Reviews with content warning for Stalking - The Phantom of the Opera

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The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux

31 reviews

directorpurry's review against another edition

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mysterious sad medium-paced

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

4.75

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uparrowhead's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.5

A classic which, in my opinion, deserves to be considered timeless; the Phantom of the Opera raises the question on how we should treat the truly low members of society.

The novel introduces the story of the Opera Ghost, which stalks the shadows of the Paris Opera House and hunts for mischief and mystery. Strange events emerge and connect as the singer Christine Daaé slowly begins her rise in fame with her heavenly vocals, supposedly learning to sing from the Angel of Music. The reader navigates through this episodic novel and slowly gathers the truths to the unfolding story.

The Phantom of the Opera places a great emphasis on concepts of love, obsession, desire, and pity. How can we learn to, not love, but accept someone who is supposedly heartless? How can we take pity on people who are seemingly monstrous? How does unrecieved love mould into an overpowering obsession built upon desires we are unable to satisfy? The novel feels like it is truly a love letter to these themes as both pain and pleasure are combined into the flowing story.

I have loved this ever since watching the musical, and the original story that brought it to life is absolutely incredible.

I can't get over how beautifully tragic the ending for this novel is. It ends in Erik's death for his own overflowing love of Christine, one which he had never experienced with another woman in his life. It just serves to show how much Erik wished for nothing but a normal life but was cursed from the endeavour ever since he was first born just for his horrific features, leading him down a path of using his wits and intellect for his own disturbing gains as a way to not acknowledge his pain.

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ina_pages's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark funny mysterious sad medium-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

3.0

To say I expected a lot from this book would be an understatement, and sadly they weren’t full met (although I think that might be a fault on my end). I grew up watching the movie-musical adaptation, and the touring theater cast was all I could talk about for months when they finally made a stop in my home country. I love this story with my whole heart, but the source material is leaps different from the musical by Webber.

This isn’t to say this book was bad though! I did enjoy myself while reading it. The language, although not the easiest to read, isn’t totally archaic and I’d even recommend it for people whose first language isn’t English. If anything the language, to me, was one of the best parts of this book. Gaston Leroux often droned on about music and gothic architecture; and while that may not be everyone’s cup of tea, I thoroughly enjoyed his analogies.

< Leroux also makes use of a lot of metaphors relating to the sea or bodies of water. One of my favorites lines in the book reads like this: “In the orchestra stalls, the drugget covering them looked like an angry sea, whose glaucous waves had been suddenly rendered stationary by a secret order from the storm phantom, who, as everybody knows, is called Adamastor. MM. Moncharmin and Richard were the shipwrecked mariners amid this motionless turmoil of a calico sea.” Beautiful.>

What I found I couldn’t stand with this book were the characters. The simplest way I could describe Raoul in this book is a whiny, wimpy, cowardly white boy who did nothing but cry at every little inconvenience. I hated Raoul so much from start to finish, it actually amazing.

Christine was just a hair better but barely. In all versions of this story, Christine is depicted as a foolish and naive girl of pure innocence—she is literally likened as an angel throughout the book. However, I didn’t get naive or innocent… I just got stupid. Maybe I’m just pessimistic and have little patience but Christine throughout the book really just read to me as an idiot. She somewhat redeems herself in the end but as the book as written in the perspective of an investigator from the future, you can’t really tell what she’s thinking and so her character fell a little flat to me.

Erik is my favorite character in the movie and in the musical, but in this book we don’t get much insight from him either which is a total shame. <The first couple chapters literally fly by without him actually being there. We live through it with just the knowledge of his presence which, I think, might be the point if the author wanted to establish him as something incorporeal only to shock the readers somewhere down the line to say he’s mortal. If it is, brilliant! If not well…> To me he’s a tad bit better than Raoul and Christine but he’s equally as whiny as Raoul.

