Reviews tagging 'Grief'

Alone by Barbara De Smedt

5 reviews

havefa1th's review against another edition

dark emotional 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? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Racism, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Stalking, Death of parent, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Medical content

roachquesadilla's review

dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

4.25

The acknowledgement!!! I almost didn’t read it but I’m so glad I did. Holy crap!!!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Medical trauma, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail

ruminant's review

challenging dark sad tense fast-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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Stalking, and Sexual harassment

Moderate: Alcoholism, Confinement, Death, Panic attacks/disorders, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Kidnapping, Grief, and Death of parent

Minor: Sexual content, Vomit, Medical content, Abortion, and Fire/Fire injury

rainbowfairie's review

challenging dark emotional 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 read this book in about two days because I wanted to see what happened. It does a good job of keeping you on your toes and interested. I enjoyed the writing and dialogue. There was strong character development. I enjoyed that the book jumped between past and present timeline to give perspective and background. That being said, I feel the ending was rather abrupt compared to the pace of the rest of the book. The chapters toward the end when

the husband is grieving are very choppy and disjointed, which I believe was the author’s way of showing how dissociated and depressed he was.

I was most disappointed by the way the book ended.

Call me a romantic but I wanted some form of resolution to this sad ending. Ending with the antagonist stalking the daughter made me angry lol. I will say, I thought it was a nice twist of fate that the author wrote in the car accident and the fire to have been connected and that Oscar and Julie were perhaps destined to play out this tragedy as the Fates had irreversibly woven the strands of Oscar and Julie’s lives together in that night.

The abrupt ending made me immediately want to read the next book, which appears to only be available in Dutch. If it releases in English I am unsure if I will read it.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Stalking, Car accident, Abortion, Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Abandonment

Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence

laurareads_bcn's review

dark 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

3.75

Did not expect the end. The story was great, and fast enough to not get bored.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Emotional abuse, Gore, Torture, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Alcohol