Reviews tagging 'Gore'

Cows by Matthew Stokoe

76 reviews

amymariereads's review against another edition

dark fast-paced

• Loveable characters? No

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Fatphobia, Gore, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Abortion, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

thede5tiny's review against another edition

challenging dark tense fast-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Death, Gore, Rape, Excrement, and Murder

mackwhyte's review against another edition

dark fast-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Fatphobia, Gore, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Sexism, Sexual violence, Torture, Blood, Vomit, Abortion, Murder, and Pregnancy

psychogen's review against another edition

dark sad fast-paced

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

2.25

Obvious reflection of society and the place of an individual in said society. Focus on darkness and emptiness of the world and people within.

For my taste too much focus in disgusting details for the sake of being shocking. There is no natural development into crazy things, all is described as horrible as possible. 

In comparing for example “American Psycho” managed to show insanity inside the normal world, which “cows” misses to deliver on.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Medical content, Medical trauma, Abortion, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, and Sexual harassment

promisesatsundown's review against another edition

challenging dark medium-paced

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

3.0

I gave into the hype that is so frequently mentioned in my favorite horror subreddits about this book. I’ve read a decent amount of extreme horror and knew somewhat of what I was getting into. 

I found the parts about Steven’s daily life far more interesting than the actual cow part of the story. That part I just could not take seriously and it bordered on comical. 

But then I started to think, Steven has been horribly abused his whole life and has had no real exposure to the outside world- what’s to say that anything in the book is truly happening? Maybe he’s just sitting on his bed, the TV on and nothing is real. 

It’s gross and shocking for sure, if you can’t stomach gore, bodily waste, beastiality, or animal abuse, skip this one. But if you can realize it’s just a book and try and analyze what the underlying themes are (isolation, mental illness, the need for human affection) it’s not completely devoid of merit. Three starts for what (I think) the author was trying to say and for the prose itself, which was quite good considering the subject matter. All in all, at least I can say I read it. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Gore, Sexual content, Blood, and Excrement

beastiality

kingnixon's review against another edition

challenging dark sad medium-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gore, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Slavery, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Cannibalism, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail

sylvermoon's review against another edition

dark medium-paced

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

1.5

Basically splatterpunk. Didn’t enjoy it at all, and not even for gore / similar reasons. Cows speaking and the slaughterhouse environment were so ridiculous. I would have DNF, except I don’t ever do that. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Incest, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

brutallybookish's review against another edition

dark sad tense medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Gore, Sexual violence, Suicide, and Murder

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Excrement, and Vomit

jocelyn73c's review against another edition

challenging dark sad tense fast-paced

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

3.0

I'm not a big splatterpunk reader. Extreme gore is not really my thing. This book really pushed a lot of my boundaries, but that being said I thought the writing was good and there was an actual message about male isolation and dominance over others that I thought was well illustrated. I won't ever read it again, but I'm not mad I read it this one time.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gore, Mental illness, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Self harm, Sexual content, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Medical content, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail

This is a splatterpunk book and probably should not be read by someone who isn't familiar with the genre. It's very graphic and challenging.

spphynx's review against another edition

challenging dark fast-paced

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

5.0

Absolutely the worst and best book I’ve read so far this year. Very challenging. I mean, really wow, what the fuck.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Gore, Rape, Excrement, Vomit, Medical content, and Abortion