domreadsb00ks's review against another edition
challenging
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
The real life Franklin expedition sailed off into the Arctic waters to doscover the Northeest passage. No one knows what happened to them. There are some Inuit accounts of crazed white men stumbling across the arctic wastelands, some even resorting to cannibalism, but no solid evidence.
The Terror reimagines the experience of these 150 men, all told expertly through a handful of key characters. Each chapter begins with the date and location of the character at that point, and a nice detail is that the location and date gradually become more unclear and then completely unknown towards the end of the book, and the end of the crew.
All the traditional perils of the Arctic are here; the ice freezing the ships into place and tearing them apart; the cold wind turning men's noses black with frostbite and scurvy induced by the stale food. But there is something else out here. From the first page it is clear that something else stalks the men, larger and more intelligent than anything encountered before.
And yet it turns out that not even a genuine monster is more terrifying than the human mind pushed past its breaking point. The cast of this book are well-crafted; you genuinely want them to survive.
Certain scenes genuinely made me so tense waiting for what happened next, and others made me genuinely sad and frustrated with events both out of and in the characters' control.
Really recommend this book.
The Terror reimagines the experience of these 150 men, all told expertly through a handful of key characters. Each chapter begins with the date and location of the character at that point, and a nice detail is that the location and date gradually become more unclear and then completely unknown towards the end of the book, and the end of the crew.
All the traditional perils of the Arctic are here; the ice freezing the ships into place and tearing them apart; the cold wind turning men's noses black with frostbite and scurvy induced by the stale food. But there is something else out here. From the first page it is clear that something else stalks the men, larger and more intelligent than anything encountered before.
And yet it turns out that not even a genuine monster is more terrifying than the human mind pushed past its breaking point. The cast of this book are well-crafted; you genuinely want them to survive.
Certain scenes genuinely made me so tense waiting for what happened next, and others made me genuinely sad and frustrated with events both out of and in the characters' control.
Really recommend this book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Injury/injury detail, Medical content, Racism, Alcoholism, Blood, Cannibalism, Murder, Violence, and Xenophobia
Moderate: Bullying, Chronic illness, Alcohol, Cursing, Fire/Fire injury, Kidnapping, Grief, and Mental illness
booksmithscientist's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Addiction, Blood, Bullying, Cannibalism, Confinement, Cursing, Deadnaming, Death, Emotional abuse, Excrement, Gore, Grief, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, and Medical content
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