Reviews tagging 'Death'

A Dreadful Splendor by B.R. Myers

20 reviews

prettiestwhistles's review

adventurous emotional hopeful mysterious fast-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Confinement, Mental illness, Death, Alcoholism, and Murder

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Child abuse, Classism, Gaslighting, Grief, Alcohol, Misogyny, Terminal illness, Police brutality, Pregnancy, Injury/Injury detail, Abandonment, Bullying, Suicidal thoughts, Infidelity, and Sexism

Minor: Blood, Incest, Miscarriage, Dementia, and Medical content

Several characters are described as "mad," including one encountered directly in the narrative. While her condition is never specified, she experiences auditory hallucinations and is killed while trying to murder the protagonist. The narrator attributes the violence to her illness.

laura_awkward_fox's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Body horror, Death, and Murder

Minor: Miscarriage

mary_trot's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Murder

Moderate: Alcoholism and Mental illness

clarabooksit's review against another edition

dark mysterious medium-paced

• 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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Mental illness

Moderate: Blood, Grief, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Suicide, Sexism, Death, and Classism

Minor: Incest and Slavery

mattiedancer's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.5

Writing: 3⭐️/5 

The writing in this novel is fine. Near the end – or the further I got into the book – the more Myers seemed to find a writing flow. However, a couple chapters or so into the book, I realized that several paragraphs were formatted nearly the same length with sentences of exactly (or nearly exactly) the same length with the same rhythm. Once I noticed this, it was hard to keep reading as it gave a very boring, dry sound to every piece of action, despite the story being utterly compelling. Eventually, this kind of fell away, but it never fully left, and it really struck me as quite hard to continue reading.

Characters: 3.5⭐️/5

Alright, so the characters are interesting, but also inconsistent at various points. I felt like some of the backstory was thrown in almost too conveniently and it gave a lack of polish to the characters. However, I did find our MC and our main love interest compelling and – as the story continued – they grew nicely (if conveniently) enough to keep me engaged and happy.

Plot: 4⭐️/5 

The plot started strong. We have a crooked medium who robs her clients in order to pay her rent. We have a conveniently rich man who has need of her fake services. And we have a murder – or suicide? – that we need to solve. Compelling, right? I loved the main plot. For as predictable as some turns were, it remained fun and fresh in feeling enough to keep me thoroughly engaged. However, my main gripe is with the ending, which felt like way too much, too soon. For some reason, Myers chose to use about the final 20-30 pages to wrap up every little thread possible – including several that really should have been left alone. The overwriting of the ending was hard to deal with, especially after a fun journey.

Who Should Read This Book? 

• Fans of fantasy and mystery novels
• Fans of mystery novels looking for a fresh plot
• Fans of historical mystery novels with a side dish of romance
• Readers of the above persuasion looking for plot overwriting

Content Warnings? 

Murder, gaslighting, mental illness, stalking, police brutality (minor), child abuse, death, pregnancy, miscarriage, incest, violence, injury, injury detail, blood, grief, gore, confinement, drowning, infidelity, toxic relationship, misogyny, sexism, slavery (minor), emotional abuse, physical abuse, suicide, animal death (minor)

Post-Reading Rating:  3.5⭐️/5

Oh, if only it hadn’t tried to wrap up every tiny thread in the last bit of the novel, I could have loved it so much more.

Final Rating: 3.5⭐️/5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Death, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Miscarriage, Toxic relationship, Violence, Infidelity, Incest, Misogyny, Murder, Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Sexism, Stalking, Blood, Child abuse, Grief, Suicide, Gore, Mental illness, and Pregnancy

Minor: Animal death, Police brutality, and Slavery

aturb92's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

• 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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Vomit, Death of parent, Alcoholism, Suicidal thoughts, and Death

Minor: Miscarriage

lilacs_book_bower's review

dark mysterious medium-paced

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

4.25

Even though I correctly guessed every revelation to this mystery, I still really enjoyed it!  The characterization was nice, the story moved along at a good clip, our heroine was smart and independent, but it didn't feel cliche.  I think people probably could have figured out the mystery for themselves a bit sooner.  Spoiler about the villainous plan:

Did they really think no one would recognize her when they came back?  I don't think they thought things through very well./

. Also, I have some quibbles about the way the author wrote inheritance and entailment issues.  There were a couple times where I thought, "I don't think that is right?"  They took me out of the story momentarily, but I was able to move past them to enjoy the story.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Confinement, Death, Gore, and Injury/Injury detail

bessadams's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Confinement, Death, and Murder

Moderate: Gun violence, Death of parent, Police brutality, Classism, Violence, Suicidal thoughts, Pregnancy, Infidelity, Grief, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Alcoholism, and Animal death

Minor: Mental illness and Miscarriage

katieconrad's review

dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Infidelity, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Blood, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Pregnancy, Medical content, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Violence, Alcohol, Murder, Vomit, Miscarriage, and Alcoholism

Minor: Animal death and Incest

blewballoon's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• 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

4.0

I had low expectations for this book, and then I found myself getting super into it. I listened to it on audiobook (good narrator) and I found myself wanting to get back to it and thinking about it when I wasn't listening. Sometimes with audiobooks my mind drifts and I miss things, but I was laser focused and trying to piece all the information together and make deductions and predictions. I was happy I figured some stuff out, but there were also a couple twists that I enjoyed. There was a twist towards the end that kind of ruined the story a bit for me

I understand the dramatic irony of having the main character fooled into thinking there is a ghost when she has been peddling false ones herself, but I always prefer my stories to have actual supernatural stuff rather than just "maybe supernatural, oh just kidding."

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I also was really sad at what happened to Audra's character. I wish she hadn't just flipped a switch and gone so violent so suddenly. It was a bit foreshadowed with her family history, but it felt too out of character with the rest of her story.

, but the following events and epilogue helped make up for it, so I wasn't too disappointed and still came away with an overall positive experience. Great spooky seaside estate vibes, lots of twists and mysteries, very suspenseful. Nothing super graphic happens on the page. The main character was fairly clever and observant

although I feel like she dropped the ball/picked up the idiot ball a few times

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The romance was actually decent, I liked them together.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Violence and Death

Minor: Mental illness, Murder, Miscarriage, Suicide, and Pregnancy