Reviews tagging 'Gun violence'

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon

25 reviews

kb33's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious slow-paced

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No

4.5

This would be a 5 star read if it weren’t for the homophobia by the author and some of the other things that were more common in romance books written around the same time as this (originally published in ‘91 I think). Two men in the book are supposedly gay. One is a pedophile/rapist and barely has a part in the book, and the other is a torturer/rapist and does have a bigger part in the book. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Death, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Misogyny, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Gun violence, Rape, and War

Minor: Body shaming, Chronic illness, Infertility, Pedophilia, Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Colonisation

mykingdomforabookworthreading's review against another edition

1.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body shaming, Death, Domestic abuse, Gore, Infertility, Infidelity, Misogyny, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Vomit, Medical content, Kidnapping, and Sexual harassment

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body shaming, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Incest, Infertility, Mental illness, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Abortion, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

kenzibir's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes

4.25

Loved this as an audiobook

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Sexual harassment, and War

bree_h_reads's review against another edition

If I had finished the book I think it would have been 2-2.5 stars. There was a lot about the book I enjoyed and thought was well-written, but overall it didn’t appeal to me and didn’t keep my interest.

I was often bored and found it hard to focus on the book. There was also the issue of the book’s SA. It felt over done and like it was for shock value. There was just something odd about it and how often it was used. Like it was unrealistically being used for realism. The book’s men also made me uncomfortable overall. A mix of the struggle between overplaying the sexism of the time AND when the book was written. Even when male characters were meant to be likeable, I just found myself untrusting of them. The spicy in the book also felt a little odd, though it’s not as bad as the other issues.

That isn’t to say the book lacked merits.

The narrator herself was excellent. Her voice was very well-suited to the story and Claire. She also did an excellent job with the character voices. They were all well-acted and distinct. I also appreciated how much research it seemed was done for Claire’s medical knowledge. There was a distinct sense the author really understood what Claire would know and had access to after time travelling. Despite many of the men making me uncomfortable, I really liked the other characters. They all felt complex and unique. I found it interesting to sort out their struggles and secrets.

Overall I do see the appeal of these books and why people enjoy them, they just aren’t for me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Gun violence, Misogyny, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Murder, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Mental illness, and Panic attacks/disorders

Minor: Infertility and Infidelity

addisonpatrice's review against another edition

adventurous dark slow-paced

3.75

What an adventure! This one took me nearly a month to finish because of the 1700s setting and the density of the writing, but I'm glad I did so. Jamie and Claire are just dreamy.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Confinement, Death, Gun violence, Infertility, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual content, Torture, Blood, Grief, Medical trauma, Murder, Pregnancy, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

outofthepinksky's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional tense slow-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Murder, Pregnancy, Alcohol, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Ableism, Alcoholism, Animal death, Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Infertility, Infidelity, Racial slurs, Vomit, Grief, and Classism

Minor: Child death, Fatphobia, Gun violence, Hate crime, Suicidal thoughts, Kidnapping, Abortion, and Death of parent

mykaafriesen's review against another edition

adventurous emotional tense medium-paced

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

4.0

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

🌶️.5/5

Another wonderful example of the book being better than the show! I just love Claire and Jamie<3 Their love transcends time and space and damn it if i don’t want it! It’s so popular for a reason, Diana Gabaldon knows what she’s doing! 😭🫶🏻

Also, this was my first audiobook and I was thoroughly impressed. Davina Porter has a wondrous way of engaging you right from the start! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore and Gun violence

Minor: Rape

shayrawd's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional funny tense slow-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Rape, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, and War

sonygaystation's review against another edition

challenging dark sad tense slow-paced

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

1.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Cursing, Infidelity, Misogyny, Rape, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Medical trauma, Murder, Pregnancy, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body shaming, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Racial slurs, Xenophobia, Vomit, Grief, Colonisation, and War

Minor: Animal death, Child death, Suicidal thoughts, and Abortion

sup3r_xn0va_maya's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

2.0

💬: “Don’t be afraid,” he whispered into my hair. “There’s the two of us now.” I felt warm, soothed, and safe for the first time in many days."

