Reviews tagging 'Cursing'

All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

17 reviews

sierrabowers's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad slow-paced

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

3.75

I did like this book, but it was a slow read, and I struggled with how I felt about one of the main characters. I didn’t like what he was doing but at the same time, I knew he had no choice, and ultimately was very sad at what ended up happening. It’s not often that a book can shock me, and this one SHOOK me at the ending. Overall, I liked it but I wouldn’t reread and I wish it would have had an underlying subplot to make it more interesting. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Alcoholism, Cancer, Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Death, Genocide, Gun violence, Hate crime, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Blood, Police brutality, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, Alcohol, and War

izzy_14's review against another edition

dark inspiring sad tense 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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and War

Moderate: Bullying, Child abuse, Death, Blood, and Murder

Minor: Child death, Cursing, Gore, Gun violence, Rape, and Death of parent

lucyatoz's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional inspiring sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr is an sweeping epic of storytelling. Marie-Laure LeBlanc has been blind since she was six. Her father is the locksmith at the Museum of National History, and to help her find her way around Paris, he has built her a wooden model, complete with miniature house and storm drains. When the Nazis invade France, they flee Paris to Saint Malo, a port town in Brittney, to the home of her Great-Uncle Etienne, a survivor of World War I, and his housekeeper, Madame Manec.  

In almost alternate chapters, we also learn the story of Werner Pfennig, a German orphan. His father died in the mines and he too is destined to work there, until he find an old broken radio and his life changes forever. He is recruited and sent away to school where he develops his skills in triangulating radio signals. The lives of Marie-Laure and Werner are intertwined in a single day and it is a deeply moving story that the rest of the novel builds towards. 

I had a copy of this novel on my bookshelf and listened to it on BorrowBox. I read this for prompt 25, an author "everyone" has read except you, for the 52 Book Club Reading Challenge 2024.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cancer, Death, Violence, Abandonment, and War

Minor: Cursing

ella_rose_77's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, and War

Moderate: Cursing

esjackson's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional sad 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 jumping time periods was very confusing at times

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Physical abuse, Violence, Antisemitism, and War

Moderate: Ableism, Cancer, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Torture, Murder, and Abandonment

Minor: Cursing and Death of parent

erebus53's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.25

Another book club read, and I'm glad I was put onto this one, as I otherwise wouldn't have bothered with it. This is a beautifully woven tale of .. uhm, nerds in World War II.

Werner is a snow-haired German lad who was orphanned by the mines of the Reich. As a curious child he develops himself into an electrical engineer who specializes in fixing radios, and is noticed by a German general who forwards him for advancement in an elite military school.
Marie-Laure is the daughter of keymaster of the French museum. She develops cataracts and goes blind as a child, and her father crates a scale model of her neighbourhood as a tactile map for her to learn her way around.
When the war starts, Marie-Laure and her father flee to her uncle's house, and Werner is a radio engineer for Hitler's army.

This story is told with deep emotional resonance, and using all sorts of literary quirks that focus on themes of light and darkness, sounds, sensation, fear and bravery, morality, logic and puzzles, knowing and learning, art and music, the love of nature, and of people. I love the descriptions of things like disappearing in fog– that it's about vanishing into whiteness rather than shadows.  The descriptions are visceral and evocative as well as clever.

This is a story of survival, of war, of fear and bloodshed, and it doesn't pull its punches. It certainly answers, in a humane way, questions about how people can do inhuman things in war, and the toll it can take on families.

I found the going slow, and occasionally tense, but also full of whimsy and beauty in contrast.
Well worth the read.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Cancer, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Terminal illness, Torture, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Xenophobia, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Antisemitism, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Bullying, Pregnancy, Alcohol, and Classism

nmckelv's review against another edition

emotional reflective 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? No

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Cursing, Death, Mental illness, Violence, and War

Minor: Child death, Rape, Suicide, and Grief

minib's review against another edition

1.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing

orchidlilly's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

2.5

,Let's face it, the world war II genre is overplayed. The writing here wasn't bad, it was good even, but the plot mostly lost me. It mainly follows two people, a blind French girl and an orphaned German boy as they grow up in Europe. The plot just doesn't feel very grabbing or original to me, it's your standard world war II book, with a bit of romance and, for some reason fantasy, thrown in unnecessarily. The short-lived romance between the two main characters seems odd and forced and the up in the air magical artifact McGuffin that then has no actual plot value is downright strange. Honestly, the best parts of this book are the ones that focus on the German boy's sister, and fellow soldier, but even those aren't very original. There's simply so much of the same world war II book a person can read without getting tired of the same old schtick, and this hit the limit for me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Bullying, Confinement, Genocide, Gun violence, Hate crime, Antisemitism, Grief, Religious bigotry, Murder, and War

Moderate: Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Terminal illness, Torture, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Police brutality, Kidnapping, Death of parent, Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Panic attacks/disorders, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Terminal illness, Excrement, Vomit, Medical content, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual harassment, and Deportation

nialiversuch's review against another edition

emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• 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: Ableism, Body horror, Bullying, Cancer, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gun violence, Hate crime, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Terminal illness, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Xenophobia, Blood, Vomit, Antisemitism, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Abandonment, War, Injury/Injury detail, Classism, and Deportation