Reviews tagging 'Violence'

Just Like Home by Sarah Gailey

119 reviews

eliya's review

challenging dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• 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

4.0

fuck me, man. this was tough. i read this book just in time for a book club to discuss it, and i didn’t cry until the acknowledgements. 
sarah gailey’s writing is so incredibly intimate, a lot of reading this felt like guilt dripping down my back mixed with the cold nakedness of being alone with the words. 

pg. 320:
“We didn’t ask to be born, did we? We did t ask to have to soak up their sings and their expectations. All we ever did was love them, and all they ever did was hurt us.”
…”He loved us, though,” … “more than anything.”
“Oh, he loved us both as best as he could,” … “He tried to build us strong and steady and whole. But he didn’t keep us safe. He didn’t know how to shelter us from all the hurt that was waiting, because he thought that hurt was the shape of love.”

(personal reflection)  When my dad died, and after, I kept thinking of all the guilty memories I have, all the times I’d let him down. I didn’t get to know my dad as a whole human being before, but I know he loved us. My childhood sucked and I was abused and he did his best to love us. My mom could never understand what she did wrong, when we talked about her abuse, she just gave the reasoning that that’s how she thought to love us, that’s how you raise kids. My whole family thinks that love is the shape of hurt. 

 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Toxic friendship, Cursing, Death of parent, Toxic relationship, Body horror, Murder, Torture, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, and Panic attacks/disorders

Moderate: Physical abuse, Terminal illness, Violence, and Child abuse

Minor: Vomit

kingsteph's review

challenging dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Terminal illness, Murder, Kidnapping, Torture, Violence, Toxic relationship, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Vomit, Emotional abuse, Grief, and Gaslighting

ceruleanseas's review

dark emotional slow-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Bullying, Death, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Terminal illness, Torture, Violence, Abandonment, Child abuse, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, and Murder

oliviaclaire's review

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

2.25

Just Like Home has one of the longest buildups I've read in a while. You could probably start at page 100-125 and not have missed anything particularly vital to the story.  It drags so long that by the time the reveal is finally made at the end of the story I'd already been uninvested for too long to be pulled back into the ending. 

I also think I personally prefer horror stories where I can root for a hero or antihero but in this case Vera is utterly delusional and not at all likeable. The first of these issues is understandable but it means that the second causes real problems because I don't feel for her as a a character or want to excuse any of her bad behaviour.  I can't decide whether it's that Vera isn't written well enough for her ignorance about her father's justifications to read as sincere or whether she's supposed to be fully aware that she's spinning stories for herself. It also doesn't feature a complex father-daughter relationship at all. Vera's barely conflicted, she just idolises a serial killer. Only her relationship with her mum has much depth

and then we find out that that relationship isn't with her mother at all...

It feels like this book tries to do an awful lot. Every single character is not what they seem and no question that's raised has a remotely simple or straightforward answer. With so many mysteries unraveling all over the place in the second half of this book it's almost impossible for any of them to come to a full or satisfying conclusion.

Obviously, this story wasn't for me however I do want to commend Sarah Gailey's writing style. It's very atmospheric and her descriptions are very evocative. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Gore, and Violence

Moderate: Mental illness and Murder

brianna_moye's review

dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Death, Gore, and Body horror

Moderate: Blood and Violence

alarrabee's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Gore, Grief, and Terminal illness

Moderate: Abandonment, Mental illness, Child abuse, Murder, Torture, and Violence

Minor: Body horror, Bullying, Domestic abuse, and Physical abuse

schnaucl's review

challenging dark mysterious tense medium-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? It's complicated

4.0

This was well written, but not my favorite of Sarah Gailey's novels.

It was strange to me that even as a child Vera never once thought that murder was wrong.  I get that she thought her dad was saving the men he killed, but she was old enough to understand what murder was and that it was wrong.   And dealing with the tension between love of her father and what it would mean to turn him in might have been an interesting thing to explore.

I did think having the house as an actual physical thing that protected her (and needed protection in return) was interesting.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child abuse, Gore, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Emotional abuse, and Mental illness

bonniejpg's review

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Murder, Torture, Violence, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Death, and Child abuse

jessiejonesbentley's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Blood, Death, Stalking, Torture, Kidnapping, Murder, Bullying, Death of parent, Physical abuse, Violence, and Toxic relationship

brookey8888's review

dark mysterious 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

3.0

I just wanted more from this. 

It honestly was not even scary or really that creepy. The plot was fine, but I wanted a little more of the serial killer aspect and with a certain person( if you know you know). The ending of this was honestly so ridiculous and didn’t even make that much sense, but it was different. Overall this was fine and kept me entertained , but nothing special and nothing I’ll ever think about again to be honest. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Murder, Violence, Grief, Mental illness, Torture, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Body horror, and Kidnapping