Reviews tagging 'Animal cruelty'

'Salem's Lot by Stephen King

24 reviews

kaimetcalfe's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense slow-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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Murder, Physical abuse, Rape, Child abuse, Gore, Medical content, Violence, Child death, Misogyny, Domestic abuse, Gun violence, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Animal cruelty, Car accident, and Sexism

Moderate: Excrement, Cancer, War, Adult/minor relationship, Drug use, Pedophilia, Grief, and Suicidal thoughts

gflechas's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

The book is strongly influenced by Bram Stoker's Dracula, and is pretty transparent about it in the into. I walked away feeling like I listened to "Steven King does Dracula" which for me was a positive. King goes his own direction with the ideas and makes them his own. I had fun and would recommend it, though there is not the same hope to be found in Salem's Lot as was found for Mr. Harker and his band of heros.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, Sexual violence, Addiction, Suicide, Domestic abuse, Body horror, Blood, Drug abuse, Rape, Violence, and Homophobia

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Sexual content, and Sexual assault

kpbooks's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Misogyny, and Homophobia

alexashabit's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal cruelty and Animal death

Minor: Homophobia, Rape, and Racial slurs

spoookycat's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Violence, Animal death, Gore, Child abuse, Death of parent, and Death

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Sexual assault, Alcoholism, and Rape

Minor: Fire/Fire injury

shieldbearer's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense 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

Excellent writing, and the slow pace is absolutely a plus- like building an intricate domino structure before knocking it all down. Found myself particularly attached to Mark. King has a knack for portraying humanity at its most grotesque that is more fascinating than his monsters. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Blood, Car accident, Grief, Sexual content, Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Classism, Cursing, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Infidelity, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Murder, Physical abuse, and Violence

Moderate: Fatphobia, Ableism, Islamophobia, Transphobia, War, Bullying, Medical content, Racism, Racial slurs, Homophobia, and Vomit

Minor: Excrement, Addiction, Rape, Pedophilia, and Abortion

baudi_moovan's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Animal death, Child abuse, Death of parent, Stalking, Violence, Bullying, Child death, Suicide, Gore, Alcoholism, Grief, Infidelity, Kidnapping, Murder, Animal cruelty, Death, and Domestic abuse

caitlin1066's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.5

I didn’t really like Misery so I was quite nervous to read another Stephen King book, especially with the amount of pages that Salem’s Lot has. But I actually enjoyed it, the middle part of the book especially. Unfortunately, I do feel as though the end is rather lacklustre and the last 150 pages or so are rather boring, but it was still an enjoyable read with some scary moments in.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse and Death

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Gore, Death, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, and Murder

miagw962's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.5

There is no life here but the slow death of days, and so when the evil falls on the town, its coming seems almost preordained, sweet and morphic. It is almost as though the town knows the evil was coming and the shape it would take.

My third Stephen King book and one of his popular ones - had no idea what to expect getting into this one only to find out it was VAMPIRES which is great because I read Dracula and loved it (I need to get more into vampire stories I think). This was really great; a little long and strenuous but the characters King creates feel so real and their fears become my own. The sense of atmosphere built up around the town itself was so interesting and not something you come across a lot in fiction about monsters. It was really set up to be a haunted house story but ended up being about vampires which was cool. I love how the three Stephen King books I've read utilise the monsters as metaphors, usually for a loss of innocence or childhood trauma. It's super thought-provoking but I will not get into it now because I need to be in the right headspace. But yeah, this was fun!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Death, and Body horror

Moderate: Child death, Gore, Death of parent, and Child abuse

jaedia's review

challenging dark mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.25

 Took much too long to get going though King's writing has a way of making nothing seem readable. There were pages that simply detailed what different families were having for dinner. While I can respect this was to effectively show the slow death of the town, some of it was just boring. Also would be remiss not to mention the sheer amount of homophobic slurs in the book. And this was clearly written when King had a very bleak outlook of the world.

That all said, I did enjoy reading it. The writing was enjoyable, the story compelling, and the dread creeping. A nice dark vampire horror story of a town's slow, sleepy, bloodcurdling death. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Animal death, Blood, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Toxic relationship, and Violence

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Bullying, Classism, Transphobia, Suicide, Sexism, Rape, Physical abuse, Medical content, Injury/Injury detail, Infidelity, Homophobia, Grief, Gore, Fire/Fire injury, and Gaslighting