking, and Gun violence

crowcore's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense fast-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

4.5

I finished this book on a train ride from California to Washington-- a hurricane was hitting southern California and everywhere north of there was on fire, all the way up to Canada. The smoke was so thick at some points on the track that the only thing we could see out of the windows were the powerlines, and some parts of the track were too hot to go at top speed safely so we spent an extra few hours breathing in smoke.
So the book felt a little on the nose 😬

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Violence, Chronic illness, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Grief, Sexism, Stalking, Death of parent, Dementia, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Kidnapping, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Classism, Colonisation, Death, Animal death, Blood, and Misogyny

Moderate: Toxic friendship, Body shaming, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Forced institutionalization, Ableism, Deportation, Confinement, Infidelity, Medical content, Torture, and Genocide

mandkips's review

challenging dark reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• 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

Graphic: Stalking, Murder, and Blood

Moderate: Violence and Gore

Minor: Animal death and Infidelity

kaylatee's review against another edition

dark 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? No

1.5

So excruciatingly slow with a narrator that is unreliable and unpleasant. The whole shebang feels very pointless by the end.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Death, Gore, Gun violence, and Murder

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Fire/Fire injury, Mental illness, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Physical abuse

Minor: Animal death

- Lots of gun violence - Main character shares anecdotes from her childhood of her emotionally and physically abusive grandfather and mother who suffered bouts of psychosis. Not graphic, but still upsetting - Taxidermy is a main subject

2 taxidermy statues also get destroyed by humans

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A fire in a warehouse destroys a bunch of taxidermy statues. Narrator describes this in fair detail

kelseyland's review against another edition

dark mysterious medium-paced

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

4.5

An eco-thriller set in the near future, in which a security consultant turns detective to unravel the mystery left for her by a radical environmental activist. It's an unsettling, timely, and captivating book in which VanderMeer examines (among other things) the consequences of human action and apathy on the natural world.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Child abuse, Blood, and Murder

Moderate: Violence and Gore

Minor: Child death and Death of parent

sorryiambooked's review against another edition

dark informative mysterious tense slow-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? It's complicated

3.5

I don't even know where to start with this book.

When I looked up the author’s name to check spelling, I saw that under his Wikiepedia page, it says that he’s a part of the literary movement New Weird. Which is probably the most accurate thing I’ve read. VanderMeer excels at bringing a new level of interesting and weird in speculative fiction/ science fiction (even though I’ve only read two of his books so far, including Hummingbird).

The thing is, I didn’t love this book. It’s touted as an eco-thriller yet the thriller part wasn’t at the level that I personally prefer and enjoy. Hummingbird, I found, was a lot more subtle with the thriller aspects, playing the long game with the reader. Keeping me interested just enough to keep turning the page. Which tends to be more of a least favorite kind of thriller. Even though one of the twists was really good, I started to suspect about halfway through the book.

I also went in with a high level of expectation of the writing. When I read Annihilation, I was enamored with VanderMeer’s writing. This book, however, VanderMeer’s writing is more direct with shorter sentences and less awesome descriptive writing. Though I will acknowledge that having that kind of writing wouldn’t have fit into this book.

I did enjoy the commentary on how humans and our behavior, without bothering to realize, are slowly killing the Earth by ruining fragile and important ecosystems. Which in turn tends to make us more fragile and less likely to be able to adapt to major changes in our natural environment; where we don’t stand a chance when something like a pandemic hits. This book clearly was published at an interesting time and hits fairly close to home with current events. 
 

However, the whole of the book was too meandering for me. I didn’t much care for our MC “Jane Smith” and because of that I disliked the parts where she tells a story about her childhood; those parts rarely felt necessary to me and while meant to be a look into the characterization of Jane, I rarely cared.

Honestly, I think this is going to be one of those books where a reader will either enjoy it or not enjoy it. Even though I find myself in the middle, I’m not sure that the characters and overall plot matter so much as the social commentary that VanderMeer makes.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Murder, Physical abuse, and Violence

Minor: Car accident, Child death, and Death of parent