Reviews tagging 'Drug use'

Pod by Laline Paull

18 reviews

bemoregarnet's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional 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? No

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Drug use, Rape, and Violence

cassie7e's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad slow-paced

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

I don't know how to rate this book. It was vicious, and beautiful, and sad, each in their part. I detached from the pain and cruelty (human and dolphin alike), struggled to make sense of what was happening and how it related to real world human activities, but unexpectedly found myself moved to tears at the whale's ending song.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Death, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Drug use, Medical content, and Death of parent

builtoutofbooks's review against another edition

dark 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? It's complicated

3.25

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape and Sexual assault

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Drug use, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Grief, and Death of parent

ani_raven's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.25

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Drug use, Rape, and Grief

ketreads's review against another edition

dark

0.25

TRIGGER WARNING!

I would not have finished this book for anything less than the May Fantasy Fellowship Readathon. I complainted incessantly on the group chat just to drag myself through the whole thing.

The main character/s of this book are Dolphins and while it does have some PoVs outside of these two, it mostly revolves around these main two. Sad to say, these extra PoVs were often distracting and sometimes outright pointless. At some points the book SEEMED to have some form of connection to the reader (mostly in the form of Google the military trained dolphin) only to have this pulled out from under you by the many competing voices throughout. Ea is by far the most central character and yet we're given very little development leading up to the inciting incident, only for it to fall a part very soon after.

The writing style at first felt lyrical and an interesting way to use animal communication methods (having all dialogue take place through clicks, waves, or other italic font) but said dialogue is bland and often felt juvinile. The story felt confusingly pointless as well as adding in too many details that had little to no impact on the story itself or felt as though it had no real build up to feel satisfying. 

My main gripe is that this book featured as LOT of rape. Like, A LOT. 
If you remove the fact that these characters are dolphins, this book is 70% about rape. The anthropomorphism of the majority of characters ended up ruining the little this book had going for it (a unique PoV). We're subjected to this for the majority of the books run time and I genuienly struggled.

The worst part about this is the book was also boring. The inciting incident, character arcs, and multiple PoVs end up having very little impact on the story at all. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Drug use, Misogyny, Rape, Sexism, and Sexual assault

berodatheelf's review against another edition

emotional informative sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character

4.0

Informative and well researched but absolutely brutal, Laulie Paull leaves no punches. The story weaves humans impact on the environment with feminism but is told uniquely from the POV of various aquatic creatures (mostly dolphins). 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Animal death, Child death, Drug use, Rape, Sexual assault, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, and Fire/Fire injury

laurenbastian's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

4.25

A terrifying and tragic story that shows us exactly the harm we do to our neighbors on this planet. The story is about dolphins and the complex and sometimes horrifying power dynamics and social structures of the ocean. But it is also about how, amidst and underpinning it all, humans have pushed these aquatic communities to annihilation. This is a book of climate grief that does not shy away from gore and violence.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Drug use, Genocide, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Blood, Trafficking, Kidnapping, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, and Colonisation

emilyseebold's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious sad tense fast-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? It's complicated

4.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Violence, Kidnapping, Grief, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Confinement, Drug abuse, Drug use, Genocide, Mental illness, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Xenophobia, Blood, Trafficking, Kidnapping, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Ableism, Transphobia, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, and Fire/Fire injury

ank3's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative inspiring 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? It's complicated

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, Sexual harassment, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

bethtrigg's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, and Rape

Moderate: Bullying, Death, Drug use, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Blood, and Death of parent