hyacinthed 's review for:

Firestarter by Stephen King

2.5

dark mysterious 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: Yes

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Complicated feelings on this one.

Strengths:

• Strong worldbuilding (as always)
• Great structure
• Solid development of Charlie/decent development of Andy
• Dude putting on lingerie and jerking it to a garbage disposal. Lit.

Difficulties:

• Literally everything relating to Rainbird. The overt racism in his characterisation (yes it was the '80s, no it has not aged well), the literal pedophilic overtones of how he thinks and speaks about Charlie.
• The homophobia sprinkled throughout.
• The constant fat-shaming of Andy after he blows up on thorazine (we get it, he's fat, you don't have to remind us once a page).
• The lack of resolution of Vicky's death - I was hoping for some kind of reconciliation/closure.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Confinement, Death, Mental illness, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Medical trauma, Stalking, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body shaming, Fatphobia, Pedophilia

Minor: Homophobia