Reviews tagging 'Blood'

Certain Dark Things by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

90 reviews

sonygaystation's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious slow-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Blood, Body horror, Violence, Murder, Cursing, Injury/Injury detail, and Death

Moderate: Stalking and Gun violence

Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Torture, Sexual content, and Pregnancy

raavi's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious 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? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual harassment, and Torture

Moderate: Xenophobia

Minor: Grief and Adult/minor relationship

bobbyob's review against another edition

adventurous dark sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Gun violence, and Blood

Moderate: Sexual violence, Addiction, Alcohol, Police brutality, Medical content, Body horror, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Drug use, Sexual harassment, Murder, Misogyny, Death of parent, and Drug abuse

Minor: Animal death, Confinement, Slavery, Trafficking, Animal cruelty, Classism, and Colonisation

izak113's review against another edition

4.5

Spoiler

I'm so glad the dog lives and as much as I did cry when Atl left Domingo behind, I think it is the best for him AND the dog. They both deserve to live good and comfortable lives. Also, Domingo being 17 and having a relationship with 23 year old Atl *siri play All Too Well by Taylor Swift*. Ultimately, I really enjoyed this (the narrator was utterly amazing, like by far the best narrator I've ever listened to) and I think I'll actually end up giving it a higher rating after I give the ending some time to marinate.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Gore, Physical abuse, Violence, and Blood

carlyoc's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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? Yes

5.0

In a world much like our own, vampires are real. There are revenants out of old European folk tales, necrosis also from Europe but more recently evolved who can enslave humans with their blood, and Tlāhuihpochtli out of Aztec legend who were once warrior priestesses of the Nahuatl god of war. In Mexico, tribes of vampires compete with human gangs to rule the local underworld. Mexico City is one of the few havens free of vampires thanks to the government's anti-vampire "sanitation" crews and the strong human gangs. Until a young vampire named Atl sneaks in, on the run from a necros named Nick. She befriends a young trash collector named Domingo but will he slow her down or be the key to her survival?

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Death, and Gore

Minor: Sexual violence

The villain fantasizes about secually assaulting and torturing Atl but we don't get many pages or graphic description from his perspective

sophiamoonlight's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad fast-paced

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

4.0

An einigen Stellen hatte ich das Gefühl, dass die Autorin entweder nicht das ausdrücken konnte, was sie wollte, oder Dinge vergessen hatte anzupassen.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Blood, Sexual violence, Murder, Gun violence, Violence, Animal cruelty, Toxic relationship, Gore, and Death

jodierose14's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism, Police brutality, Death, Misogyny, and Blood

daniellekat's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious fast-paced

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

3.25

Silvia Moreno-Garcia is one of my favourite author's but this one fell a bit short for me. I typically love the vividness of her writing and her characters but everyone felt flat and one dimensional here.  There were too many characters for me to feel connected to any of them, but I do think the changing POVs was well utilized for this narrative. The book was well paced and had me engaged throughout. I loved all the vampire lore but it was weirdly woven into the storytelling (It often felt like Domingo's only purpose was to ask questions for the reader). Overall, SMG is still one of my favourites and I love the diversity of her writing, you never know what you'll get.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Gun violence, Blood, and Gore

Moderate: Toxic friendship

Minor: Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Colonisation, and Bullying

ramalam98's review against another edition

dark mysterious 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

3.5

Certain Dark Things is an original and diverse take on vampires where various 'subspecies' exist around the globe, integrated to a greater or lesser extent into human society. Mexico City is a 'vampire-free zone' but our main character Domingo is about to discover just how incorrect that is.

What I liked:

• The cover!! Considering trying to find it as a print.
• The vibes, they do a great job of matching the cover. I love vampires and really liked the lore that is introduced in this book. Plus, the gritty, 'noir' atmosphere that makes Mexico City feel both futuristic and modern. 
• The world-building; a lot of thought has been put into vampire traits and history, as well as the state of Mexico City. It did feel a bit surface-level at times, but it isn't a big book and I am perfectly happy with what is there. 
• The Aztec inspirations, mythology and history were great to read.
• The plot, to an extent: it was fun and readable! 
• The commentary of colonialism under a vampire lense.
• The dog!!

What I didn't like:

• The tone: this is an adult book, but to me reads quite YA with a lot of gore. The dialogue felt immature most of the time, the sex was fade to black, and overall nothing had the kind of nuance I would expect from a book directed at adult audiences.  However, this is one of Moreno-Garcia's first books! I'm very excited to read more from her. 
• Furthermore, this is classed under the 'horror' genre and I think I disagree with that. Vampires don't always equal horror, and this is gorey but I don't really get any other horror traits from it. 
• I feel like Domingo should have been aged up at least a year to 18. He's 17 and I believe Atl is 22 or 23, which paired with the power imbalance of her being a vampire that could kill him in a heartbeat, made the romance just a bit icky. 
• The development of the above romance. It felt like Atl switched from 'absolutely not' to 'i love him' within a couple of paragraphs and I would have liked either more buildup or a smoother transition. 
• I didn't really connect with any of the characters. We had five POVs, and three of those were always very brief which didn't allow for any connection to them while also taking time away from Domingo and Atl. Ana was great until she just wasn't, for plot reasons, and I think Rodrigo's internal POV/motivations were unnecessary. 

I also just really don't know how I feel about the ending!! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Gore, Violence, Gun violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Death of parent, Death, and Vomit

Minor: Animal death and Colonisation

maresuju's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Gore, Adult/minor relationship, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, and Violence

Moderate: Addiction, Grief, Gun violence, Sexual violence, Death of parent, and Death

Minor: Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Torture, Animal death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Kidnapping, Rape, and Trafficking