Reviews tagging 'Alcohol'

Ανεμοδαρμένα Ύψη by Emily Brontë

39 reviews

elenaaurora's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

domestic abuse, alcohol abuse, class, education, money, revenge, love, work, the mountains, ghosts and tomb stones. 
don’t read this if you’re sad or too sensitive. 
 catherine haunting the narrative for the whole book. 

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readingwithkaitlyn's review against another edition

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

3.0


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ghostsversion's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This book really was… something. Compared to Agnes Grey, this was like going from learning how to swim to diving in the middle of the ocean. This is of course a different type of book so it isn’t really a shock. I was shocked though when finding out that
the POV of this book were a Mr Lockwood and Ellen Dean, and not at the very least Catherine Linton nee Earnshaw.
It was a really interesting read and I might have rated it higher if not for
the excessive amount of incest and the constant racism and stereotyping of Romani people.
Also to the people who consider this a romance, I hear you and I somehow get you but please don’t go looking for this.

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bashsbooks's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Writing reviews for classics that I like is never easy - I always feel immense pressure to say something profound and original about a work that 1) I enjoyed and 2) so did everyone else. Of course, the trouble with such a well-liked book is that everything profound and original about it has already been said, more or less.

So let me say some basic and trite (but none the less true to how I feel) things about Wuthering Heights.
 
First and foremost, Brontë's toxic, passionate speeches from Heathcliff and Catherine (Sr.) about each other fuck severely. Catherine's "Nelly, I am Heathcliff" confession? Healthcliff's proclamation about the depth of Catherine's affection for him compared to Linton? The "You say I killed you - haunt me, then!" argument? All bangers. Go off, you absolute maniacs. 

Secondly, and speaking of the haunting by Catherine of Heathcliff, the thread of her ghost trying to get into Wuthering Heights throughout the tale is sewn into the story with just enough detail to be compelling without being overwrought - from the early scene Lockhood witnesses all the way to Heathcliff's death under the open window. I especially like the lack of concrete proof of the ghost and the skepticism of the storytellers themselves. 

And now, thirdly, the storytellers and the frame story in general have been fun to turn over in my head. From the beginning, I wondered, why are Lockwood and Nelly our narrators? I think there are dozens of valid answers to this question. Two of my favorites includeto create distance from the narrative to drop details & increase unreliability and to provide perspectives closer to the intended readers. I'm especially obsessed with Nelly Dean and the constant interjections of her opinions into her retelling. 

Something specific to the audiobook version that I listened to - the Spotify version read by Billie Fulford-Brown - is that it was read fantastically. Fulford-Brown clearly had a great handle on the text, reading all the dialogue with accurate emotion. She also gave the characters distinct voices without being over-the-top. Her performance made Brontë's mid-19th century prose much more accessible.

Anyway. There's a lot more I could say about Wuthering Heights - for example, Brontë's descriptions of the moors are a masterclass in thematic use of setting - but I'll cut myself off here, lest I write a whole paper. Let me end by saying it's fucked up that Kate Bush managed to successfully summarize and convey the main storyline of such a complex book in a 4.5-minute song after only watching the last ten minutes of a movie adaptation.

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asrasher's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

intense, absurd, bizarre, but I ended the book with a resounding emotion of "damn, I get why people love this book." 

it takes you on a truly immense character journey spanning 3 generations and 50 years - and doesn't start coming together till the last chapter or so. 

overall, completely worthy of its legendary status. I felt like honestly it could have been longer/more fleshed out at the end, that's my only critique. The wrap up of the younger generations story and the breaking of the cycle of trauma felt possibly like something EB struggled to write, or express. Which to be fair, makes sense.

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josisreads's review against another edition

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dark mysterious sad
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated

3.0


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maayanaravot's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark sad tense 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

4.25

This book is a total adventure to read. It has very dark themes of abuse and is filled with hate and revenge. Even so, the book is written so well and i found it enjoyabke to read. After i fished it, i didnt know what to make of it, what was the point? I wasnt sure how much i liked it. But over time ive grown to like the book more and see how it explores trauma and clinging to the past. Idk if id reccomend it to anyone tho, cuz its very tense. 

The only character i really liked is edgar, he deserved better.

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ejthephoenix's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0


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riverofhorton's review against another edition

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This book is incredibly violent, with every kind of toxic relationship and abuse you can think of, with the kind of casual racism and misogyny that I have at this point come to expect from 19th Century fiction. That said, I may well return to this book at a later date, since there were a few scenes that I found to be quite thrilling, and I do find myself invested in the characters and their development. Right now just isn't the right time for me to be reading a book with this amount of violence.

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eva_vva's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5


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