Reviews tagging 'Bullying'

Let the Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist

81 reviews

maddireads13's review against another edition

dark mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Bullying, Child abuse, Death, Gore, Pedophilia, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Torture, Blood, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail

jiggityjog's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-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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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Pedophilia, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal death, and Child abuse

gringolet's review against another edition

dark tense medium-paced

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

4.0

The gender stuff is. complicated. Mileage may vary on that front. Personally, I enjoyed this book, and while some of the vast array of interwoven story lines are less engaging or emotionally affecting than others, the central relationship between Oskar and Eli really works.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Bullying, Death, Gore, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Stalking, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

hejsansvejsan's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad fast-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Child abuse, Blood, and Murder

jbcrue's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Cursing, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicide, Terminal illness, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Medical content, Cannibalism, Medical trauma, Suicide attempt, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

beeping_librarian's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense 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

3.5

Still unsure what the point was, if there was one, but it was an interesting and unsettling ride.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Bullying, Gore, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Violence, and Murder

elvenpanther's review against another edition

dark mysterious fast-paced

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

4.25

Lindqvist managed to write this in such a way, that despite being uncomfortable at how twisted much of this novel was, I was throughly engrossed and could not put it down. I enjoyed how he wove the story through the view points of several members of the community and how he tied all of those "individual" narratives together.
This novel was dark, and gritty, and explored so much more than "monster" trope. In a way, it focused on how monstrous people could be. How sometimes it's not what goes bump in the night that you need to fear, but instead your neighbor or your classmate. It explored broken people, broken families and broken children and their struggle to navigate the world when they feel alone.
I didn't really know what to expect when starting this, and yes some parts of the novel made me squirm, but overall I enjoyed it. I had watched the Swedish film adaptation after and I will say I appreciate how much more in depth the book went. It made for a much more complex and visceral narrative than the movie.
*As a warning, the book does strongly contain the topic of pedophilia*

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Bullying, Pedophilia, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Medical trauma, and Murder

Minor: Animal death

jaedia's review against another edition

Did not enjoy

the paedophile perspective. At all. Why? I'm sure something comes of it later but ew

. The writing style was fine enough to read but the story itself just felt too mundane and I couldn't get interested. None of the characters were interesting to me, or loveable. Even when

the vampire attacks somebody

there was no excitement there, I didn't feel gripped, no suspense. I was just bored. Decided not to waste my time further. It may well pick up but many books to read, little time!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Bullying, Child abuse, Death, Pedophilia, Toxic relationship, Blood, Suicide attempt, Murder, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body shaming, Child death, and Fatphobia

owlribbon's review against another edition

dark sad 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? It's complicated

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Child abuse, Gore, Pedophilia, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail

cousinrachel's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

The movie (Swedish original) had a much more "spare" plot with fewer characters and tangents--better for it, I think. My goodness, this book was all over the place--I think I read it about ten years ago but IIRC, 1/2 of the plot was about Oskar and Eli, the rest being side characters doing god knows what.

Also, the violence was gratuitous beyond belief, to the point of being ludicrous. My lord. Did we need that much information about the

alcoholic pedophile

?

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Death, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual violence, Violence, and Murder

A homeless, alcoholic man sexually abuses a child prostitute whose pimp has knocked out his front teeth. This man later develops an attraction to a different child, a vampire, becomes devoted to the child and enslaves himself to finding victims. When he ceases to be useful the child eats him, but he doesn't fully die and becomes a zombie-vampire. The zombie man then rapes the child.

The vampire child murders several people in order to eat them: she tricks someone into thinking she is injured so that the person tries to help and lets his guard down, enabling the child to kill him. A woman survives an attack only to become a vampire herself, and later sets herself on fire to avoid harming anyone else. Her fiance seeks revenge for her against the vampire, who overpowers and graphically slaughters him.