Reviews tagging 'Death'

Parable of the Talents by Octavia E. Butler

143 reviews

moonlitmeda's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Lesbophobia, Murder, Physical abuse, Police brutality, Pregnancy, Religious bigotry, Slavery, Suicide, Torture, Trafficking, and Violence

Moderate: Grief, Hate crime, Homophobia, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Child abuse, Child death, and Gun violence

Minor: Addiction, Alcohol, Car accident, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Incest, Infidelity, War, and Pandemic/Epidemic

lunaliz's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark reflective medium-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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Slavery, and Religious bigotry

Moderate: Child abuse, Pedophilia, Death, Grief, Sexual assault, Homophobia, Rape, and Sexism

Minor: War, Racism, Vomit, Kidnapping, Pregnancy, and Suicide

atalea's review against another edition

dark reflective medium-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

3.75

Parable of the Talents is a strong sequel to a great book. However, the series didn't fully work for me because of Lauren and her Earthseed preachings. Lauren can be a very strong and intelligent character who I admire at one point, but then the story drifts back to focus on her Earthseed mission and I am just not that interested in it. What I really like about this book however, is that a lot of the side characters voice my opinions on Lauren's character and her tunnel vision and she in turn makes valid criticisms of others. The characters therefore felt very real to me. I just didn't feel connected to the main character and her mission unfortunately, which weakened my reading experience.

As an apocalyptic book, it is one of the strongest I have ever read. Events and motivations felt real and possible, which made the book even more scary. The main portion of the book felt like a true apocalyptic survival story á la The Walking Dead and I could totally see this as a movie.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Religious bigotry, Slavery, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Confinement, and Rape

Moderate: Pregnancy, Pedophilia, Misogyny, Deportation, Sexism, Death, Physical abuse, Kidnapping, Blood, Sexual violence, Murder, Child abuse, and Gun violence

Minor: Drug abuse, Adult/minor relationship, and Suicide

catalyst226's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional medium-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

Fifteen pages in, I had to remind myself this book was published in 1998 because it's echoing things happening today. A little over halfway, I found myself slightly disturbed that when I switched to reading some news articles, there was a lot of similarities. Butler truly was ahead of her time with these novels. Reading the interview after the epilogue, she seemed to model the events on sentiments about public education back in the 90s so it all tracks.

If you're a fan of things like The Handmaid's Tale or incredibly well-written speculative/dystopian fiction, pick up this and it's prequel immediately.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Slavery, Death, Gun violence, Religious bigotry, Rape, Child death, and Sexual assault

samanthamurk's review against another edition

emotional reflective

• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Absolutely love this book. This sequel added so much depth to the characters. I love how lauryns daughter challenges the main character, it adds so much complexity to the story.

The social commentary is also spectacularly done and scarily relevant, I mean the evangelical politician who ppl thought would never win the election but did his slogan was literally make america great again. I mean if i didn’t know better i would never have guessed these books were written any time before 2016 at least.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Religious bigotry, Emotional abuse, Rape, Kidnapping, Trafficking, Death of parent, Classism, Child abuse, Slavery, Sexual violence, Murder, Genocide, and Death

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, and Self harm

karen191's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

Wow what a novel. Between the events that that happen in the novel that are currently happening in real life and Octavia Butlers amazing writing I was enthralled with this novel. I found myself thinking about it at every possible moment. I don’t think I’ve cried at so many different points in a novel before, but still it was such a good read. I definitely spoiled some parts for myself but it was just such an intense read, that in some spots I couldn’t but the book down for the day without knowing what was going to happen next. 

fuck Marc. Me and all my homies hate Marc. How could he steal his sisters child in the name of his faith?!? He didn’t deserve a sister like Lauren

 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Religious bigotry, Death, Forced institutionalization, Slavery, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Rape and Sexual assault

kurumipanda's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, Slavery, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Sexism, Outing, Murder, Genocide, Death of parent, Lesbophobia, Homophobia, Death, Kidnapping, Trafficking, Religious bigotry, Racism, Physical abuse, Pedophilia, Misogyny, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Rape, Gun violence, Violence, Confinement, Child abuse, and Blood

Moderate: Medical content, Police brutality, Child death, Classism, Suicide, and Child abuse

Minor: Eating disorder, War, Islamophobia, Dementia, Fire/Fire injury, and Bullying

cuddlygryphon's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional slow-paced

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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Grief, Gun violence, Death of parent, Misogyny, Murder, Rape, Suicide, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Police brutality, Child death, Kidnapping, Sexism, Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Confinement, Pregnancy, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Sexual assault, Torture, Violence, Religious bigotry, and Sexual harassment

hralston88's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-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: Sexual violence, Religious bigotry, Physical abuse, Death, Violence, and Slavery

nearlyfearless's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective 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? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Religious bigotry, Torture, Child abuse, Death, Gun violence, Kidnapping, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Murder, Physical abuse, Violence, Suicide, and Slavery

Moderate: Grief, Pedophilia, War, and Suicidal thoughts

Minor: Trafficking