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grendel is the silliest little creature and i hate him <3
the prose was fucking insane too like what is this BOOK it was FASCINATING
the prose was fucking insane too like what is this BOOK it was FASCINATING
"Mama! Waa! Waaa!" I bellowed to the sky, the forest, the cliffs, until I was so weak from loss of blood I could barely wave my arms. "I'm going to die," I wailed. "Poor Grendel! Poor old Mama!" I wept and sobbed. "Poor Grendel will hang here and starve to death," I told myself, "and no one will ever even miss him!" The thought enraged me.
It's good at first to be out in the night, naked to the cold mechanics of the stars. Space hurls outward, falconswift, mounting like an irreversible injustice, a final disease. The cold night air is reality at last: indifferent to me as a stone face carved on a high cliff wall to show that the world is abandoned. So childhood too feels good at first, before one happens to notice the terrible sameness, age after age. I lie there resting in the steaming grass, the old lake hissing and gurgling behind me, whispering patterns of words my sanity resists.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Violence, Murder
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I didn't enjoy this book. Maybe it's been too long since I read Beowulf, or maybe I just had a hard time getting into chopped up, stream-of-consciousness writing style (that seems to come and go), but it was not a fun read. Grendel is a monster of old, this is true, and he is mad - as all monsters must be. But that's about where the sense of it stops.
It's hard to grasp any kind of coherence from the descriptions of the villagers' culture or religion. At times their religion is mentioned to be pantheistic, and at times their rituals sound overtly Christian. And for some reason, a monster who lives outside of these constructs has a particular and special hatred of women that shines through every time a woman is mentioned. At one point, he holds a woman upside down by her legs, splits them apart, and makes really disgusting commentary about her genitalia. I don't remember that in Beowulf, and I question the necessity of it here.
Overall, it is .... ok, I guess. Not for me.
It's hard to grasp any kind of coherence from the descriptions of the villagers' culture or religion. At times their religion is mentioned to be pantheistic, and at times their rituals sound overtly Christian. And for some reason, a monster who lives outside of these constructs has a particular and special hatred of women that shines through every time a woman is mentioned. At one point, he holds a woman upside down by her legs, splits them apart, and makes really disgusting commentary about her genitalia. I don't remember that in Beowulf, and I question the necessity of it here.
Overall, it is .... ok, I guess. Not for me.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Gore, Misogyny, Sexism, Violence, Blood, Murder
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Cursing, Death, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Grief, Stalking, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Dysphoria, Injury/Injury detail
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Contains spoilers: Grendel is a monster, literally. He is misunderstood, the townspeople hate him and he hates them. He likes to eat them, and watch them suffer. The townspeople also seem to dislike each other, and they certainly despise those from other towns. This book is just full of hate and unnecessary violence. It's gruesome and bloody. It is full of philosophical references and is written very well (hence the three stars). Maybe I didn't like it because it actually speaks the truth to a side of the world we live in, and I don't like that side either. Maybe it's personal preference, but I just wanted this novel to be done with.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gore, Blood, Injury/Injury detail
challenging
dark
funny
tense
fast-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
Content Warnings
Moderate: Gore
dark
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This is a great concept, but… It never felt connected to Beowulf. The language was all wrong, too modern. There was too much philosophy and politics.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Violence, Blood, Murder
Minor: Cursing
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
3/5
⚠️CW/TW: Murder, Gore, and Death⚠️
I didn't have high hope going into this book because I wasn't the biggest fan of Beowulf but I was pleasantly surprised with how much I enjoyed this book. I really liked seeing the progression of Grendel's personality and morals throughout it. This book kind of makes you sympathize with him but also makes you not like him at the same time. This book was also one of the first times I had ever annotated a book so as I was doing it I noticed alot of symbolism in the book and it was nice to see all of this compare to the Beowulf poem. I really like how it went more in depth with some of the other characters like Grendel's mom and the Dragon. I really ended up loving the Dragon even more than I did in the poem. I really enjoyed his chapter. I do want to say though there were a couple of chapters in this book I couldn't stand. One of them I didn't even completely finish because I just didn't like it all. Besides those few two chapters I did enjoy this book. It exceeded my expectations.
⚠️CW/TW: Murder, Gore, and Death⚠️
I didn't have high hope going into this book because I wasn't the biggest fan of Beowulf but I was pleasantly surprised with how much I enjoyed this book. I really liked seeing the progression of Grendel's personality and morals throughout it. This book kind of makes you sympathize with him but also makes you not like him at the same time. This book was also one of the first times I had ever annotated a book so as I was doing it I noticed alot of symbolism in the book and it was nice to see all of this compare to the Beowulf poem. I really like how it went more in depth with some of the other characters like Grendel's mom and the Dragon. I really ended up loving the Dragon even more than I did in the poem. I really enjoyed his chapter. I do want to say though there were a couple of chapters in this book I couldn't stand. One of them I didn't even completely finish because I just didn't like it all. Besides those few two chapters I did enjoy this book. It exceeded my expectations.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Gore, Murder
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Death, Gore, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Blood, Murder, Injury/Injury detail
adventurous
challenging
dark
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Grendel by John Gardener 4/5
A short, wonderfully weird interpretation of the monster Grendel from the Anglo-Saxon poem Beowulf. Looking back on this book, I DID enjoy it, but reading it is a slog at times, due to the rambling nature of the narrative. It attempts to be contemporary and deep by analyzing modern structures of power as they compare to feudal ones, as well as including a smattering of modern slang, but hearing an ancient dragon say "Fiddlesticks" did take me out of the narrative a bit. I loved the descriptions, the kennings, and the political drama, but I'm also a lover of the source material.
A short, wonderfully weird interpretation of the monster Grendel from the Anglo-Saxon poem Beowulf. Looking back on this book, I DID enjoy it, but reading it is a slog at times, due to the rambling nature of the narrative. It attempts to be contemporary and deep by analyzing modern structures of power as they compare to feudal ones, as well as including a smattering of modern slang, but hearing an ancient dragon say "Fiddlesticks" did take me out of the narrative a bit. I loved the descriptions, the kennings, and the political drama, but I'm also a lover of the source material.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Gore, Blood
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Gore, Sexual violence, Violence, Blood, Injury/Injury detail