Reviews tagging 'Physical abuse'

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon

40 reviews

scoads's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny inspiring mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.0

A book with more than a few problems and an interesting yet problematic take on autistic stereotypes in young boys, but a very compelling and suspenseful story told from an interesting perspective, very close to my heart.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Animal death, Child abuse, Death, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Violence, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, and Abandonment

camoo3032's review against another edition

tense medium-paced

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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Infidelity, Violence, Blood, and Excrement

Minor: Ableism, Cancer, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Suicide, Medical content, Dementia, Murder, and Alcohol

another_dahlia's review against another edition

dark emotional medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Police brutality, and Abandonment

Moderate: Bullying and Infidelity

Minor: Vomit

lillelow's review against another edition

dark emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.0

Read this when I was younger and for some reason something about it stuck in my head, so I decided to read it again as an adult. Apparently I’d forgotten most of the plot because I didn’t remember the major plot twist, but other than that, the book didn’t stand out to me as much this time around.

If you have no experience with autism and would like an insight into what that might look like (which I think everyone should) this will probably be a very eye-opening book and I’d absolutely recommend it. But if you’re already familiar with autism, I guess it doesn’t make that much of an impact - hence why I don’t find it as mind-blowing to read now as when I was younger and probably didn’t know as much. The story in itself is actually quite tragic and other than the plot twist, it’s all rather predictable - so the score ends up somewhere in the middle for me. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death

Moderate: Ableism, Bullying, Confinement, Cursing, Eating disorder, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Violence, Vomit, Death of parent, Gaslighting, and Abandonment

reddeddy's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Animal death, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Toxic relationship, Excrement, Vomit, and Abandonment

Moderate: Body horror, Bullying, Confinement, Drug use, Infidelity, Sexual content, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Vomit, Grief, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, and Alcohol

Minor: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Drug abuse, Self harm, Police brutality, Dementia, Kidnapping, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail

lana_reads98's review against another edition

adventurous inspiring reflective medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Infidelity, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic relationship, Vomit, and Alcohol

Moderate: Physical abuse, Police brutality, and Death of parent

samburkhouse's review against another edition

adventurous lighthearted medium-paced

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

2.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, and Abandonment

Moderate: Animal death and Violence

Minor: Alcohol

charliesmith1564's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative mysterious reflective sad 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? No

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, and Physical abuse

cehanzen's review against another edition

adventurous hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense slow-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? Yes

3.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, and Physical abuse

kaylamoran's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful sad medium-paced

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

3.0

I'm genuinely torn on this book.  As far as enjoyment, I loved it.  But I don't think I can give it more than a 3 or recommend it because it just felt like a collection of autistic stereotypes clumsily thrown together.  Not that any of the behaviours are necessarily inaccurate, but I'm tired of how autism is only ever portrayed one way, we aren't all like Sheldon Cooper or Rainman.  We need different portrayals too.  

Also, I'm a bit alarmed by how many reviews describe Christopher as high functioning.  It's not the functioning labels that bother me, I only recently learned they were problematic myself.  It's the fact that Christopher clearly has very high support needs, and the fact that he's being considered high functioning reminds me of how autistics who are good at masking aren't believed.  If this is what's considered high functioning, we need more of an understanding of what autism is.

And I blame no one for that (if you wrote that in a review I totally get it, and I'm not upset and I don't think you did anything offensive).  Because it's BECAUSE this is the only portrayal we get that that causes the lack of understanding, it's not the reader's fault at all.  The lack of societal understanding of autism is largely due to this.

So yeah.  Portrayals like this are the reason I hear stuff like "you can't be autistic, you're too good at reading emotions" or "you're sarcastic" or "you're too pretty" or "girls aren't autistic."  And I guess it's not the books fault either, because it's a valid experience of autism and some people do fit this description.  I guess I just wish it wasn't the only one we saw.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Animal cruelty, and Animal death

Moderate: Cursing, Emotional abuse, Panic attacks/disorders, and Gaslighting

Minor: Infidelity and Physical abuse