Reviews tagging 'Medical trauma'

Miracle Creek by Angie Kim

21 reviews

omgmkg's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad 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

I’m not sure how to give this book a star rating. I found it insufferable at first because it was just so obvious that each perspective was obfuscating a lot. The inclusions of little details thrown in like “…before cigarettes and Matt” that were largely irrelevant to the current topic and I guess designed to build suspense just really didn’t work for me. It was super weird to have them especially since they were not in first person. The court room procedural was boring and unnecessarily detailed for me, hard to get through… until it wasn’t. At some point, I switched to the audiobook, which made things easier right away. And then the story itself got me. By the end of this book, I really liked it. I liked the dilemmas each character faces, I liked the deep complexity and conflict. 
It was also a compelling exploration of motherhood (but almost all of it is super dark, at least at first…)

Spoiler

the book really started to work for me when Young began to investigate and put the pieces of the puzzle together herself. Then, any obfuscation was by others for a REASON (they didn’t want her to find out the truth) rather than casually just not mentioning things or making them purposefully mysterious just for the reader. Her third person but limited perspective also worked for me here. And the book fully gelled into something pretty fantastic once the whole family knew the truth and disagreed about what to do next. That was really great writing and a super compelling challenge. It is where the heart of the book truly lies. I’m not sure how the author could have gotten there without at least some of the parts that didn’t work for me, but I wish there had been less purposeful misdirection and more focus on Young and her family.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Grief, Adult/minor relationship, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Infertility, Child abuse, Child death, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Sexual violence, and Suicide

Moderate: Xenophobia, Gaslighting, Excrement, Medical trauma, Sexism, Medical content, and Alcohol

moniipeters's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad 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
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Xenophobia, Blood, Body horror, Car accident, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Infertility, Injury/Injury detail, Infidelity, Medical content, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Murder, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Suicide, Abandonment, Child abuse, Child death, Death of parent, Gaslighting, Gore, Grief, Sexual content, Suicide attempt, Toxic relationship, Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Sexism, Violence, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, and Terminal illness

antidietleah's review against another edition

emotional mysterious medium-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? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Medical content, Sexual assault, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Suicide, Adult/minor relationship, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Racial slurs

shainabriley's review

adventurous dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical trauma, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Sexual assault

Minor: Suicide

lpdx's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Child abuse, Confinement, Injury/Injury detail, Ableism, Sexual assault, Child death, Medical content, Medical trauma, Suicide, Chronic illness, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Gore, and Rape

Minor: Excrement and Infertility

betsygrace's review

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

2.5

This was very popular and it’s been on my shelf for ages, so I finally decided to read it. I think it was overhyped. It’s a legal thriller, but there is this weird stigmatization of autism that I don’t like. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Medical content, Sexual violence, Toxic friendship, Bullying, Blood, Child abuse, Medical trauma, Murder, Sexual content, Child death, Classism, Confinement, Injury/Injury detail, Toxic relationship, and Violence

camz's review

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Child death, Chronic illness, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Infertility, Medical content, Medical trauma, and Murder

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Rape, and Pedophilia

jesscoast's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

I’ma little floored after wrapping up this devastating, complex, horrific book. Yet I’m incredibly impressed by the feat accomplished by Kim in telling this detailed, structured, gripping story.

With elements of horror and family drama woven through the intricate threads of Miracle Creek, it goes further than any courtroom thriller could be expected to do. The character’s back stories, family dynamics, motives and claims all come into question and all play out over an emotional four day trial. The book is not for the faint of heart and I did have trouble coming back to it in the beginning, but I felt a commitment to the characters to see it through to the end. Each new peice of information is a clue and the mystery begins to reveal itself along the many intentions, misguided deeds, web of lies, cover ups, and guilty consciousnesses. Each new discovery makes the reader reposition their theories and redirects the jury, making everyone a suspect and truly playing into the spirit of mystery. The execution of this story, though heartbreaking and gory, is brilliantly designed. The focus on pain and suffering, the tragedy and fall out, deaths and injuries caused by the explosion were all focused on the impact on victims and survivors, parents losing children or children losing patents. The seemingly random decisions and actions that compounded down a path to a deadly accident and the chaos and devastation that followed. This book curable certainly left an impact on me, I’ll be thinking about it for a long time to come. Its heaviness will sit with me, as will the strength of Theresa, Young, and many of the women in difficulty situations, the sacrifice of immigrant parents, and the struggles of mothers of disabled children in this story. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, Death of parent, Gore, Death, Medical trauma, Body horror, Child abuse, Grief, and Medical content

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship

katrinarose's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad 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

5.0

This book was beautiful and heartbreaking. I definitely understand the comparisons to Little Fires Everywhere with the writing style, mystery stemming from a fire, intensely explored parent-child relationships, and overall themes. I loved both books (and they do have plenty of differences from each other). 

The author does an incredible job making fully developed characters. Reading her writing makes me feel justified for every complaint I’ve made for other books not having good character development, because THIS is what good character development looks like (and I’m not just picky, although maybe I am that too.) Kim definitely puts you on an emotional rollercoaster - you begin hating a character from another character’s viewpoint but then you get humbled once you get the other character’s perspective, backstory, emotions, and motivations. It truly is a study of “there’s two sides to every story”, and I think it gives the reader a lot to think about, not just in the book, but how we interact with the stories told every day by people we know and especially online.

The storyline itself was very engaging; it was very hard to put the book down. I really enjoyed all the POVs, for the reasons listed above but also for how it propelled the story along. I’m in awe of how she kept the mystery going even when we did get the the perspectives of the one(s) who committed the crime. I like a court procedural style. The back and forth was very satisfying to me, and reminded me a little of The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest. I think it was believable but I think that’s because I found the characters so believable, and I understand a few criticisms of the crime plot’s unbelievability. However I don’t think it was enough to ruin or even affect my reading experience. 

I’m in love with Kim’s writing style too. She gives her characters such grace while not shying away from the dark things they do too. In my opinion she is a master of similes, never before have I seen them used so often with such strong effect. 

I feel like I could talk about this book forever but I’ll leave it at that. I can’t think of anyone I wouldn’t recommend this book to, except maybe minors due to some tough subjects. It’s a new favorite.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Chronic illness, Grief, Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Fire/Fire injury, Infertility, Infidelity, Pedophilia, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Medical trauma, Sexual assault, Child abuse, Death, Emotional abuse, Murder, and Racism

Moderate: Suicide, Sexual content, and Xenophobia

apiora215's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious 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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Car accident, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Sexual harassment, Suicide, Child death, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Infertility, Sexual violence, Ableism, Alcohol, Body horror, Death, Emotional abuse, Grief, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Medical trauma, Murder, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Suicide attempt, and Vomit