Surprisingly the most interesting character in this book is the Persian who doesn’t exist in the other adaptations (I could be wrong, don’t quote me on that). His story in the movie/musical was given to Madame Giry. I think this was a good call for the adaptation as it deepened her character in comparison to the book. <(Madame Giry in the book didn’t read very well to me. She was boring and seemed almost as stupid as Christine. I really liked that they made her character more formidable in the adaptations as it gave a better representation of women in comparison to the book.)>

Overall, the book wasn’t horrible. It felt a little lackluster in comparison to its adaptations but if you’re into gothic horror or simply want to read the source material for Phantom of the Opera the Musical then I say go for it! Just don’t expect it to be anything like the movie.

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seapotatohowisitalrtaken's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad fast-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

4.5

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giulianalb99's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad 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

3.75

Tenía bastantes ganas de leer este libro ya que me propuse a principios de año leer unos cuantos clásicos.
La verdad es que la trama me ha parecido muy buena pero muchas veces se me ha hecho un poco pesado y lento. Aunque eso no quiere decir que la pluma del escritor es una pasada, para mi gusto le sobran páginas.

La verdad es que hay muy pocos personajes de la historia que me hayan gustado y no he llegado a simpatizar con casi ninguno: Raoul me ha parecido bastante pesado y siento un amor/odio hacia Christine que no sabría ni cómo explicar. También me hubiera gustado que hubieran pasado más cosas en la ópera ya que me ha parecido que ahí no están casi nunca (sólo al principio y al final).

Por los temas que trata, me parece que es un libro que todo el mundo debería leer (aunque no esperéis una historia de romance bonita, porque este libro es básicamente horror y tragedia).

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andyandnormski's review against another edition

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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

2.25

Maybe I was influenced a bit by my love of the musical. Maybe I went into this with certain expectations, but I did not enjoy this as much as I really wanted to. The writing is overly flowery and needlessly dramatic. This makes it a slog to read through. If you go into this expecting it to be a sort of precursor story to the musical, be prepared to be disappointed.

The plot. Where to begin with this? The plot wanders from scene to scene. It feels like it's trying to be told as a mystery but it doesn't quite accomplish this. Random events happen one after another, and we're told through Raoul's perspective that this is all caused by some nefarious plan the phantom (Erik) is orchestrating. And since Erik is hidden in the shadows and Raoul has yet to see him, we're told outright by Raoul that this is evil. It's hard to read it that way considering many scenes don't feel interconnected and most characters have little influence on the story. You could cut many characters out and it wouldn't alter the trajectory of the plot. Raoul's brother barely has a presence and he is killed off in the last chapter almost as an after thought, as if the author forgot about him and realized he was a loose end. This happens more than once. Characters are quickly introduced, then whisked away before their appearance even has a moment to breathe. Even Erik suffers from this. The near entirety of his backstory is introduced in the epilogue, again feeling very much like an after thought.

And Raoul? It's rare that I see a main character that I wholly root against. He is incredibly unlikable. He's brash, deeply paranoid, and borderline hostile towards everyone around him right from the start. His behavior towards Christine can almost be described as a stalker. While much of Erik's behavior is questionable, Raoul doesn't fair any better. If this was a different story, both characters could be painted in an antagonistic light. Why this story is told from Raoul's perspective and not Christine's is a mystery to me.

All in all, I didn't enjoy this. I don't think I'll be reading it again. I'm not sure if I want to keep my copy either.

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livelaughomo's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense 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

3.0

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jobaji's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

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

3.5

I thought this book was pretty interesting! It was told in a cool way, with Leroux assuming the role of a historian or reporter. Some of Erik’s lines were truly spine-chilling, but the themes of nature vs. nurture and showing compassion to those whom most people would turn away from were definitely worthy of further thought. It’s a slow read at the start, but towards the middle the story starts to pick up.

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fishbones's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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linnylionheart's review against another edition

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dark sad tense fast-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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