Reviews with content warning for Rape - The Shards

Reading this book was weird because throughout reading this i felt that it was mediocre in a lot of ways but, for some reason, i still couldn't stop reading it.

I did not like any of the characters, the writing was disappointing, some sentence that were supposed to make you want to read it more made me cringe so hard because of how bad and abundant they were and the book didn't needed to be that big.

Yet i still really like this book, i don't know, i had fun reading this for some reason. Maybe it's because ive been waiting for a while a book that like feels like gossip. And this very much felt like gossip, but with like unlikeable characters (which makes it even better actually, i just love reading about insufferable people (my next read might be the secret history after this))

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dylan2219's review against another edition

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dark mysterious slow-paced

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

3.25

In so many ways typical BEE fare - here are the brands, here are the bands, here are the cars, here are the drugs, here are the blood and the cum and the emotional nihilism - but also has a weirdly mournful quality brought by his stab at (parody of?) auto fiction. The book is maddeningly repetitive and overlong - definitely a consequence of his serialisation of it - and for long stretches I was bored out of my mind. Even if this is the desired effect, it remains (like in American Psycho) massively unpleasant to read. Like that book, too, sex and violence are treated with a medical-gothic style that makes it grow increasingly anaesthetic. It would be more effective without Ellis’ needless signposting that he is chasing after that feeling of blunting and numbness that he has cultivated his whole career. By the far the most interesting aspect, improved by his own reading of the audiobook, is the way he seems genuinely traumatised and haunted by his own career and life. He is aware that his childhood and adolescence has infected him with a kind of strange desire for transgression, that ultimately leaves him cold and affectless. His books, too, have brought him no pleasure, and writing feels more like a way for him to try and get it all out of his system. I can respect and admire this, and we are given more insight into Ellis’ protagonist (and hence, self) by the level of first-person psychological detail, in a way that is more compelling than in his other work. And the narrative twists, and slow unravelling of this voice as the book goes on only adds to the appeal. Not sure I think this is a good book, but there are things about it I enjoyed.

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kayewa's review against another edition

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dark slow-paced

4.0

Probably should have known a Less Than Zero - American Psycho mash-up was always going to be where BEE’s journey took us. It’s absolutely too long, it’s definitely not for the faint of heart, and if you tired of his long lists of 80s brands / music years ago, he’s still doing that, but I’m still here for his drugged out nihilist dreamscape when he’s making it work. Definitely glad he took time from hosting his wretch podcast for this.

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valeriekate's review against another edition

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dark mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
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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