Gabaldon, Diana. Outlander: A Novel (Outlander, Book 1) (p. 212). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

📖Genres: romance, romantasy, adult, adventure, historical romance, historical, fantasy

📚Page Count: 850

🎧Audiobook Length: 32h 38min

👩🏾‍🏫My Rating: ⭐️⭐️ - 2/5
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TW -

ableism, animal death, blood, body horror, cursing, death, death of parent, emotional abuse, gore, grief, injury/injury detail, misogyny, murder, physical abuse, pregnancy, rape, sexism, sexual assault, sexual harassment, sexual content, sexual violence, torture, violence, vomit, war

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon is an 800+ page historical romance that has action, spice, time travel, and adventure. Claire is a nurse from 1945 and she's thrusted back in time a few hundred years, where she has to survive until she figures out how to get home. It's here that she meets Jamie, a Scott who wants to show her a love so true. At least she won't have to try and survive alone, with him by her side. I didn't love this story, I barely liked it. Between the weird and slow pacing and the threat of rape being constantly thrown around, by the time the book was over I was exhausted and annoyed from the read.

I didn't like the book's pacing. The book started off really slow, I'd say it took about 2 to 3 hours of listening to the audiobook for the story to actually start moving forward. Once the story started to move, things got interesting and I became invested. Then, I'd say 200 pages into the action, things slowed down to a crawl and I stopped caring about the story. After about 150 pages of the slow crawl, things picked up again. Do you see where I'm going with this? This strange pacing continued throughout the entire novel.

(Trigger Warning  - rape, sexual assault)
The threat of rape was constant from the moment the main character went back in time. I understand that your female main character went back in time, that doesn't mean you have to have every other man she encounters try to physically & sexually attack her. I honestly should have counted the amount of times Claire was threated with physical or sexual harm by a man, there are a few times where she actually IS attacked. Claire apparently isn't the only one who's in danger of being sexually assaulted.

At the tail end of the book Jamie gets arrested and he incidentally ran into Randall, well Randall is an evil man so he wanted to take revenge on Jamie and he does that by mutilating, torturing, and raping Jamie for an uncertain amount of days.

(Trigger Warning  - rape, sexual assault, drugging)
Unfortunately, it gets worse. Now,

by the time Jamie is rescued from Randall at the end of the book, he has PTSD, he's so sick that he might die, and he doesn't want to look at his wife because he feels ashamed and disgusted with himself because of the sexual assault. How do I know this? Because he tells Claire and there's a dialogue about the assault and Jamie tells Claire exactly what was said and done to him. For some odd reason the author decided to make Claire drug Jamie with opium, so he hallucinates, and then she pretends to be his assaulter (Randall) and she says the things he said and then she does the things he physically did to elicit a response out of Jamie. Well, it does get a reaction, Jamie attacks Claire and they go tumbling to the ground (while Claire is getting beat on by Jamie). Somehow, while they're tumbling on the group Claire is able to insert Jamie into her, and now they're having intercourse. Claire "cured him" and helped him claim his "manhood".

OMG. How ridiculous, gross, and unnecessary.

(Trigger Warning - physical abuse, domestic abuse)
The spice fluctuated. At first I was into it but then there was this strange scene where

Jamie physically held down and beat Claire because he wanted to prove to his band of merry men that he was punishing her for her actions. I just didn't understand this scene, it made me sick to my stomach and it made me like Jamie a lot less than I previously did. After that, I wasn't interested in any spice between Jamie and Claire.

I'm giving it one and a half chilies 🌶️.5 out of five chilies

This book also ends in the

pregnancy trope

, and if you know me then you know I hate that trope very much. So, the ending was just disappointing for many reason. I really tried to trust recommendations and then trust the process with this one and that failed me. There were only a few times during the 32 hour audiobook that I enjoyed the reading experience. I just didn't like this book and I won't be continuing with the series.
⭐️⭐️ - 2/5

I listened to this for free on the library app, hoopladigital.com

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Animal death, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Infertility, Infidelity, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, War, and Injury/Injury detail