Reviews tagging 'Sexual assault'

The Cellar by Richard Laymon

5 reviews

jcliff's review

dark funny tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes

4.5

Richard Laymon writes like Stephen King with fewer scruples and a good editor. Fast-paced and about as sleazy as I was expecting, but with a few surprisingly lovable characters. Massive content warnings for sexual assault, child abuse, and misogyny, so read with caution. As a huge fan of video nasties and specifically Stuart Gordon's movies, though, this feels like Castle Freak in novel form - would recommend to anyone else with extreme horror brain rot. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Kidnapping

add_a_little_spook's review against another edition

challenging dark 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? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Murder, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Grief

brokenlyrium's review

dark mysterious sad tense 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? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Gun violence, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence

kmt75's review

dark fast-paced

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

3.0

Good. God. This is hilariously bad.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Incest, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Kidnapping, Stalking, Murder, and Fire/Fire injury

jordanaholberton's review

3.5

despite this high ish rating this book is terrible do not read it, I think about it so often and it never fully leaves my mind. Very disturbing and difficult to read, terrifying ending with no closure. So weird and goes into specifics. I do not get uncomfortable easily but this book made me so uncomfortable. This is not in a oh yeah I love weird books this will be great for me way, I am actually telling you not to read it. Check trigger warnings and take them seriously if you are going to ignore me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Incest, Rape, Sexual assault, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Extremely disturbing, as someone who does not get triggered easily this book was very difficult to read and disgusted me many times. Take the content warnings seriously as it is not just once or twice but a large portion of the book. I would recommend not reading it if you have any doubts as I am still unable to stop thinking about the things that happened in this book.

Kidnapping, child abuse and pedophilia are major story lines in this book and is talked about in depth regularly. The main characters are a mother and her 12(?) year old daughter that are running away from the formerly imprisoned father. He was imprisoned for child abuse to the daughter and was abuse to the mother as well I believe. While the father is chasing them to the city they run to, he kidnaps a little girl, kills her family and continuously rapes and abuses her while he tries to find the mother and daughter. These instances are not talked about in extreme depth but it is obviously clear and not skipped over at all. It is described unnecessarily. In the town the characters deal with some killings in the beast house. Later it is found that they are a human/dog/wolf hybrid animal killing people. Near the end, the father gets to the town and kidnaps a teenage girl as well. The mother and daughter make friends with two guys trying to kill the beast and go to help him. the beast kills the men when there turns out to be like seven of them and also humans living with and helping them. The beasts and humans take the mother and daughter hostage and keep them locked in the cellar to impregnate them with wolf/human hybrid monster children. The teenager and kidnapped child escape from the father, this is the only positive as the last page ends with the mother pregnant with a wolf baby and the daughter saying she hopes she gets pregnant from jason (a dog). These are not wolf/humans in a twilight way either i must add, this is in a beastiality gross disgusting want to barf way. If you still want to read this book after this description I do not know what to tell you, I read this book almost a year ago and it still haunts me to this day.