Reviews tagging 'Alcohol'

Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

66 reviews

charleyyyyy's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes

5.0

Oh
Shit
Uh
Huh
Fuck
?????

That was so cool

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Gore, Mental illness, Self harm, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

lemonteacookies's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious 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? No

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Blood, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Child death, Confinement, Suicidal thoughts, and Alcohol

steph_weigle's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious sad medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Bullying, Cancer, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Eating disorder, Gore, Gun violence, Infertility, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Cannibalism, Death of parent, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Genocide, Infertility, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Suicide, Suicide attempt, and Colonisation

larbster90's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark funny 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

4.5

I never know what’s going on in these books but I enjoy them anyway

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Gore, Gun violence, Mental illness, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Medical trauma, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Sexual content, Vomit, Grief, Death of parent, and War

Minor: Child death, Chronic illness, Terminal illness, Abandonment, and Alcohol

lunarlibra's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

Love love love. I read through the night so I'm not very coherent rn but as much as I loved GtN, I LOVED HtN!! I plan to reread both before moving on to NtN and will update my review with more coherent thoughts, but one thing: I deeply appreciated the depiction of hallucination and different perceived realities, especially after reading the acknowledgements. Anyway. God what a great book

i love killing(???) God in fiction, even if it doesn't keep

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gun violence, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Gaslighting, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body horror, Death, Eating disorder, Genocide, Gun violence, Mental illness, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Grief, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Alcohol, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Body shaming, Cancer, Child abuse, Child death, Gun violence, Mental illness, Racism, Violence, Medical content, Grief, Cannibalism, Suicide attempt, Murder, and Gaslighting

shottel's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny mysterious sad medium-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

4.75

Like Gideon the Ninth, the book-cover reviews and summaries don’t do it justice. Harrow the Ninth is a fantastic, funny, unique, genre-blurring novel whose worldbuilding and mystery-oriented storytelling makes it worthy of reading on their own. To an even greater degree, it is a poignant picture of psychosis and grief. I was not expecting to see in such detail a broken mind, agonized by self-doubt and the mistrust of others, and the crushing weight of immense loss.

Outside of the deep themes of regret, loss, absence, grief, and psychosis, there is much to say positively. Harrow manages to pull off pop culture references and memes humorously, without making me want to throw the book across the room. (Minimally spoiling example: A subtle joke invoking none pizza left beef.) This, combined with a tamer but still present version of the sense of humor that made Gideon distinctive makes for an enjoyable time. It doesn’t lag so hard in the first half like Gideon does (although I do feel it could’ve likely been shortened a good 50-100 pages). The ending was exciting, the payoff for working through over 400 pages of confusion (albeit a well-written 400 pages) deeply worth it. My only gripe is that, without spoiling anything, the last 5 or so pages are a bit confusing and sad in a way I don’t think fits, but this doesn’t harm it enough for me to say the ending was anything but excellent.

Overall, I would strongly recommend this book to anyone who has read Gideon the Ninth and would be interested in a good mystery or an evocative portrait of disturbed mental faculties.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gore, Mental illness, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Gun violence, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Vomit, Suicide attempt, and Alcohol

Minor: Sexual assault, Sexual content, Dementia, and Pregnancy

skudiklier's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark funny mysterious tense

• 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

Oh my god this book. I have no idea what to say about it. I don't know how else to say this but reading it made me feel like I was going crazy. I'm so glad I was reading this well after it came out and I could look up just enough people talking about it online so that I could know I was actually having the intended experience and not wildly misunderstanding something. For a book that made me feel like I had no idea what was happening, I loved it. I definitely want to read the next one. It made me scream at the people who recommended it to me. It has such a good payoff after all the confusion and disorientation. I wish all books were this devastating and this satisfying and this funny.

mild spoilers

NONE HOUSES LEFT GRIEF???? what the fuck.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gore, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

Moderate: Cursing, Mental illness, Cannibalism, Death of parent, and Alcohol

Minor: Child death and Sexual content

bebidocrimes's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense slow-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

4.75

While it's a little heavy handed on the dialogue explanations of the magic system and world building, I did have an easier time keeping track of the secondary characters. I agree that just accepting that you are going to be confused helps navigate the disjointed timelines. (Some fandom osmosis also helped me keep up, too tbh) I am fascinated by a depiction of god as a flawed and selfish individual who probably shouldn't actually be worshiped. I'm going to need to sit with this one for a while.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Mental illness, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Cursing, Drug use, Sexual content, Pregnancy, Abandonment, and Colonisation

immovabletype's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious slow-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Cursing, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Death of parent

Minor: Child death and Genocide

kierank's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad 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

5.0

Rewired my brain chemistry

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gore, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Gaslighting, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Cursing and Alcohol

Minor: Colonisation