Reviews tagging 'Body horror'

The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton

35 reviews

a_little_wonky's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.0

Really intriguing premise and writing. I usually stay away from mystery/thriller because I find them predictable but this wasn’t, by any stretch of the imagination - and there were many stretches of the imagination. I’d definitely have to read this a second time to catch all the little clues now that I know the ending. Honestly I’m sure I missing things because it was so fast-paced I just kept going, I couldn’t put it down. 4 stars because I do think some plot lines were left hanging (I hate intentionally misleading clues that are never resolved), and time travel isn’t really my jam. But definitely worth the read. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child death, Death, Violence, Blood, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, and Forced institutionalization

Minor: Addiction, Rape, and Suicide

gracescanlon's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional tense slow-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

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child death, Confinement, Death, Gun violence, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Animal death, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Medical content, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Drug abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Vomit, Fire/Fire injury, and War

lemerrier's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious slow-paced

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

3.75

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child death, Death, Fatphobia, Violence, Death of parent, and Murder

Moderate: Drug use and Self harm

kirtreads's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense slow-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

4.25

This book has such a fun premise, the setting is fun, and it has some great twists throughout. The author does a good job of capturing the Agatha Christie vibe very well. 

However, this book has some issues. First, there are so many characters and all have small details that you need to remember. It gets very complicated and some of it feels redundant. The main character says his head feels full to bursting by the end and I agree.

Second, this book had some characters that just did not meet to be in there. I think we could have done with one or two less perspectives and had a tighter grip on the details as the reader. I often felt lost in the plot and then info dumped on. 

Lastly, the big plot reveal for Aidan.

You are telling me this man gets trapped in this hellscape, doesn’t remember who he is, then he learns this woman is a friend, but she betrays him for a reason we really don’t know, gets cool with that real quick, learns she murders his sister in some horrific way and still decides, yeah, I’ll go on the run with this woman?  At no point did I ever feel these two were connected that deeply so the ending felt forced. I get letting her escape but now having to run away and spend his life on the run for this woman is crazy. I get what the author was doing and that the two died to themselves but you gotta make me believe it a little bit more.

Overall, despite the issues it was a fun pool read that I will still recommend to people I know love Agatha. Not the best book I have ever read, but very fun. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child death, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Torture, Violence, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Drug use, and Sexual assault

brittaanson's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

2.0

I wanted to love this book, and the beginning really sucked me in with the mystery. The structure is ambitious and intriguing, but by the end, I was confused and unsatisfied. Partly due to the nature of the plot, there wasn’t any deep character development, and as the truth of what was going on was revealed, I disliked the story more and more. The ending has so many twists that didn’t feel completely earned, and by that point I didn’t care about any of the characters. The rules, ethics, and motivations of those driving the story remain ill-defined to me. I didn’t enjoy the violence and aggressive fat phobia in the book. However, I will concede that the cleverness of the overall concept may be enough for someone else to find more satisfaction in this read than I did. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Alcoholism, Body horror, Body shaming, Death, Drug abuse, Fatphobia, Gore, Physical abuse, Suicide, Torture, Blood, and Murder

Moderate: Self harm

Minor: Rape and Stalking

juanat77's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense 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? It's complicated

3.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Bullying, Child death, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Gore, Gun violence, Infidelity, Physical abuse, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

wickedgrumpy's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

2.5

To relate it to a movie mash up, take Being John Malkovich and pair it with Knives Out with a dash of unexplained world building sci-fi time loop situation. 

Premise was quite good, but the execution suffered.  It dragged in the middle and the wrap up at the end wasn’t very satisfying because it left so many questions unanswered.

---

Content Warnings

Minor: Ableism, Addiction, Alcoholism, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gore, Gun violence, Infidelity, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Medical trauma, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Dysphoria, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

jess_tries2read's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny inspiring mysterious tense fast-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? Yes

5.0

This book was completely unique to anything I had read. It took the trope of a dramatic murder at a creepy, rich-people mansion to a whole other level.

The story starts in the most dramatic way possible: a consciousness in a body they don't remember, nor do they remember anything else, except one name, Anna. This character is dragged into a neverending whirlwind of events once he sees a woman sprinting through the forest crying for help. Eventually he ends up a Blackheath, a blighted estate that once held prestige, until it was marred by the death of one of the Hardcadtle children 19 years ago. 

The unique mystery had me in its grip until it ended.

 

The implication of the cosmic race/justice system is so compelling. The Plague Doctor was a great figure, terrifying and illuminating. You were scared to see him but also thrilled because you get to peek behind the veil of the bigger story. The body switching was the perfect, dramatic backdrop to obscure the simpler mystery of Evelyn's death.

5/5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Suicide, and Blood

Minor: Body horror, Sexual harassment, and Classism

breadbummer's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

3.5

On the whole, it's an interesting premise. What if someone took your run-of-the-mill Victorian murder mystery but twisted it a little to make it so the same person was living the same day over and over again in other people's bodies? In my case, as someone who's always found sleuth stories about rich people getting murdered at fancy parties to be cheesy and repetitive, I found this story to be...well, cheesy and repetitive. Not repetitive in itself, but it uses the types of characters and themes typically found in this genre.

As far as content goes, whenever a cis man writes a book like this with not a few female characters in it, I expect a "she breasted boobily down the stairs" moment to show itself before too terribly long or at least for pretty much all the women to fall for the central male character (no matter how strongly they're written) but, to my pleasant surprise, I don't ever actually remember this happening. HOWEVER!!! If you're particularly sensitive to fatphobia, don't bother even touching this book, much less opening it up. The rather long section in which the main character goes through the day as Ravencourt is punctuated pretty much every sentence or two with disgust of the host's body. It got to be so uncomfortable that I almost dropped the book entirely if it weren't for the fact that I was behind on my reading goal.

I just finished it like half an hour ago, so my take on the ending might still need some time to cook, but I think I enjoyed it. I certainly got got about who the culprit ended up being (which took me some time to appreciate more), and I thought the idea of this whole scenario of Blackheath being kind of like

the episode "White Christmas" from Black Mirror absolutely fascinating to say the least (still wondering if the events at the mansion actually happened earlier on in the timeline and that the plague doctors gained control of it or if absolutely everything was conjured up by them).

I was originally gonna go with a rating of 3.25, but these final twists bumped it up a bit.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body shaming, Child death, Death, Fatphobia, Suicide, Stalking, Murder, and Classism

Moderate: Confinement, Gun violence, Self harm, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Animal death, Body horror, Drug use, Rape, Sexual assault, Blood, and Car accident

bergha1998's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense 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

3.75

It’s a groundhog’s day Clue mystery. Everyday the main character wakes up as a different guest at a country party trying to solve a murder. Every different guest has the MC’s soul, but their own personalities and wants. The plot twists are crazy. Such a good mystery with a lot about morality and character development. 

Murder Mystery, Slightly Fantastical, Lots of Violence/Murders

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Body horror, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Infidelity, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Suicide attempt, Murder, Abandonment, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Rape and Sexual assault