Reviews tagging 'Eating disorder'

Magic for Liars by Sarah Gailey

27 reviews

defunctfridge's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-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? Yes

4.75

incredibly written and highly addictive. my biggest belief on mysteries and plot twist is: if your audience cant go back and find the clues you wrote a bad twist. and this book is littered with bread crumbs that you can put together with ivy. if you pay attention you can solve it, which is such a good feeling as a reader to put the pieces together be wrong and rearrange them. the characters are also so well written with such care and depth.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Murder, Body horror, Alcoholism, Death of parent, Gore, Death, Cancer, Abortion, and Blood

Minor: Self harm and Eating disorder

tangleroot_eli's review against another edition

mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

Soooo many mixed feelings about this one. I really like magical mysteries. This one clips along at a fairly good pace, and having the investigator be an outsider is a nice take on the genre. 

But I felt so frustrated by the MC (static and underdeveloped), the interview scenes (tortuous), and the ending

Ivy says that turning the killer in won’t be justice, but it also lets them dodge all accountability, and this killer REALLY needs to be held accountable.

I felt very unsatisfied when I reached the end.

I don’t know if Gailey intends to return to Ivy’s world, but I don’t think I’d follow if they do.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Body horror, Gore, Blood, and Murder

Moderate: Death of parent, Abortion, Vomit, Cancer, Alcoholism, Terminal illness, Alcohol, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Fatphobia, Suicidal thoughts, Eating disorder, and Infidelity

booksandteatime's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pregnancy, Panic attacks/disorders, Cancer, Gore, Medical content, Abortion, Blood, Death, and Death of parent

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship and Eating disorder

foxwish's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

3.0

Very enjoyable, it's fun to watch Ivy investigate and interview people as long as you ignore that she has never interviewed people before yet is oddly good at it. I didn't care for the romance but think it was a shame that there isn't any closure for either character there. The whole Chosen One plotline was very obvious

Dylan was too flat of a character to have ever actually been the Chosen One.

and the reveal of who did it and why wasn't satisfying to me. The ending felt sudden and I expected more from it.

It's a bit of a miracle Ivy managed to solve this case considering she spends the majority of the book drunk, hungover, obsessing about her new crush and worrying about her relationship with her sister. Gailey tries to dig deeper with themes of parent death, identity and estrangement but it just fell flat for me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism and Alcohol

Moderate: Medical content, Cancer, Pregnancy, Abortion, Blood, and Death of parent

Minor: Eating disorder

lycheeteareads's review

dark emotional mysterious 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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Abortion, and Cancer

Moderate: Alcoholism, Death of parent, and Bullying

Minor: Eating disorder

lipstickitotheman's review against another edition

adventurous 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? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Body horror, Alcoholism, Blood, Death of parent, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Cancer, Abortion, and Alcohol

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Classism, Eating disorder, and Bullying

arthur_ant18's review

dark mysterious medium-paced

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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Cancer, and Abortion

Moderate: Bullying, Death of parent, and Alcoholism

Minor: Eating disorder

erebus53's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious sad slow-paced

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

3.0

This was an audiobook I checked out as part of a reading challenge, to read a book that had been nominated for literary award(s),  but not been an actual award winner. I figured that could go one of two ways; the book could be a hidden gem that's only of niche interest, or a promising title that didn't quite match up to the top billing nominees. The book ended up being slightly more of column B.

The narration in this book as brilliantly delivered. The main character is jaded and sardonic, and is a lonely woman with a tendencies toward takeout food and alcoholism. Xe Sands narrates the character expressively and playfully, especially the parts where the characters are getting more and more inebriated. An interesting narrator; I might see if I can find other titles read by her.

As far as genre goes, the story is magic-school meets murder mystery, and a romantic twist, with the emphasis mostly on the crime solving stuff. As a result it slid off me a bit, because murder mystery things aren't really my preferred genre. I did like that there was diversity in the story. There were characters of different ages, and there were several queer (gay and pansexual) characters in this story, but the main character is a woman trysting with a man. Although the characters are ethnically diverse, their ethnicity is not focused on at all in the story.

The thing that probably drove me most to distraction was the slow pace. I generally love stories that dwell on the building of relationships between the characters, but the main theme of this book was the impossibility of being able to really bond with others if you aren't prepared to be honest with them, so the relationship building aspect felt shallow and unrewarding.

On a personal note, this book does deal with the aftermath of losing a mother to cancer. It probably says a lot about how much I have grieved and coped and healed that I didn't find this subject matter really upsetting, but rather, I felt like it represented real-life everyday tragedy and the failure of a family to cope because they couldn't share their feelings openly, and support each other in their loss.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Pregnancy, Abortion, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Chronic illness, Alcoholism, Alcohol, Terminal illness, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Mental illness, Medical trauma, Medical content, Grief, Drug use, Death of parent, Death, Bullying, and Blood

Minor: Eating disorder, Adult/minor relationship, and Pedophilia

sarahmanuel3's review against another edition

dark mysterious fast-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abortion, Death of parent, Violence, Body horror, Cancer, Alcohol, Terminal illness, Blood, Murder, Pregnancy, and Death

Moderate: Bullying, Grief, Panic attacks/disorders, Vomit, Injury/Injury detail, and Medical content

Minor: Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, and Adult/minor relationship

schnaucl's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad 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? It's complicated

4.75

I really liked this book.   Even though I guessed some of the twists, I thought it was cleverly written.  I really liked the protagonist's voice, and her ability to imagine herself in different timelines felt very genuine.

I almost expected it to turn out that it was a kind of magic that she was doing, to so fully inhabit the alternate timeline characters.

The characters were interesting and as were the ways the high school was both magical and utterly ordinary.  Ivy's resentment at the wasted magic was understandable, as was the student's "waste" of magic because they're just kids and it's common for them, not the extraordinary thing it is for Ivy.  

It was a very well built world.  I'd like to spend more time there. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Alcohol, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, Toxic friendship, Blood, Gore, and Medical content

Minor: Sexual content, Terminal illness, Cancer, Death, Eating disorder, Abortion, Death of parent, and Emotional abuse