Reviews with content warning for Blood - Meddling Kids

Reviews tagging 'Blood'

Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero

24 reviews

monarchbooks's review against another edition

adventurous 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

4.0

I don't know what I was expecting going into this book but it was not what I got. Every page shocked me. A bit wordy and heavy on metaphors. Unexpected queer rep.

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sn8man's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.0

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thelittleone's review against another edition

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adventurous dark lighthearted mysterious tense fast-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

3.25

Very talented writer, and a great riff on Scooby Doo and Lovecraft with a few unique spins. I probably would have rated this higher if it weren’t for one thing: I cannot stand Andy.

As a take on Scooby Doo, most of the cast stays true to character as darker, more realistic versions of themselves haunted by a harrowing investigation in their teen years. However, the author combines Daphne and Velma into one character, named Kerri, and introduce Andy in Velma’s place.

Andy is introduced in a scene

fighting off multiple grown men twice her size in a bar fight with ease.

She’s capable of about doing anything to save the day,

as she “learned to fight” when training in the military for a year (which she ran away from). Also, she broke out of prison.

Look, I get the book is about Lovecraftian horrors and that requires me to suspend my disbelief a bit, but this gets into the territory of “look at my super cool original character” aka Mary Sue.

Also, there’s a coming of age story here about Andy, who is a non-binary lesbian, falling in love

with her childhood best friend, Kerri.

I am absolutely here for it, and at a high level I love it. There’s moments where it feels like a really candid take on the confusion about navigating the unknown between two young women who care immensely about each other. But, other times it absolutely gives “man writes lesbians” vibes.

When Andy confesses her feelings to Kerri, she tells her that she’s been “fantasizing” about her since she was 13 years old. If a man confessed his feelings to his childhood best friend and said he’s been “fantasizing” about her since he was 13 years old, she would probably be terrified and grossed out. But a woman says it and it’s okay? There’s also a scene where Andy forces a celebratory kiss onto Kerri when Kerri has already told Andy that she doesn’t like women and it just feels like a violation of Kerri’s autonomy.

Also, there’s a graphic scene early on in the book

where Kerri has a nightmare about being violently molested.

It feels really out of place from the rest of the book, and I just can’t help but think that a woman author would never include a scene like that in a book so why does a male author feel the need to do it?

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dexkit10's review against another edition

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dark mysterious 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

4.25

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madladhatter's review against another edition

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adventurous funny 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

4.0

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matcha_cat's review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny medium-paced

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

2.0

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readerfromtheblacklagoon's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious 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

3.5

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preciouslittleingenue's review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny reflective tense 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? No

4.5

Oh this was just so FUN!

It's totally not something I'd pick up on my own. The presence of tentacles on the front cover, making it a "monster book" would have immediately put me off it if it wasn't a rec from a friend. And let me tell you, I am so glad they did recommend it.

The start is STRONG and throws you right into it without mincing words. It's almost like you've been thrown a pile of newspaper clippings and have to piece it together as the narrative unfolds and then watch it all fall into place. Loved that. At first this stylistic choice made me feel very removed from the characters, but this didn't last long at all. I was DOWN BAD for Kerri and Andy. Right from the beginning where Andy has that incredible passage personifying Kerri's hair...I knew I would go down with this ship. I, myself, have been head over heels for far too many curly redheaded femmes. Nate was not *unloveable*, but he just didn't shine like the girls did. But that's okay. It's about time the sapphics outshone the men in a novel, especially one written by a man!

The mystery had me guessing! And I wasn't right at first! It definitely ended up being more whacky and goofy than anticipated, but when the book is a direct reference to Scooby Doo and there's a literal Zoinx river...I didn't care too much haha.

So many of Andy's one-liners had me rolling on the floor. I bookmarked them in the audiobook but it returned. Will add later. The group banter was excellent. The METAPHORS had me laughing. The way he described a thought being stopped from coming out of Andy's mouth like a person being stopped by a burly bouncer...WHO COMES UP WITH THAT! It's brilliant and so funny.

The hurt/comfort bed sharing scene???? I WAS ON MY KNEES!

Thoughts on certain aspect of twist ending:

Important to note: Lindsay Ellis has a great video unpacking this topic, but the twist ending DOES contribute to the harmful stereotype that all trans women are just evil men dressed as women, who dress as women for the express purpose of doing said evil. Of course I don't think that was the author's intention, but in the world we live in, we need to at least acknowledge that these tropes can still find their way into media, however innocent and dormant they seem.

Other than that! The twists were GREAT. Only saw them coming like a page ahead of when they actually came. And the VERY LAST ONE AT THE END. I WAS GIGGLING LIKE CRAZY. WHAT A WAY TO END.

I should have known that the SCOOBY DOO BOOK would have a talking dog.

This is what I'm talking about. A level of unhinged I would never usually go for but I'm so glad I did. Amazing. So close to perfect.

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hauntedboi's review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny lighthearted mysterious 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

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ash_ton's review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny mysterious 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

3.0

Okay so. Originally I had given this book 4 stars but after thinking about it, I lowered it to 3. I couldn't get past a lot of things no matter how much I liked the actual story.

First, though, no matter how much I complain, I did like the book. I like the concept of the

talismans

even though I know that isn't a novel (haha) idea. I was still shocked and wasn't expecting

the kids to be part of the ritual.

I also wasn't expecting

Dunia Deboen to be involved, nor was I expecting her to be Damian Deboen.

Maybe in hindsight it should have been obvious but *shrugs*. So, despite the things I'm about to complain about, I did like the book because the story itself was good, in my opinion.

These are things I know others have talked about, so I'm just going to be another voice agreeing with them. The random insertion of the script format throughout the book wa sso jarring and unecessary. It did nothing for the storyline. If all the dialogue would have been in script format, sure. But that would've sucked and I would have hated it lol. In the same vein, I hated the amount of ridiculous "big" words added that seemingly were only there to beef up the sentences. Also, the made up words as well. Myriaphonic, as far as I can tell from googling, is not a real word. After some clicks, I found out a miraphone is a type of tuba, so maybe that's what he was going for? But like, bud. Pick something else.
The one random 4th wall break 75% into the book was also super jarring and unnecessary to me. If you're going to break the 4th wall, only doing it once isn't gonna cut it. Is the book self-aware or not?
My one last small gripe is how

Dunia/Damian spoke at the end. Like he was trying to be old but hip at the same time. No one, not even a 200 year old dude, is gonna talk that cringy and weird.

One last thing. I'm confused about the ending. I get that Tim is Sean's great-grandson. Fine. Makes sense. But

the spirit inhabiting Tim says he's been possessing all the dogs and that it got easier when Kerri was at college? And then the spirit makes Tim smile "bittersweetly" and says "It's all been done before." Bro wtf does that mean.

Idk if I'm just stupid, but I don't understand. I don't see anyone else mentioning that part.

Bottom line: I liked the book/story, I just mostly hated some of the writing style. Usually, I can get over that and in this case I did. I'd still recommend it, especially if you like Scooby Doo and/or retellings.

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