Reviews tagging 'Confinement'

American War by Omar El Akkad

8 reviews

blake245's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Fire/Fire injury, Murder, Blood, Body horror, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Deportation, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Hate crime, Pandemic/Epidemic, Torture, Toxic relationship, Trafficking, Violence, and War

frogggirl2's review against another edition

challenging dark medium-paced

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

5.0

What a stunning, impactful, important, well-characterized book!   There are a lot of complex things discussed here with a lot of depth and grace.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Confinement, Murder, Death, and Torture

wafflepolly's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark reflective medium-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

4.25

I think this is one of those books that is going to stay in my head for a long time. I strongly recommend listening to the NPR Throughline podcast episode "Extremist Futures" which features some really insightful input from the author about his thoughts, metaphors, and own experiences behind the book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, War, and Death

Moderate: Genocide, Death of parent, Confinement, and Grief

hopefulpterodactyl's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Violence, Torture, Suicidal thoughts, War, Blood, Gun violence, Death, Confinement, Alcohol, Genocide, and Forced institutionalization

keegan53's review against another edition

challenging dark fast-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

5.0

An amazing book. The world building is fantastic and there is amazing character development. So well crafted. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Grief, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Excrement, Kidnapping, Alcohol, Blood, Car accident, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Torture, Racism, Terminal illness, Violence, Mental illness, Self harm, Sexual content, War, and Murder

esem's review against another edition

dark sad medium-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, War, and Confinement

hmatt's review against another edition

dark reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

Incredibly powerful. This is such a hard but also necessary time to read this sort of work - or just this work, in particular. I read quite a bit of speculative fiction and I still can't quite compare this book to much else. Think World War Z, but closer to home, more realistic, and more political. I was wowed at how I could both disagree with the protagonists and also empathize with them (the mark of great characterization, IMO). 

If you like audiobooks, it's short-ish and extremely well narrated. Plot-wise, it almost lost me about two-thirds of the way through, but quickly turned back around and tied everything together.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Torture, Physical abuse, and Confinement

Moderate: Death, Genocide, Grief, Gun violence, and Mass/school shootings

Minor: Suicide

sophiace's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

• Strong character development? Yes
• 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: Torture, Violence, Death, Confinement, and Blood