Reviews tagging 'Grief'

All the Dangerous Things by Stacy Willingham

69 reviews

ashwatever98's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Child death, Dysphoria, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Mental illness and Blood

Minor: Suicide, Self harm, Infertility, Kidnapping, and Grief

This book was a difficult read but was so well written. The troubles of motherhood and mental illness was very well explored. I felt the pain and emotion throughout.

r_o_s_e's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Kidnapping, Mental illness, and Grief

Moderate: Infidelity, Suicide attempt, Murder, Miscarriage, Child death, Death, and Suicide

Minor: Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Vomit, and Sexism

feralbookwife's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

3.75

Fast paced, solid mystery. Kept me guessing until the end. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Infertility, Infidelity, Kidnapping, Pregnancy, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Suicide, Vomit, Blood, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Sexism, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Violence, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Misogyny, Murder, Trafficking, Drug abuse, Grief, Mental illness, Miscarriage, and Toxic relationship

tifftastic87's review against another edition

dark mysterious medium-paced

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

5.0

Isabel Drake is a mother slowly unraveling from the kidnapping of her son. We enter the story one year after his disappearance, the police have no leads and the only clue is an open window. Izzy is distraught, and suffering from severe insomnia, her husband has left her and she has no one to turn to for help. She's been throwing herself into researching all of her neighbors and telling her story at true crime conventions, where she meets Waylon. Waylon is a young podcaster invested in her story and his appearance changes Izzy's investigation and everything she knows. 

I wasn't sure about this one at first, but the way it stuck with me. The bits we know about Izzy's life come out in drips and drabs over the course of the book. We get tiny flashbacks to her childhood and her meeting her husband. All of these flashbacks and the little  morsels of information we get serve to paint her as an unreliable narrator, and then add to that her extreme lack of sleep and you have a portrait of a woman losing her mind and her grip on ... well everything. 

The twists were foreshadowed nicely in a way that really made you think Izzy was even more unhinged than she is. I didn't expect most of them and I really didn't expect the outcome at all. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Miscarriage, Alcohol, Gaslighting, Grief, Toxic relationship, and Drug abuse

Minor: Murder

charrrchar's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Drug use, Suicidal thoughts, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Suicide attempt, Infidelity, and Suicide

Minor: Infertility

exlibrissum's review against another edition

dark mysterious medium-paced

• Loveable characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Child death, Death, Grief, Mental illness, Murder, Infidelity, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Violence, Infertility, Injury/Injury detail, Gaslighting, and Suicide

wonderfulxwonderful's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• 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

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Child death, Gaslighting, Kidnapping, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Death, Grief, and Infidelity

30before30's review against another edition

dark emotional inspiring mysterious reflective tense fast-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? Yes

3.0

I thought this book was a little better than average. The thing that made it worth the read was all of the twists and turns. They were all over the place but in my mind believable. It reminded me so much of the show The Woman in the House (…) that was on Hulu. Characters were ok, plot development was ok, but I wasn’t wowed. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Suicide, and Murder

zosiablue's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

3.75

"Nobody understands what it's like to be locked in the mind of a mother." 

Really sophisticated and moving missing child thriller that boils down to one sentence: for the love of god, address trauma with your children or they will be fucked up for LIFE. Everyone would've probably lived through this story had they one conversation with their parents.

Additionally, the husband in the story was one of the most odious villains I've come across in a while. I hated that dude so much. 

Last, this made me want to live in both Savannah and Beaufort. Why in the world am I in Minnesota?

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Gaslighting, Grief, and Infidelity

Moderate: Murder, Infertility, Suicide, Pregnancy, and Toxic relationship

mysterymom40's review against another edition

emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Infidelity, and Child death

Moderate: Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Toxic relationship, Grief, Murder, Blood, Kidnapping, and Fire/Fire injury