Reviews tagging 'Drug abuse'

Whiskey When We're Dry by John Larison

2 reviews

sarahkorn's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

4.25

I picked this up at random looking for another cowgirl/sapphic western and was very pleasantly surprised at how good this book was. Lots of cowboy gun-slinging action, beautiful place setting, and a loveable yet complicated cast of characters. Jess as the lead had a huge heart, and I was warmed by the overall message.

There are two big downsides for me: lots of violence/gore (personal preference - check the trigger warnings) and heavy usage of racial slurs. I understand the argument that could be made about keeping the language accurate to the time period (that part I think succeeded) but at a point, especially for a book written by a white male author, it's excessive and fairly lazy as a creative device in 2024.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gore, Gun violence, Racial slurs, Racism, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Cultural appropriation, Alcohol, Colonisation, War, and Injury/Injury detail

amynbell's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense slow-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

2.5

I started out thinking I was going to love this book, but then it just went on and on with the fighting, making dumb choices, and people dying. The setting is somewhere out west during the mid to late 1800s. A teen girl is left orphaned on a homestead and decides to dress as a boy to go find her brother who has already left home and is wanted as a bank robber. She makes her living as a sharpshooter, and when she finally catches up to her brother, it turns out that he's being a Murderous Robin Hood for Jesus. People justifying doing horrible things in the name of religion always grates. StoryGraph lists this as being a fast-paced novel, but I found it to be an absolute slog. I loved it at 20%, was tired of it by 40%, and was skimming it by 80%. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Violence, Blood, Trafficking, Kidnapping, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail