Reviews tagging 'Confinement'

How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu

16 reviews

otakatoe3's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic, Medical content, Medical trauma, Murder, Pregnancy, Cancer, Abandonment, Infidelity, Chronic illness, Child death, Death, Racism, Terminal illness, Confinement, and Grief

st_ender's review against another edition

hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? N/A
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Last part sort of let me down but it's still a hit

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death of parent, Terminal illness, Animal death, Medical content, Death, Grief, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Medical trauma and Body horror

Minor: Chronic illness, Confinement, Cancer, Pregnancy, Body shaming, and Suicide

Extensive discussion of euthanasia, and anything that can possibly happen to a person once they die.

foldingthepage_kayleigh's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

This novel is a collection of short vignettes, following interconnected characters through their experiences with dying and death, of the people and animals around them and of the world. 

I’ve been sitting on this review for awhile because I’ve needed to collect myself and my thoughts after this depressing read. Almost grotesque in its depictions of grief, I found myself crying in horror at almost every chapter. This book reminded me a lot of Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel, but even more bleak and realistic.

Overall, I think this book adds something interesting to the sci-fi genre in its speculations about death industries, and to be able to give impactful characterizations in just one chapter each is impressive. I’d recommend this book to those who like well-written books that will make you feel emotionally intense, and who find medical/sci-fi/space to be intriguing.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, Suicidal thoughts, Confinement, Vomit, Death, Death of parent, Child death, Medical content, Pandemic/Epidemic, Terminal illness, Grief, and Classism

torismazarine's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful reflective sad 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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Death of parent, Cancer, Confinement, Death, Pregnancy, Child death, Grief, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Medical content

Moderate: Confinement, Animal cruelty, Animal death, and Dementia

Minor: Abandonment, Pregnancy, Classism, and Murder

arlaubscher's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Blood, Cancer, Child death, Death, Pregnancy, Terminal illness, Pandemic/Epidemic, Animal death, Chronic illness, Death of parent, Body horror, Medical content, and Suicide

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Classism, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Cursing, Medical trauma, Miscarriage, Dementia, Confinement, Mental illness, Gore, and Infertility

augie_'s review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• 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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic and Child death

Moderate: Medical content, Pregnancy, Death, Death of parent, Grief, Confinement, War, Violence, and Xenophobia

lpdx's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death of parent, Grief, Mental illness, Classism, Confinement, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Suicidal thoughts, Chronic illness, Suicide, Medical content, Medical trauma, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Terminal illness

Moderate: Animal cruelty and Forced institutionalization

Minor: Abandonment, Colonisation, Excrement, Pregnancy, and Vomit

jhbandcats's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful informative mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.5

Beautiful book about humanity and its possibilities. Each chapter is a separate short story and all the stories are subtly interwoven. It’s fun figuring out how each new chapter’s characters relate to those from earlier chapters. 

The book explores people’s response to the disaster of a world-wide ancient plague that kills millions; it’s more about how the people face the challenges and grow rather than an exploration of the plague itself. So well-written that the words just flow smoothly. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Forced institutionalization, Medical trauma, and Pandemic/Epidemic

jazhandz's review against another edition

DNF at 35%. This is one part personal (I thought I was ready to read a pandemic book, turns out I’m not even when that pandemic is wildly far-fetched) and two parts about the book (I read the first four chapters/interconnected stories and it felt like reading the same thing four times).

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic, Child death, and Grief

Moderate: Body horror, Confinement, Medical content, Terminal illness, and Death

Minor: Animal death

lilifane's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

What a fascinating concept. I really love these kinds of works. 
This is basically a short story collection in which each story is connected to the others in some way. These might be just little references to things we've read before, or deeper connections you only figure out later. And that's actually my favorite sort of short story collection. 
All of these stories were also connected by recurring themes. Most prevalent life, death and grief. But also love, family and friendship. Additionally, very story was tied to a pandemic outbreak at the beginning of the book and how this event influenced the way people live and die in the future. The stories itself were little glimpses in the lives of their protagonists. We only get to see a small part of a specific time in their lives, and to me, every story felt very personal and intimate. You see how these people struggle, but also change the lives of others around them in small and big ways. 
But it was definitely a very bleak and depressing read for the majority of the book. With a little bit of hope sprinkled into it. It was hard to read sometimes, and it took me longer than expected, just because I needed breaks to do something fun in between the stories. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, Cancer, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Death of parent, Grief, Abandonment, Confinement, Medical content, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Terminal illness