Reviews tagging 'Child death'

The Salt Grows Heavy by Cassandra Khaw

220 reviews

eddieboy's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Medical trauma, Cannibalism, Body horror, Medical content, Child abuse, and Child death

kit_kat_snac's review

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-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? It's complicated

3.5

I did not like this book at the start. It uses some difficult language but after I got used to it I got more into it. By the end I was invested and it did not go where I expected. It took about half the book to get into though because it is shorter. If you want a short interesting read with a nonbinary character I recommend. It was definitely a bit of horror and a bit of mystery. Not my favorite ever but pretty solid.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Cannibalism, Gore, and Violence

Moderate: Emotional abuse and Physical abuse

It can be pretty dark and there are child deaths in here but it is important to the plot

laelolou's review

dark mysterious fast-paced

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Body horror, and Child death

lady_dariya's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

3.5

Holy body horror batman, check the warnings before embarking!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, Violence, Medical content, Body horror, Child death, Blood, Gore, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Murder

meagan123's review

adventurous dark fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cannibalism, Violence, Blood, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, and Gore

Moderate: Animal death

Minor: Abandonment and Pregnancy

anderska1011's review

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Child abuse, Child death, Cannibalism, Gore, Body horror, and Blood

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury and Domestic abuse

dearestdaisies's review

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? N/A

Choosing to not give a star rating because I honestly don't know how I feel about the book, and partially that is on me. Horror is a genre I don't really read, and I can recognize when I'm not the intended audience. It feels unfair to knock off points for something that is clearly not for me.  

But I can at least somewhat review the contents of the book. I think the prose is really beautiful, and suits the dark setting well. Eerie and strange, in a good way, but it's also far too complex to follow along easily. Or at least, that's how I personally felt. I literally did not understand a good portion of what I was reading, and often had to look up words. Sometimes, multiples times on a single page, maybe even a paragraph. At some point I just stopped doing that because it was really distracting, and broke immersion from the story. I feel like I would have enjoyed this book way more if I understood what I was reading.

I'm thankful this is a novella, but oddly enough I think the plot and the characters (mainly the Mermaid and the Plague Doctor) would really benefit from more development. It feels like a lot of the plot happened just because it could.

As a forewarning to future readers, in terms of content warning there's some detailed gore/murder in the book, along with detailed medical dissection. These sections didn't phase me since the usage of overly complex language made it hard to follow along the gore-y scenes, but it might disturb some if you can visualize text as you read. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Medical content, Murder, Cannibalism, and Child death

pich's review

adventurous dark mysterious reflective tense fast-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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Gore, and Body horror

hendrixpants's review against another edition

adventurous challenging mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Death, Child death, and Violence

fictionalfelinefanatic's review

adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Short, intense haunting story that jumps right into the dark world of what we would say are mermaids but gies so much deeper. Listening as an audiobook, it's a delight as the author is clearly a wordsmith and able to pull you into this dark and vicious world where  no one is safe including children and even.more disturbing still the children are dangerous. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Body horror, Child death, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, and Death