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Reviews tagging 'Domestic abuse'

Das Beste sind die Augen by Monika Kim

14 reviews

dark emotional sad tense fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

4.75 STARS

This was such a brilliantly executed horror book. It was a fast paced decent into madness, and I couldn't keep my eyes away from it. A lot of the themes, especially about mother-daughter relationships, hit very close to home for me. I could understand Ji-Won's seething anger towards the world around her, even if by the end of the book, she was unrecognizable due to her descent to madness.

The plot twist at the end was crazy. By that final page, my jaw was left wide open. If you are a fan of shocking body horror and the types of stories where you watch someone's descent into madness, you will absolutely love this book. 

Expand filter menu Content Warnings
dark tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Expand filter menu Content Warnings
dark emotional tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

A wild ride, starts slow and speeds up. I appreciate that while there was gore, it was never overly gratuitous and by no means is it on every page. A really amazing horror debut from Monika Kim, and despite being horror manages to insert meaningful commentary. For anyone on the fence, if you can handle descriptive gore and aren’t too squeamish, I’d really recommend this one. 

Expand filter menu Content Warnings
adventurous challenging dark emotional funny informative mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Thank you netgalley, Monika Kim and Kensington Books, Erewhon Books for the arc of The Eyes are the Best Part.

This was a great, fun quick, gory read of Ji- Won and her increasing obsession of blue eyes after she tastes her first fish eye at home. The narrative was medium paced at the beginning picking up to a fast pace from half way through the book. The descriptive gore when Ji-won starts realising she's addicted to eyes is well done, because it's added with the dread and the build up of the obsession.

I feel that this book also tackles loss, grief, mental heath and abuse very well. The Korean culture and expectations was interweaved within the narrative beautifully and made for a wonderful tense read. Would love to see this released into the audiobook world! 

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