Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.46 AVERAGE
3.46 AVERAGE
5* for the way it is written and 4* for overall enjoyment. It is everything I want; gothic, well written, unpredictable, short story intertwining narrative and hard work. It's such a claustrophobic novel and sometimes I think it pushed it too far and lost clarity, especially when the sentences were so beautiful. It's so good! I'd say the low ratings are because it's slow fabulist literary fiction rather than horror - the twist, while amazing, doesn't really matter - more the characters are the point of this book.
Quietly twisted, to horrifying, to bitterly sad, with the most fitting ending I never expected. What a perfect horror story. It left me perfectly unsettled just as it should have. Exceptional on every level. My favorite read of the year.
(For those of you who are sensitive to animal cruelty, skip a few pages when rabbits are mentioned. It's not graphic, but the details are haunting enough for me to wish I could unread.)
(For those of you who are sensitive to animal cruelty, skip a few pages when rabbits are mentioned. It's not graphic, but the details are haunting enough for me to wish I could unread.)
Iris Villarca, a 11-year-old, is a descendant of two powerfully cursed family lines, and is now protected by her father to ensure her survival. He prepares a set of rules for Iris, which are simple, clear, easy to memorize, as any Villarca who fails to follow the rules will have to face her. Things tumble down when Iris isn't able to see sense in her father's rules, which seemed absurd, silly and stupid.
Rawblood is a gothic thriller, set back in the 19th and 20th century, written with multiple POVs on multiple timelines. An exquisite read. The chapters were neatly packed, the order of the plot was precisely managed, the ultimate revelation was slow, true, hitting straight to heart. More importantly, the characters were brilliant, multi dimensional, varying, with reasonings, judgements, righteousness, crimes and a disturbing past clinging to their sleeve. Every characters were connected, interlinked, making the reading get interesting slowly and steadily as the plot progressed.
Since the book was written about the Victorian era, the labourious effort on the author's part was visible, satisfactory and a much appreciable work of art. Right from the medical terminologies, or the livelihood of people around then, or the women's life and men's life having different effects on their choices, everything was crafted with so much research.
The plot was carried away neatly, and I enjoyed the reveal even when I was able to detect it a bit earlier than I assumed to be. However, it seemed slightly disappointing to think 'the great reveal' didn't give much needed justification for the things that had happened to the Villarca family.
One of the huge flaws of the book was the writing style. It was overly flowery, too poetic, filled with too many words that were written to obscure the plot, and obscured the essence of my reading experience. If this was a literary achievement, I would have read a dictionary rather to read a story. I wanted to know, feel, experience and imagine, not to indulge in cramped up sentences with too many unnecessary words. If one could get over this, the book is an absolute delight with the story, characters, and plot execution.
Rawblood is a gothic thriller, set back in the 19th and 20th century, written with multiple POVs on multiple timelines. An exquisite read. The chapters were neatly packed, the order of the plot was precisely managed, the ultimate revelation was slow, true, hitting straight to heart. More importantly, the characters were brilliant, multi dimensional, varying, with reasonings, judgements, righteousness, crimes and a disturbing past clinging to their sleeve. Every characters were connected, interlinked, making the reading get interesting slowly and steadily as the plot progressed.
Since the book was written about the Victorian era, the labourious effort on the author's part was visible, satisfactory and a much appreciable work of art. Right from the medical terminologies, or the livelihood of people around then, or the women's life and men's life having different effects on their choices, everything was crafted with so much research.
The plot was carried away neatly, and I enjoyed the reveal even when I was able to detect it a bit earlier than I assumed to be. However, it seemed slightly disappointing to think 'the great reveal' didn't give much needed justification for the things that had happened to the Villarca family.
One of the huge flaws of the book was the writing style. It was overly flowery, too poetic, filled with too many words that were written to obscure the plot, and obscured the essence of my reading experience. If this was a literary achievement, I would have read a dictionary rather to read a story. I wanted to know, feel, experience and imagine, not to indulge in cramped up sentences with too many unnecessary words. If one could get over this, the book is an absolute delight with the story, characters, and plot execution.
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I just don’t want to have to try this hard to get through and understand a book
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐
Genre: Horror
Rawblood is the story of Iris Villarca. An eleven-year-old girl who lives with her father at their isolated house Rawblood. Iris soon finds out that there is a horrible congenital disease that runs in their family and that is why her father wants to isolate her and keep her away from everyone else especially her friend Tom. Whether the disease is the truth or just a cover-up to something more sinister that’s for you to find out.
