Reviews with content warning for Rape - Malice

Reviews tagging 'Rape'

claireshields's review

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mysterious fast-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

4.25

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hoppyread's review

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dark mysterious reflective fast-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

4.0

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hikajelny's review

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challenging dark mysterious tense fast-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

From the beginning til the end, everything that I guessed or predicted were all wrong. You would have thought that you got the answer but no, it wasn’t as easy as this. Malice is a brilliantly written piece of literature that challenged your standpoint through the presentation of unreliableness of the materials presented, thus causing you to scrutinize everything. The author made it work without overcomplicating the plot through easy narration and direct explanation/discovery of a situation, motive, anything that might raise a question.

I was quite surprised to find out how fast the story progressed - when it came to thriller or detective theme story, the plot tended to be drawled out in a way that it felt the detective was “struggling” with the challenge through long description and abundance of hints to be parsed through but it was different for this book. It didn’t mean that the challenge didn’t exist, it was present strongly but written in a way that lulled you into a false sense of security. You were as confused as the characters — it was at the very least, basic in the manner of description to fit the image of, “This is it, this is what we know and there’s no need to talk poetry about it.” Hence, the fast pacing of the story (at the very least to me).

The characters portrayed are also very on-ground. It evoked strong emotions from you, whether it’s sense of justice, dread, pity, with the careful way the author wrote and developed them. It was truly brilliant with the way the author would call back and maintained the identity of the characters, then presenting it in a way that might lead you to believe otherwise.

It’s definitely a worth read — my guts were basically free falling and my brain worked overtime trying to piece everything out.

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a1exander's review

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challenging mysterious medium-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

3.75

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jhbandcats's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious sad fast-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

3.75

I really like all the Kiego Higashino books I’ve read, especially The Devotion of Suspect X. The ending was shocking; I felt like I’d been punched. Higashino is a master of the plot twist. However, I feel Suspect X is the pinnacle of his work and nothing I’ve read since has been quite as powerful. Of course when the bar is set so high, it’s difficult to surpass what’s already the best.

Malice is the first of a different series. It focuses more on plot than character. The man arrested for murder is such an unreliable narrator that it’s hard to see what he’s truly like. We learn more about Detective Kaga, and his guilt and remorse at failing a student who was being bullied back in his teacher days, but we don’t know anything else about him. We know nothing about his private life, his friends and family, his likes and dislikes - his character isn’t developed at all.

The plot, which is explained early on, changes repeatedly. The readers aren’t sure what’s true, and I found it confusing to have to keep rearranging my idea of what had happened. In the end I felt it was more of an overly complicated annoyance than a plot twist. That said, I’m about to start reading the second in the series to see what happens next.

Overall the book was complex and convoluted and, as such, was quite a feat. But I didn’t find it completely satisfying.

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x_tora's review

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dark mysterious fast-paced

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

3.25

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seaoftranquility's review against another edition

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mysterious

4.0

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nico_asteri's review against another edition

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dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

5.0

This book was amazing. I don't usually like mysteries because I get so annoyed with the genius detective trope that just magically notices exactly the thing they need to notice and somehow extrapolates the exact actions the killer took. This book was nothing like that. For one thing, you find out who the killer is pretty early in the book. The book is really about figuring out the motive behind the murder. Kaga, the detective, is certainly smart and perceptive, but I really liked how the narrative showed him working to find the answers as opposed to just magically knowing everything because he saw just the right piece of evidence. It was so great I plan to read others in this series. Kaga is officially my favorite fictional detective ever!

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