Reviews tagging 'Cannibalism'

The Devourers by Indra Das

38 reviews

og_tomatogirl's review

dark mysterious 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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Cannibalism, Blood, and Gore

Moderate: Sexual assault, Sexual content, and Vomit

lanid's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense

• 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Injury/Injury detail, Rape, Violence, Excrement, Sexual assault, Body horror, Death of parent, Dysphoria, Gore, Death, Blood, and Cannibalism

Minor: Biphobia, Homophobia, Misogyny, and Suicidal thoughts

talonsontypewriters's review

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Sexual content, Animal death, Body horror, Cannibalism, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual violence, Violence, Death, Murder, Rape, and Death of parent

Moderate: Kidnapping, Child death, Abandonment, Excrement, Fire/Fire injury, Self harm, Sexism, War, Drug abuse, Misogyny, Pregnancy, and Vomit

Minor: Classism, Homophobia, Transphobia, Colonisation, Abortion, Dysphoria, Religious bigotry, Xenophobia, and Racism

Smoking. Urination. Discussion of and explicit descriptions of rape, as well as depiction of aftermath, but no extended scene. Sexual coercion, victim blaming/justification of rape (by character; criticized by others and narrative), discrimination against sex workers. Pregnancy and birth by rape. Decapitation. Metaphorical mentions of bestiality. Sexual relationships in a shapeshifter-unique dynamic compared to but not necessarily equivalent to parent-child dynamics, where one party has sometimes been raised by the other since youth; discussed and alluded to, but not graphically shown on-page.

squid_ears's review

mysterious reflective slow-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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Gore, Cannibalism, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, and Excrement

Moderate: Abandonment

Minor: Colonisation

aardwyrm's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-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

5.0

Like all the best horror, weird, gross, kinda horny, never fully explained, rich and dreadful and spooky and gory, gets its claws in and won't let go. Warning: One of the POV characters is a rapist. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Grief, Abandonment, Alcohol, Blood, Cannibalism, Classism, Rape, Child death, Death, Drug use, Excrement, Homophobia, Suicide, Violence, War, Abortion, Animal death, Body horror, Colonisation, Cultural appropriation, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Sexism, Sexual assault, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Kidnapping, Stalking, Vomit, Xenophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Murder, Physical abuse, and Torture

incigiru's review

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: Homophobia, Vomit, Murder, Gore, Excrement, Cannibalism, Death, Physical abuse, and Cursing

Moderate: Sexual assault, Pregnancy, Sexism, and Body horror

jaqylantern's review against another edition

dark tense medium-paced

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

5.0

Picked this for a challenge I was doing Nd I am so glad I did. This is one of the best books I hVe ever read. This is everything I WISH interview with a vampire had been. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Cannibalism, Pregnancy, and Gore

Moderate: Rape

Minor: Homophobia

kateofmind's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense 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? It's complicated

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cannibalism, Rape, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Vomit, Sexual violence, Murder, Gore, and Death

Moderate: Colonisation

hannahg94's review

adventurous mysterious reflective 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

3.0

It's a weird book. It's an odd book. And I both liked it and didn't all at once. 

Note: Some light spoilers-- found it too hard to describe without them. 

It's a story within a story. A young college professor finds himself hypnotized by the bizarre conversation he has with a stranger who claims to be half-werewolf (full well knowing this is a rather deceitful way of describing himself-- he is a shape-shifter). The stranger asks him to transcribe an old text for him, and the professor agrees to, for reasons he himself cannot explain. The text tells a story of another shape-shifter, who after centuries of "devouring life" wants to create it, so he rapes a human woman. That's none too pleasing to the woman, who teams up with the shape-shifter's ex-companion to hunt him down, and attempt vengeance. 

The narration of the books gets passed around from the professor, Alok, the human woman, Cyrah, and to lesser degrees, the two shape-shifters (Fenrir and "The Stranger").

I thoroughly enjoyed Cyrah's narration, it is memorizing with a lot of pull and interest to it. Most of the "plot" takes place in her chapters. Her voice was the most interesting to me, and she is certainly the most likeable character. I found both shape-shifters pretty unlikable (though I imagine that is the point). And Alok is... fine. I guess. He was neither here nor there for me. 

So why didn't I like the book? The main reason is probably that the writing in general was a bit too gory for me. I have pretty vivid images in my head when I read, and I think this is the only book I've ever read that made me continuously cringe from the sheer amount of vomit, urine, and consumption of human flesh mentioned on nearly every page. It made some parts of the book genuinely unpleasant to read. I also found some parts of the book pretty slow, and some of the descriptions are a little too indulged in for my liking (especially, but not always, when they were gory descriptions).  

However, the story is pretty fascinating and the writing can be beautiful. I know very little about the parts of the world this book takes place in, but Indra Das painted the pictures very clearly.

Overall, it's a pretty well-written book, if not my personal cup of tea. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cannibalism and Gore

Moderate: Rape

redbirdreading's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Cannibalism, Excrement, Murder, Pregnancy, Sexual assault, Death, Gore, Rape, and Violence