Reviews tagging 'Body horror'

Dracula by Bram Stoker

58 reviews

idesofmarch's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Blood

Moderate: Body horror and Sexism

jess_tries2read's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious slow-paced

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

3.75

Favorite parts: the imagery!! Victorian England, an ancient, Transylvania castle, spooky graveyards. All super cool. The book is written from letters and journal entries which adds to the realism.

Bad parts: Because of the journal entry thing, the audience only gets descriptions of the area through the lens of the author. Most of the recorded entries are centered on dialogue. What visuals are described are awesome, though. 

The pacing in the second half of the book was very slow...

... and the ending was a little underwhelming. 

Plus, I wanted Dracula to be hot. 

No regrets for having read it as I love having the knowledge of the story that has inspired so many other vampire stories. Plus, Victorian England is just neat.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent

Moderate: Body horror and Blood

krmreads2024's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Body horror, Death, Gore, and Blood

macliffe's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful inspiring tense slow-paced

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

5.0

One of my favorite books of all time. It’s technically horror I suppose but I see it more as a hopeful story about good winning over evil.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Violence, Blood, Stalking, and Murder

Moderate: Body horror and Misogyny

Minor: Child death and Antisemitism

riverofhorton's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful inspiring mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

Overall, I really enjoyed this book. The world-building was incredible, and all but one of the main group were fully fleshed out characters. The only things that let it down were poo Quincey, the language of Van Helsing being a slog to get through, and the repetition of a lot of the bits of lore. Four times we're told that Dracula can't cross running water, three times that killing Dracula will stop the transformation of any vampires that are somewhere between human and vampire, three times we're told that communion wafers act as a talisman against the vampires, plus a few others that I could mention. I wonder how long this book would be without these instances of repetition. I particularly enjoyed reading the letters between Mina and Lucy, and their respective journal entries about the other: Mina is definitely gay for Lucy, and I can see no other explanation for the way she talks of and to Lucy. I would like to have seen some more expression of that love, but I get that wasn't really possible when this was published, sadly.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Child death, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Xenophobia, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Cannibalism, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Alcohol, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

renorsomethin's review against another edition

dark tense slow-paced

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

for a book about vampires this is pretty boring and drags on quite a lot as well as being full of repetitive misogynistic rants and xenophobia (just read anne rice or something instead)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Xenophobia, Blood, Medical content, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body horror, Chronic illness, Death, Gore, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Forced institutionalization, Xenophobia, Blood, Medical content, and Medical trauma

Minor: Animal death

decepticons's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious slow-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Racism, Toxic relationship, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Medical trauma, Murder, Gaslighting, and War

Moderate: Mental illness, Misogyny, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Medical content, Kidnapping, Cannibalism, and Stalking

Minor: Child abuse, Child death, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Classism

Vampirism used to excuse racism

“My dear Mina, why are men so noble when we women are so little worthy of them?” says enough about the book really

rosamaria's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.5

It’s a good thing Dracula did not turn Van Helsing into a vampire, because we would have had to sit through his drawn-out monologues for all eternity.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Gore, Blood, and Murder

Moderate: Animal death, Misogyny, and Sexism

jonwood's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

This is really good, I was surprised, but 'Dracula' reads surprisingly modern and I really enjoy the prose of the journal entries. I'll say the book does fall flat a bit when characters, especially Van Helsing, deliver dialogue in a rather purple-ly prose sort of way that is hard to take seriously at times, does undercut serious moments. Most of the suspense is undercut by popular knowledge that Dracula  is a vampire, but despite back, this enjoyable like any well-crafted story, and as Dracula is more of a tertiary character, that doesn't impact the experience too much (at least for me) as the book is more about these characters reacting to his presence than Dracula himself. Highly recommend, and if you aren't one for horror, I still think this is rather readable and enjoyable, it's not that scary, more a supernatural adventure.

 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Mental illness, Violence, Blood, and Medical content

Minor: Body horror, Misogyny, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide

leonormsousa's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious slow-paced

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

3.5

I can recognise it as an important part of history in literature but it was not the most enjoyable read.
Very slow and long, a bit repetitive at times even. The characters were a bit dumb, they would come to the obvious conclusions too late and act like it was the smartest thing ever and not right in front of them the whole time. Although I can accept that it is representative of its time, my feminist side could not sit super well with the book. Similarly, there were sections of the book that felt prejudiced and bothered me a bit, although one could say it was once again representative of the mindset of high class people of the time.
As usual with classics though, I am nonetheless happy to have read it and looking forward to reading articles about the significance of this book and to better understanding its motives.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Body horror, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Misogyny, Racism, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism