Reviews tagging 'Abandonment'

Down Among the Sticks and Bones by Seanan McGuire

20 reviews

chris_reads's review against another edition

adventurous dark fast-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness

Moderate: Child abuse, Misogyny, and Murder

Minor: Death, Blood, and Abandonment

imds's review

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Confinement, Death, Emotional abuse, Blood, Grief, Murder, and Abandonment

ju_harue's review against another edition

dark sad slow-paced

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

2.5

Foi interessante ver como ocorreu a história das gêmeas no outro mundo. Porém a escrita mais rebuscada, com requintes sombrios, me fez desfocar um pouco, tornando-a mais longa do que de fato é. No entanto, há ótimas reflexões sobre as imposições que muitas vezes os genitores podem vir a fazer na vida de crianças e como isso impacta e muito, repercutindo para sempre.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Murder, and Abandonment

Moderate: Body shaming and Fatphobia

pacifickat's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious sad 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? It's complicated

4.5

*review to follow*

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Death, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Blood, Grief, and Murder

Moderate: Misogyny, Sexism, Slavery, Lesbophobia, Abandonment, and Classism

Minor: Bullying and Child death

Child neglect, narcissism

lahars_little_library's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious fast-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Blood, Kidnapping, Murder, and Abandonment

Moderate: Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, and Emotional abuse

nothoughts_mt's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood and Abandonment

Minor: Fatphobia

withloveandlights's review against another edition

The first part of this novella really focuses on parents who became parents for the wrong reasons and their children suffering the consequences of that decision. Hits way too close to home and I assume this would have further implications based off of their interactions within the Moors. Didn’t want to stick around to find out. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Pregnancy, and Abandonment

Moderate: Bullying

Minor: Infertility

ellanarose's review against another edition

dark reflective tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child abuse, Death, Emotional abuse, Violence, Blood, Murder, and Abandonment

Minor: Sexual content and Pregnancy

asparagushead's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Gore, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, and Abandonment

proudtobeabookaholic's review

adventurous dark 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? It's complicated

4.0

"Some adventures begin easily. It is not HARD, after all, to be sucked up by a tornado or pushed through a particularly porous mirror; there is no skill involved in being swept away by a great wave or pulled down a rabbit hole. Some adventures require nothing more than a willing heart and the ability to trip over the cracks in the world."

Twin sisters Jack and Jill ended up at Eleanor West's Home for Wayward Children when they were 17 years old, but what happened before that? Their parents shaped them after their own ideals and never saw them as actual people. Jacqueline became her mother's perfect daughter: polite and quiet, always in beautiful dresses she's not allowed to get dirty. Jillian became her father’s perfect daughter: adventurous and brave, always playing with boys. Identical in appearance, total opposites in personality. When the girls were twelve they found a staircase at the bottom of a trunk...

We got to know Jack and Jill in the first book, "Every Heart a Doorway", and here we get their whole story, both their (rather tragic) childhood and their adventure in another world. I now understand them better, but I would have liked to read their parts in the first book again! It also gave me a better understanding about what’s behind those doors everybody seems to want to find again. The girl's upbringing almost made me shiver - and see that there are different forms of child abuse. 

"Like bonsai being trained into shape by an assidious gardener, they were growing into the geometry of the parents' desires, and it was pushing them further and further away from each other. One day, perhaps, one of them would reach across the gulf and find that there was no one there."

It's really sad that the sisters' animosity towards each other follow them through the door to The Moors, even though in a slightly different way than expected. Now I'm curious to see what the next book has to offer!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Emotional abuse, Toxic relationship, Blood, and Abandonment