Reviews tagging 'Animal cruelty'

'Salem's Lot by Stephen King

27 reviews

caitlin1066's review against another edition

dark 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? No

3.5

I didn’t really like Misery so I was quite nervous to read another Stephen King book, especially with the amount of pages that Salem’s Lot has. But I actually enjoyed it, the middle part of the book especially. Unfortunately, I do feel as though the end is rather lacklustre and the last 150 pages or so are rather boring, but it was still an enjoyable read with some scary moments in.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse and Death

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Gore, Death, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, and Murder

miagw962's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.5

There is no life here but the slow death of days, and so when the evil falls on the town, its coming seems almost preordained, sweet and morphic. It is almost as though the town knows the evil was coming and the shape it would take.

My third Stephen King book and one of his popular ones - had no idea what to expect getting into this one only to find out it was VAMPIRES which is great because I read Dracula and loved it (I need to get more into vampire stories I think). This was really great; a little long and strenuous but the characters King creates feel so real and their fears become my own. The sense of atmosphere built up around the town itself was so interesting and not something you come across a lot in fiction about monsters. It was really set up to be a haunted house story but ended up being about vampires which was cool. I love how the three Stephen King books I've read utilise the monsters as metaphors, usually for a loss of innocence or childhood trauma. It's super thought-provoking but I will not get into it now because I need to be in the right headspace. But yeah, this was fun!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Death, and Body horror

Moderate: Child death, Gore, Death of parent, and Child abuse

jaedia's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.25

 Took much too long to get going though King's writing has a way of making nothing seem readable. There were pages that simply detailed what different families were having for dinner. While I can respect this was to effectively show the slow death of the town, some of it was just boring. Also would be remiss not to mention the sheer amount of homophobic slurs in the book. And this was clearly written when King had a very bleak outlook of the world.

That all said, I did enjoy reading it. The writing was enjoyable, the story compelling, and the dread creeping. A nice dark vampire horror story of a town's slow, sleepy, bloodcurdling death. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Animal death, Blood, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Toxic relationship, and Violence

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Bullying, Classism, Transphobia, Suicide, Sexism, Rape, Physical abuse, Medical content, Injury/Injury detail, Infidelity, Homophobia, Grief, Gore, Fire/Fire injury, and Gaslighting

georgiaaa's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Gore, Animal death, and Death

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Alcoholism, Homophobia, Rape, Infidelity, and Sexual violence

Minor: Fire/Fire injury

mojavetent's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Gore, Murder, Physical abuse, Violence, Child abuse, and Death of parent

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Car accident, Alcohol, Alcoholism, and Cursing

Minor: Rape, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence

catsy2022's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.0

 Rating: A

This edition of the book includes: two supplementary stories and deleted passages from the book. 
One about a duo drinking in a bar when a man stumbles in during a snow storm. His wife and daughter are still in their car and they've crashed into a snow bank.
The second is about the history of Jerusalem's Lot and the familial Boone connection. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Murder, and Violence

Moderate: Child abuse

Minor: Animal cruelty and Animal death

seanajk's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Minor: Blood, Body horror, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Excrement, Gore, Grief, Infidelity, Medical content, Murder, Racial slurs, Rape, Violence, Gun violence, Homophobia, Kidnapping, Bullying, Alcoholism, Animal death, Animal cruelty, Car accident, and Cursing