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august_18's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Death, Violence, and Blood
Moderate: Animal death, Child abuse, Gore, Pedophilia, Suicide, and Death of parent
Minor: Self harm, Vomit, and Abandonment
taelorrr's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Graphic: Incest
Minor: Blood and Vomit
jaedia's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Graphic: Animal death, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Incest, Mental illness, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Gaslighting, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Fatphobia, Incest, Pedophilia, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Vomit, Medical trauma, Car accident, Death of parent, Murder, Abandonment, and Alcohol
morganpearcy's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
0.5
Let me explain.
Things I enjoyed about the book:
- There’s an unexpected twist.
- It’s a quick read.
The scene where Anna yanks on Jude’s beard when he asks a dumbass question about why she thought beards were a liability in a fight. - There’s an attempt (albeit inadequate) at a feel-good ending.
Things I hated about the book:
- The ‘torture’ psychological, physical, etc was unimaginative, lacked creativity and was too phallic. Stop regurgitating TV show tropes and give us something real from your own darkness, dear author!
- From page 10, I was rooting for the ghost and was thinking it would be a nice story to read where the universe can meet out some justice. I was looking forward to Jude’s death with some serious bloodlust. But no - about 2/3 of the way through there’s a twist and guess what?
BOTH the ghost and the main character are, you guessed it - toxic freaking cishet men. There IS no one to root for. The women characters are woefully underdeveloped with zero personalities and I couldn’t root for any of them, either. This isn’t an antihero situation. The author is simply completely inadequate in attempting to make Jude a whole character. Read on for an explanation cuz I promised myself some bullet points. - The main character is underdeveloped and there are a lot of distracting incongruencias.
We jump from the intro of Jude as an eccentric musician with a flair for the macabre to Jude as caring but detached lover of barely-adult women to Jude as victim of childhood abuse to Jude as a dog lover who treats his pack like royalty, then back to Jude smashing piglets’ heads against the cement or shooting them with guns to live out a fantasy of patricide and focusing on how the pig’s heads sounded “like watermelons being smashed,” to defender of sexually abused women?! Then to man who would let their royal doggies be in pain in the back seat after having their legs smashed?? None of this did anything to develop the character. You can’t include those kinds of details without some development. Yet, the author wanted to see what stuck and threw everything at the wall when it came to Jude. - It’s not the point of the book, but the author simply doesn’t have the emotional scope, maturity or lived experience to write women SA survivors with any sort of depth or believability. Enough so that it’s distracting.
Like when Jude beats up Mary Beth’s childhood sexual abuser and Mary Beth comes back to the car and becomes physically affectionate with Jude right off the bat. I can’t speak for every SA Survivor - but I am a Survivor myself. All of the women in my life are SA Survivors excepting ONE. And I have NEVER seen that response from an actual survivor upon seeing their abuser. Especially for someone so young, who hasn’t gotten help. That response wasn’t realistic. It simply played into Jude’s toxic masc hero fantasy and what the author obviously thinks people WANT to see. When in reality it was so distractingly incongruous it made me want to plot the author’s actual murder. It was as if the author, recent to writing the book, had a woman or woman-aligning person in his life reveal that they’re an SA Survivor, he fantasized about his response in his head and then had to find a place to slap that into a story somewhere cuz he’s justice-impotent. - Again, the portrayal of women in general really exposes this author’s own implicit bias. I sincerely hope he doesn’t have a daughter. I don’t want to google it and find out. I’ll just hold on to hope.
- The ending was lackluster. Really,
both Jude and the ghost should have died. Terrible, awful deaths. The only satisfying ending would have been Mary Beth riding off into the sunset, free of Jude and at peace with her freedom and ready to get some life experience so she doesn’t make the same mistakes shacking up with toxic cishet men again.
In the end, this would have been much better as a short story culminating in several bloody deaths across the board. This was NOT a satisfying read. It wasn’t triggering. It wasn’t disturbing. It was like reading a teenage boy’s post-SVU fantasy stretched thin like butter scraped over too much bread. Go elsewhere for your horror fix. This ain’t it. .5⭐️ for potential that was never realized.
Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gore, Gun violence, Incest, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Medical trauma, Car accident, Suicide attempt, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail
dreamdoughnut's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- 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
Graphic: Death, Blood, and Murder
Moderate: Animal death, Child abuse, Cursing, Gore, Suicide, Violence, and Death of parent
Minor: Body horror, Drug use, Incest, Terminal illness, Vomit, and Car accident
jenna_justi2004's review against another edition
- 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
3.75
Graphic: Animal death, Death, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical trauma, Stalking, and Murder
pricklypear's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Graphic: Animal death and Blood
Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Suicide, Toxic relationship, and Suicide attempt
Minor: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, and Vomit