Reviews tagging 'Injury/Injury detail'

The Agathas by Liz Lawson, Kathleen Glasgow

16 reviews

tigger89's review

mysterious 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? No

3.0

I can see why some people would really like this book, but it didn't hold a lot of appeal to me. I thought the mystery was well done, particularly some of the reveals leading into the climax. I wasn't really a fan of the wealthy community setting, but I think it was used well even though I didn't personally like it. The fact that we had two narrators was used to great dramatic effect plot-wise, though I did find their narrative voices difficult to tell apart. The chapters are labeled with their names, but sometimes if I got distracted I'd forget partway through a chapter who I was following, and I'd have to flip back until I found a clue to remember, oh yeah, this is Iris or this is Alice.

I was somewhat disappointed that the involvement of Christie was limited mostly to literary quotes at the beginning of chapters and the fact that the main characters like her books. This might have been an unfair expectation on my part, based on the marketing for the book, but I was expecting something where specific scenes or twists would be referenced from Christie's canon to apply to the situation at hand. That didn't really happen, apart from the most general inspirations. But this really is kind of a quibble. If I'd read a different blurb that didn't stress Christie's importance so much, I don't think I would have complained about this at all. Blame it on the marketing!

The other thing that I couldn't help but laugh at is the chase at the climax. If you know, you know. The whole time I was like, that's not how horses work! None of this is realistic for your relationship/trust level with this panic machine horse! It's a silly horse girl fantasy moment in an otherwise serious title, which sticks out. But again it's not a major complaint, and the unrealistic nature of the climax doesn't really affect the mystery itself, just the drama surrounding it.

All in all, I didn't like the book, but I think that's more down to us not being for each other than any significant fault in the book itself. There is definitely a kind of person out there who would be very into this story. In fact, if I'd had this book in my hands 20 years ago, I know exactly which girl in my scout troop I would've handed it to. It's just not my thing, and that's okay.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Child abuse, Death, Stalking, Violence, and Domestic abuse

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Classism, and Car accident

amberinpieces's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious fast-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Car accident, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Classism, Domestic abuse, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Blood

Minor: Body horror, Drug abuse, Infidelity, Cursing, Grief, Stalking, Alcohol, Death of parent, and Sexual content

hannahfaith25's review

adventurous emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Physical abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Child abuse, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Car accident and Violence

spaghettii's review

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

Definitely left the ending open for more books 👀
Shipped the main characters so hard but I'm thinking they're both straight, unfortunately. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Alcohol, Bullying, Death, Toxic friendship, Murder, Toxic relationship, Blood, Car accident, Cursing, Drug use, Grief, Child death, Child abuse, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, and Stalking

corals's review

emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Minor: Domestic abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Car accident, Murder, Death of parent, and Grief

hollyk's review

adventurous dark funny lighthearted mysterious medium-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? Yes

4.5

I am a sucker for a multi-media story. Give me transcripts! News articles! Tweets! All of it.

This book has an engaging plot, I figured it out about 60% of the way through, but I'm here for a good time, so that sort of thing never bothers me.

Iris Adams, I love her. She is precious. She's a nerd (affectionate) who is dragged into figuring out this murder. She's tough, she's clever, and she deserves all good things.

Alice Ogilvie is a perplexing character. She grew on me, but there are definitely times where her internal monologue comes across as "grown adults writing shallow teens" which was a bit annoying. I also did not like how we barely find out where/why/how Alice just up and disappeared over the summer. It's barely a paragraph in one of the final chapters. I think Alice is better when she's with Iris, but I feel like Iris could stand on her own as a character, whereas Alice is weaker in terms of development.

Spike, Nora, and Neil were fun, but they lowkey could've been condensed into one or two people--they didn't have enough page time to shine as individuals (namely Nora and Neil).

Now, Alice is obsessed with Agatha Christie. I mean the title of the book is a reference to her. The issue I have is that Christie's works contain racism--which isn't uncommon for the time, but it is a fact that cannot be ignored (while Christie's intentions can be debated, that does not erase the fact that her books have racism, anti-Semitism, xenophobia, etc). The book And Then There Were None originally had the N-word in the title. I wish that this had been addressed in the book, whether in the book itself or in an author's note. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Panic attacks/disorders, Abandonment, Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, and Toxic friendship

Moderate: Bullying, Classism, Grief, Infidelity, and Murder

imstephtacular's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism

Moderate: Violence, Gaslighting, Grief, Bullying, Child abuse, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Murder, Physical abuse, Domestic abuse, Sexism, and Alcohol

Minor: Cancer, Death of parent, Drug use, Stalking, Abandonment, Panic attacks/disorders, Cursing, and Blood

taymorton20's review

adventurous tense fast-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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Murder, Domestic abuse, Injury/Injury detail, and Death

xlaurareads's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious tense fast-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? Yes

4.5

i thoroughly enjoyed this book! it was recommended to me by a friend of mine and i had quite high hopes on it - which were absolutely met! it was incredibly well-written with strong, amazingly crafted characters, a great storyline and incredible plot points. i had a love-hate-relationship with the fact that it took me incredibly long to figure out who the murderer is because i'm usually quite good at that. but i must say, it took the authors quite a while to drop the hints as to who the murderer is...and when they started doing so, it was quite obvious who it was. that's actually the only issue i have here, but it was a great read altogether. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Injury/Injury detail, Domestic abuse, and Murder

Moderate: Physical abuse, Car accident, and Violence

brianna_moye's review

adventurous challenging emotional mysterious sad fast-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Gore, and Murder

Minor: Alcohol, Death of parent, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail