Reviews tagging 'Drug abuse'

Affinity by Sarah Waters

5 reviews

dorynickel's review against another edition

dark mysterious slow-paced

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

4.0

I enjoyed this book so much! It hit all its marks: gothic but not overwrought, lusty but not erotic, intimate but not constricted, mysterious but not inscrutable.

Sometimes the characters seem not fully fleshed out, but then the two main characters' respective malleability and opaqueness are so intentional that I can't really take away points for this.

Above all, Waters' prose and storytelling are what makes this book stand out within the oft-derided "girly novel" genre. (Although it did take me a chapter or two to get used to the journal framing, with its varying syntaxes and mixed tenses.) I will admit that I didn't take this book seriously enough at first, and I was pleasantly surprised by the mastery with which Waters weaves the substance of the story and its candid prose together with the tropes inherent in its subject matter. Give yourself permission to take a sapphic Victorian Gothic mystery ghost novel seriously, and you're in for a real treat!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Mental illness, and Drug abuse

Moderate: Sexual assault and Suicide

Minor: Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, and Homophobia

horizonous's review against another edition

dark mysterious slow-paced

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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement

Moderate: Child death, Death of parent, Mental illness, Self harm, and Suicide

Minor: Cancer, Abortion, Blood, Drug abuse, Suicide attempt, Torture, Animal cruelty, Death, and Domestic abuse

◦ Drug abuse = Laudanum
◦ Mental illness = Anxiety, depression

sarah_i_jackson's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad slow-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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement

Moderate: Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, Addiction, and Drug abuse

Minor: Abortion

jonesmonster's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

This was darker and less tightly plotted than Fingersmith but I still loved it. It took me a few chapters to get into it but once I did I couldn't put it down. The central character veers from sympathetic and sensible to disastrously out of control of her life in a way that made it difficult to 'love' her but she definitely got under my skin.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Suicide, Suicidal thoughts, Child death, Addiction, Bullying, Drug abuse, Drug use, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Mental illness, Self harm, and Sexism

faesissa's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Drug use and Drug abuse