Reviews tagging 'Sexual content'

How to Kill Your Family by Bella Mackie

115 reviews

kmarr's review against another edition

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

3.75


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theelliad's review against another edition

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3.5

How to Kill Your Family is the account of serial murders told from the perspective of the killer as she serves jail time for a murder she didn’t commit.

The narrative voice of this novel is hilarious and sarcastic and truly kept me engaged, alongside this the dual timeline of the story is handled well and it was structurally enjoyable and followable. That said, I was disappointed by the ending, the twist was not the best but I thought fitted the story well, it was rather the transformation in Grace (the protagonist) in the final chapters. The self sufficient, powerful and somewhat narcissistic personality she has established falls victim to the writers need for a conclusion becoming submissive, easily forgiving and a bit boring as the final events of her life are recounted; it was this, more so than the plot twist, which didn’t feel right to me. However, that said I did enjoy this book enough to speed through it in a matter of days and so I cannot judge it too harshly! 


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ladynavalon's review against another edition

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dark funny slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? N/A
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

1.0


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oystersauce's review against another edition

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

3.5


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kim_lommaert's review against another edition

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dark relaxing medium-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? It's complicated

3.5


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lily1304's review against another edition

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

4.75

It's like a FUNNY version of Gone Girl or Promising Young Woman?? Like an EXCITING version of My Year of R&R?? Like all three, there's a theory of gender and anger buried here that I can't quite articulate. The protagonist is delightfully unreliable - incisive about some things, totally oblivious to others. I wanted to SCREAM when I read the ending (which I stayed up late to finish)!!!

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puddles_of_ink's review against another edition

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dark lighthearted fast-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? It's complicated

3.5


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julkatten's review against another edition

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dark funny tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0


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skylarkblue1's review against another edition

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challenging dark 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? Yes

0.25

This is... certainly a book. The more I read, the more pissed off I got at it honestly. The more I just *hated* the main character. She's so self-centered, aggressive, and her ego is insanely huge. I really disliked the parts from the prison, as it all could just be summed up as "I hate this place, I'm so smart than everyone else here I shouldn't be here" and you wouldn't really miss anything.

The concept is interesting, though pretty bare-bones. Revenge against a family who abandoned you. Except that even after learning they're not all the same, she doesn't give a single crap and kills them all regardless. The abandonment is also iffy at best, her father had an affair with her mother, father didn't want anything to do with them *apparently*. Did she try and contact her father? nope. Did she even verify if the story that he was actually her father was correct? nope.

The misogyny throughout - especially from the main character - is astonishing as well. Constantly belittling women, constantly shaming others' bodies for being "too perfect" or "not perfect enough" and it's just so tiring to read. It could have been a good satire about not judging someone by their looks or whatever, but no there's absolutely 0 commentary of that kind.

The incestuous stuff as well was really iffy to read. Grace's first thought for all the men is just "lets seduce them in one way or another" one of them literally including sex clubs with hard kinks. Yes, she takes who she believes is a close family member to a hard kink sex club. And yes, they do go into a private room. While not overly explicit it's still incredibly awkward and pretty gross.

Her treatment towards others all through the book is just horrific. She blackmails a literal child who *she* asked for help from and he was just going along with things. She has 0 issues manipulating and lying to whoever to get whatever she wants. And none of this is in a "ooh she's so smart and sneaky" way, all of it is in a "if someone actually did this in reality they'd get caught in like, 2 seconds because of how brain dead it all is".

The ending is also very stupid. It's very easy to guess how it ends, the "foreshadowing" isn't very subtle at all. Those "letters" at the end, was honestly just skipping through so much of it because I do not want to read a whole page of random "ooh football talk!" like come on. It had 0 impact or anything, it was just pure filler waffle nonsense for the *climax* and entire twist. Purely "tell don't show".

This isn't a book based in reality, it's very much it's own fantasy world. It's not clever, it's not satire. It's just a book about someone bragging how fantastic and clever they are while being incredibly stupid and aggravating all the way through. The only thing that make me remotely smile was the "bible story that wasn't from the bible" near the start. 

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taleofabibliophile's review against another edition

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dark mysterious reflective tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5


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