Reviews tagging 'Death of parent'

The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski

3 reviews

7hunder's review

adventurous challenging dark fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual assault, Xenophobia, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Grief, Incest, Murder, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Domestic abuse, Sexual harassment, Slavery, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Abortion, Drug abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Pedophilia, Animal death, Infidelity, Miscarriage, Infertility, Religious bigotry, Sexual violence, Cursing, Death, Gore, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Sexual content, Pregnancy, and Torture

jewelkr's review

dark sad tense slow-paced

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

2.5

My adult kid gave me this book as a birthday present because we enjoyed watching the Netflix series together.  This is one of the cases when the moving image production is better than the book.  I'd like to say it's because the stories were written in the previous century by a boomer male and obviously men's opinions of women/people have changed so much since then but regrettably  I can't - women's lives are still a full of  inequity and fear.  I will say that the people who produced the series addressed a lot of the absolutely disgusting misogyny in the book, as well as restringing the story in a cohesive manner and giving Geralt a personality.  Reading one account after another of what a woman (always referred to as a "girl" by the author) looks like, whether she passes the male-imposed standard for attractiveness, the incredible, cliche'ed detail of their breast-enhancing, thigh-revealing, hip thrusting outifts (compared to the male characters of whom very little is said about what they wear), the sexualization of the fight scenes between the Witcher and his female foes (always thighs and breasts exposed during a viscous fight to the death), the opening scene of an actual girl sexually attacking the Witcher in his sleep as part of her priestess training - it was all so gross that I had a hard time processing the stories behind these disturbing revelations of what men think when they see women.  The stories were interesting, although I was hoping for more of Geralt's back story, and you have to keep in mind that these stories preceded the Game of Thrones celebrity not to find them kind of hackneyed.  Sadly, no matter what male writers imagine, women are always relegated to one of three roles - virgin or girl I'd like to have sex with, whore or in this case demon, and female bringing beverages to men.  If we are imagining a different world, couldn't we fantasize something different for the women for change?

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Death, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Sexual harassment, War, Fatphobia, Kidnapping, Sexism, Sexual violence, Torture, Blood, Body shaming, Death of parent, Body horror, Sexual assault, and Sexual content

freddie_mewcury's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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? Yes

3.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood, Death of parent, Racism, Sexism, Violence, Adult/minor relationship, and Rape