Rawblood was a part of my horror October read. Right from the beginning, I felt the gothic atmosphere of some of the classics. The author’s writing is interesting and brings out lots of mysterious feel from the story. The first half was well written and a lot more focused. Unfortunately, the second half did not work for me. I think the multiple POVs along with the different timeframes were just too much. It felt disjointed and I found myself losing focus and attention.
The concept of the story is exceptional. The characters also felt well developed. In the second half, I feel the author had priority to keep the writing more poetic with the use of lots of prose here and there by different characters. Despite all that, I still feel this could have been better than what it is. It had a considerably solid potential.
Genre: Horror
Rawblood is the story of Iris Villarca. An eleven-year-old girl who lives with her father at their isolated house Rawblood. Iris soon finds out that there is a horrible congenital disease that runs in their family and that is why her father wants to isolate her and keep her away from everyone else especially her friend Tom. Whether the disease is the truth or just a cover-up to something more sinister that’s for you to find out.
Rawblood was a part of my horror October read. Right from the beginning, I felt the gothic atmosphere of some of the classics. The author’s writing is interesting and brings out lots of mysterious feel from the story. The first half was well written and a lot more focused. Unfortunately, the second half did not work for me. I think the multiple POVs along with the different timeframes were just too much. It felt disjointed and I found myself losing focus and attention.
The concept of the story is exceptional. The characters also felt well developed. In the second half, I feel the author had priority to keep the writing more poetic with the use of lots of prose here and there by different characters. Despite all that, I still feel this could have been better than what it is. It had a considerably solid potential.
I should've loved this book, I think. It's a haunted house story: the ancestral home of the Villarca family, Rawblood, is cursed by a white-faced ghoul who'll ensure the death of every Villarca who dares to fall in love. Spooky!
But actually, it was a slog to get through it at all. While the premise is intriguing, almost all of the POV characters are tear-inducingly dull; I didn't warm to Iris in her opening chapters, Charles was awful, and Mary only slightly better. When Meg showed up, things got a little more interesting, but then it was back to boring old Iris, and the big reveal at the end made me want to throw the book across the room.
Basically, it was a big disappointment for me, and while I feel mean writing this, it's really only for my own reference - so I remember never to be tempted to reread it.
But actually, it was a slog to get through it at all. While the premise is intriguing, almost all of the POV characters are tear-inducingly dull; I didn't warm to Iris in her opening chapters, Charles was awful, and Mary only slightly better. When Meg showed up, things got a little more interesting, but then it was back to boring old Iris, and the big reveal at the end made me want to throw the book across the room.
Basically, it was a big disappointment for me, and while I feel mean writing this, it's really only for my own reference - so I remember never to be tempted to reread it.
A literary horror story that follows the cursed Villarca family and their ancestral home.
We start in the early 20th century with the last surviving Villarcas, young Iris and her father Allonso living at Rawblood, their estate in Devonshire. Iris lives a sheltered and proscribed existence because of her father's obsession with a curse which has killed everyone in the family for generations. As we get different points of Iris's life the story jumps around in time giving us the story of the family going back generations at Rawblood.
I don't read a lot of horror, but if I were to list the best horror books I've read, then this story tops that short list. I found every member of Iris's family fascinating and the structure perfect to tell the multi-generational tale. It has a strong horror elements though, with the haunted house component being the least of them. Mostly it's an exploration of what people will do to other people to further their own ends and in the name of misguided beliefs. The strictures on women in the 19th and early 20th centuries also features strongly and the misogyny of the eras covered just reinforces the general theme.
We start in the early 20th century with the last surviving Villarcas, young Iris and her father Allonso living at Rawblood, their estate in Devonshire. Iris lives a sheltered and proscribed existence because of her father's obsession with a curse which has killed everyone in the family for generations. As we get different points of Iris's life the story jumps around in time giving us the story of the family going back generations at Rawblood.
I don't read a lot of horror, but if I were to list the best horror books I've read, then this story tops that short list. I found every member of Iris's family fascinating and the structure perfect to tell the multi-generational tale. It has a strong horror elements though, with the haunted house component being the least of them. Mostly it's an exploration of what people will do to other people to further their own ends and in the name of misguided beliefs. The strictures on women in the 19th and early 20th centuries also features strongly and the misogyny of the eras covered just reinforces the general theme.