Reviews tagging 'Abandonment'

She Is a Haunting by Trang Thanh Tran

28 reviews

devynreadsnovels's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective 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

2.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racism, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Alcohol, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Biphobia, Child abuse, Slavery, and Lesbophobia

margaretwaltemath09's review

dark mysterious 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

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Gore, Hate crime, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Racism, Sexism, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Kidnapping, Grief, Religious bigotry, Car accident, Suicide attempt, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Lesbophobia, Fire/Fire injury, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

elysianbud's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny 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

4.0

This made me cry several times. The characters are complicated people which I loved, especially the depths of Jade and her father. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Biphobia, Body horror, Death, Gore, Panic attacks/disorders, Racism, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Grief, Car accident, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

btrz7's review against another edition

dark reflective medium-paced

2.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment

Moderate: Alcoholism, Body horror, Death of parent, and Colonisation

lunarexorcist's review

dark mysterious sad slow-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

i thought this was a new adult book until like twenty pages in my bad. i was so let down jade was 17 and not... like... 22.

i cried at the last forty pages but then went "what. what? what???" until the end. unhinged. i cant decide if it was unhinged in a genius or stupid way, but i will say that

being horny for a ghost that is horny for you also in a toxic yuri way and also a "wow you are so repressed colonialism slash misogyny slash queerphobia is a hell of a thing huh"

is one of the more unique interpretations of "this house eats people" ive seen. 

i think the fact everyone sucks so bad throws people off but that just made my chest ache with how real it felt. that was my dad. thats my eldest daughter trauma. im gonna lose it.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Racism, Xenophobia, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Child abuse, Confinement, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Misogyny, Sexism, Slavery, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Grief, Car accident, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Abandonment, and Alcohol

t0rixoxo's review

couldnt get into it, just wasnt interesting enough for me?

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood and Abandonment

vanessamariebooks's review

dark mysterious slow-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

2.5

I wish I could say I loved this, but it just wasn't for me. Way too much description and the writing tries to be lyrical/poetic, but it just ends up making things more confusing (and the story was already pretty confusing to begin with). I do think that for the chapters that start with a body organ (kidney, liver, brain, etc.) the lyrical/poetic writing works well with these chapters, but I wish it would have been used for those chapters only and not Jade's chapters as well. I appreciate the topics/themes it tries to tackle (colonialism, intergenerational trauma, bisexuality), but it fell a little flat to me and didn't feel fully fleshed out. As for the characters, I honestly didn't care about any of them, even Jade, our MC. I didn't hate them, but I didn't love any of them either; I was really indifferent. This was also a really slow read, and I was bored throughout most of it. If it wasn't for the audiobook, I definitely would have DNF in the beginning. On the plus side, the cover of this book is gorgeous (and one of the reasons I wanted to pick this one up)! 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Biphobia, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Racism, Grief, Abandonment, and Colonisation

steppenfreak's review

dark emotional tense 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

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation

Moderate: Body horror, Death, Racism, Suicide, Violence, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail

uncreativeoops's review

dark emotional mysterious 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

3.75

The vibes were immaculate, which is pretty important for a gothic horror novel, and the author managed to create an eerie and tense atmosphere while also describing everything so aesthetically. The descriptions felt very... indirect? I sometimes had to reread parts because I wasn't sure what was actually happening but that is by no means a criticism; I adored the language. Plotwise however, I struggled a bit. Haunted houses only work if the characters have a good reason to be in them and not leave once, you know, they realize they might die. In this case, there were reasons for the main character not just going home, but they weren't strong enough for me. I got her motivations and I liked how her struggles with her family and her identity played out, but her behavior in the house was just ridiculous. And some of it seemed like it only happened to set up conflict between characters, the main thing that didn't work for me. Nearly every thing that characters got angry about was so obviously only there to create a shocking reveal and lead to an argument and some of the "dark secrets" I just straight up didn't consider as bad things. The romance also suffered from this.
My favorite thing however were the shorter horror chapters and how horror as a genre was used to discuss colonialism, racism, and sexism. Gothic horror has always been used to portray societal issues with supernatural metaphores and this was done so well here. I also have never read YA horror before and was pleasantly surprised how well these two can be mixed.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Racism, Violence, Death of parent, Abandonment, and Colonisation

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Body horror, Emotional abuse, Misogyny, Blood, Medical content, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Biphobia, Bullying, Homophobia, and Car accident

weirdassfanta's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.75

Beautifully written. This book gives you slight chills while showing that you are allowed to be angry and make mistakes. Also deals with colonization and struggling with your identity. It’s a great read for body horror lovers who are looking for something diverse.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Racism, Abandonment, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Car accident

Minor: Alcoholism and Alcohol

I will also warn people about the detailed and common talk of bugs in places they shouldn’t be, such as skin and food, as this is a trigger for me. So please be conscious of that if you decide to read this book.