Reviews tagging 'Blood'

How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu

11 reviews

heytaytay12's review

challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.25

Dark, disturbing, and deeply hopeful. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Pandemic/Epidemic, Terminal illness, Grief, Medical trauma, Blood, Medical content, Suicide, Death, Child death, and Death of parent

musicalpopcorn's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful reflective sad fast-paced

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

3.5

A collection of stories about people connected throughout a plague and its aftermath, How High We Go In the Dark is both dark and hopeful about humanity’s ability to persevere. 

I enjoyed the first half of this book more than I enjoyed the second half, but overall I liked the whole thing. The kind of dark surrealist stories about euthanasia parks and talking pigs were much more interesting to me than the ones that by contrast seemed like normal family dramas. I found all of the stories compelling however I also found that having every single main character feeling detached from their family got a little old after a while and made them feel like the same character every single time. 

This was a unique book with a one of a kind outlook on humanity. How it managed to be both so dark and depressing to ultimately hopeful was very well done. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Death of parent, Pandemic/Epidemic, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, and Chronic illness

Moderate: Cancer, Stalking, Suicide, Animal death, Blood, Colonisation, and Grief

taybug0001's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

One of the most intense books I’ve ever read. The characters’ stories are integrated in ways that make you feel like you need to read the book over and over again as not to miss a single thing. I can’t WAIT to read this again someday.

<SPOILER> Character Map:
1) 30,000 Years Beneath a Eulogy - Clara and her crystal pendant, Clara’s first Earth daughter, and Miki the artist

2) City of Laughter - Skip, Dorrie

3) Through the Garden of Memory - Everyone in this dark room was in a coma I think? We see memories of Clara and her first Earth daughter, and old Skip remembering Dorrie and Fitch (Ch 2), the lawyer Dan Paul (Ch 10), and the baby that was given a second chance at the end was Baba (Ch 13 Grave Friends).

I feel like there are more connections in this chapter but they went over my head.

4) Pig Son - Dorrie’s ex-husband

5) Elegy Hotel - Brian Yamato, his younger brother Dennis, and Dennis’s girlfriend Val who is later a passenger on the Yamato

6) Speak, Fetch, Say I Love You - robo-dog Hollywood that is later part of the shrine to deceased relatives (Ch 13 Grave Friends)

7) Songs of Your Decay - Laird who was the subject of one of Miki’s paintings?

8) Life Around the Event Horizon - Theresa (previously Clara) wears a crystal pendant and is married to Brian and is the one actually responsible for the Yamato

9) A Gallery a Century, a Cry, a Millennium - Miki and Dorrie paint the walls of the ship, Brian’s son and Val are also passengers

10) The Used-to-Be Party - Dan Paul the lawyer (Ch 3), Mabel the tattoo artist (Ch 12)

11) Melancholy Nights in a Tokyo Virtual Cafe - Ms. Takahashi also wears a crystal pendant and is looking for her mother. We later learn that she’s Nuri (Clara’s first daughter before Earth)

12) Before You Melt into the Sea - Mabel the tattoo artist and Dan Paul the lawyer (Ch 3, 10)

13) Grave Friends - Baba has memories of being a baby crawling through people (Ch 3), Hollywood is an old robo-dog from a great-great aunt

14) The Scope of Possibility - We learn Clara, Theresa, and the mother of the Siberian girl are the same person and the one who created Earth. She is searching for her daughter Nuri on Earth. She doesn’t know her daughter is Ms. Takahasi (Ch 11) who is also searching for her! </SPOILER>

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Content Warnings

Minor: Chronic illness, Suicide, Child death, Blood, Animal death, Cancer, Death, Death of parent, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Terminal illness

arlaubscher's review

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

atamano's review against another edition

adventurous emotional sad medium-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content, Death of parent, Grief, Animal death, Domestic abuse, Child death, and Death

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Blood, and Cancer

Minor: Abandonment

singrequiem's review

emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

If you want to be  emotionally devastated in just the most beautiful way over and over again - then this is the book for you. Gorgeous.  I may come back and finish this when I am emotionally stable enough to really give it the proper review it deserves.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cancer, Pandemic/Epidemic, Child death, Medical trauma, Death, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Chronic illness, Grief, and Terminal illness

Moderate: Suicide, Violence, Addiction, Animal death, Suicide attempt, Blood, Vomit, Suicidal thoughts, and Murder

Minor: Classism and Colonisation

There are graphic descriptions of decomposition and bodily changes in a detached, clinical way. (Alongside less detached scenes)

emmonsannae's review

challenging dark hopeful reflective sad fast-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? Yes

3.75

Not sure whether to give this book a 2 or a 5—it’s brilliant and I largely did not enjoy it. The main theme (and the one from which the novel gets its name) is the lengths to which humans are able to stretch to form community and help each other, and the ways all living things are interrelated over time and space. The main subject matter is inherently distressing, though, resulting in a beautiful book that is phenomenally executed and which I hope I never have to read again.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Terminal illness, Animal death, Body horror, Cancer, Child death, Death of parent, Medical content, Chronic illness, Death, Grief, Abandonment, and Animal cruelty

Moderate: Drug use, Alcohol, Blood, Mental illness, Infidelity, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, and Vomit

dnlrbchd's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Medical content, and Terminal illness

Moderate: Grief, Pregnancy, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide

ivana's review

challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.0

Beautifully written. A lot sadder than I expected, but definitely could have been more queer. As with all books that contain short stories, some were a  bit of a miss and some were really good.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Confinement, Death, Medical content, Terminal illness, Blood, Child death, Chronic illness, Vomit, Cancer, Cursing, Death of parent, Drug use, and Grief

bookishplantmom's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

5.0

I went into this book completely blind. All I knew about it was the title. So I was surprised to find that it was a collection of short stories about a pandemic. I was taken aback and genuinely unsure about continuing but after just a story or two I couldn’t stop. The collection presents a series of slice of life vignettes following a range of characters and moments through a global health crisis. This is incredibly beautifully written and gripping. It is grim and heart wrenching most of the time but also compelling. I thought the author wove together stories which became increasingly speculative in such a way that it took a moment to recall that this wasn’t real. The characters and the the world building were very convincing  and indeed I found myself lost in them fully believing that this may well be a future we face as a species. I thought the final slice of life story was a fantastic way of ending the book. This was a tour de force of writing. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Child death, Terminal illness, Medical content, Grief, Death of parent, Chronic illness, Cancer, Blood, and Ableism