Reviews tagging 'Ableism'

John Dies at the End by David Wong

32 reviews

jkpiowa's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny lighthearted mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• 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: Gun violence, Gore, Animal cruelty, and Violence

Moderate: Mental illness, Homophobia, Racial slurs, and Ableism

Minor: Suicidal thoughts

turtleofhades's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark funny tense medium-paced

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

3.75

I'd forgotten how early 00s this book was. Some of the language punted me back to a time of low rise flared jeans and layered polos; this is not a good thing.

It's still a good story with not quite unlikable main characters. I'm ready to continue on this series again as I just found out there's a fourth book (super excited since the author's writing has gotten so dang good with the Zoey Ashe series).

Definitely a must read for any time of year, but especially October. Who doesn't need a little existential dead and body horror every now and then? 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Blood, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Body horror, and Gore

Moderate: Child death, Drug use, Excrement, Murder, Violence, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Animal death, and Cursing

Minor: Racial slurs, Racism, Drug use, Fire/Fire injury, Vomit, Ableism, Alcohol, Animal death, Bullying, Car accident, Death of parent, and Suicidal thoughts

coyotes_tiptoe's review against another edition

challenging dark medium-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs and Ableism

schnaucl's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious medium-paced

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

3.5

I felt through most of my the book that it just wasn't for me.  It wasn't bad, or badly written, I just didn't click with it.  I eventually warmed up to it, enough that I may seek out the next book in the series (though given my lengthy TBR pile, maybe not).  

It's very surreal and frantic.   Parts of it definitely remind me of a video game. 

A word of warning, there are a a couple slurs thrown around pretty regularly that were more socially acceptable (at least among boys of a certain age) back when the book was written but that are jarring to read now.

There's also some animal death.

I think part of what turned me around was realizing that while John may have spoken and sometimes acted more immaturely than David, he was perhaps kinder and definitely understood people better.   I think he was smarter, too.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Violence, Gore, Death, Gun violence, Murder, Suicidal thoughts, and Ableism

Minor: Car accident, Bullying, Drug use, and Homophobia

juledebaum2's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny fast-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? Yes

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Body horror, and Gore

Moderate: Ableism, Suicidal thoughts, Mental illness, and Racial slurs

Minor: Homophobia, Antisemitism, and Sexism

em_chen's review against another edition

2.5

read this bc i was a cracked girl back in the day but forgot that my tolerance for bullshit used to be way higher. teen incel shock value vibes.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Car accident, Addiction, Alcohol, Ableism, Racial slurs, Alcoholism, Antisemitism, Cursing, and Body horror

r-slur used frequently, n word and other slurs

seagullsaga's review against another edition

dark slow-paced

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

1.5

The only reason I finished this book is because I have a complex about DNFing books. 

It’s needlessly vulgar, racist, sexist, and full of slurs that serve no purpose. The occasionally actually funny joke does nothing to counter these or make the book anywhere near worth it. 

If you like this book you probably also think that Tyler Durden is a good role model. 

Every time I looked to see how much I had left of this book I was disappointed. It drags. There’s always more nonsensical toilet humor and psychedelic crap, and none of it does anything to tell a coherent story. I was wishing EVERY character died by the end. 

I don’t normally leave reviews, and especially not with text, but this book was so unpleasant that I had to get my feelings out somehow. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Excrement, Gun violence, Racial slurs, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Racism, Body shaming, Toxic friendship, Body horror, Cursing, Ableism, Animal cruelty, Death, Animal death, Drug use, Gore, and Antisemitism

Moderate: Lesbophobia, Sexism, Car accident, Misogyny, Vomit, Fatphobia, and Homophobia

Minor: Death of parent

fuglaepir's review against another edition

dark funny tense fast-paced

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

3.0

JDATE is outdated 00s internet humour (quite literally, given its original publishing was online) but I love this book to pieces. Pargin's prose here is immature but visceral. I read this book for the first time in two sittings. John, Dave and Amy are fantastic characters and their debut is worth reading... If you can stand some questionable language in places. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Gore, Gun violence, Death, Car accident, Drug use, Chronic illness, Alcohol, and Body horror

Minor: Ableism and Racial slurs

vulcandropout's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny inspiring lighthearted mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

This series did a number on me.  It is one of the only novels I have actually been able to read and I enjoyed it so much I overlooked so many things it did not prepare me for when I recently rented an audiobook of it.   Jason Pargin uses slurs ALOT. For fun.   Racist carcicatures also.   This was my favorite book for so long I followed closely for less than a year.  Coming across his article complaining about the lack of racial slurs in bioshock infinite ruining the expierence.   His reasoning being that it was important for the time period.  I dont see the excuse for what he did in this book.  I also have only finished this one and the second book a long time ago in which every brown person dies or is dead already.  What was the resson? WHt WAS THE REASON? BItch?  I have been unphased about his alias choice forawhile but knowing that his alias is how he found out racism exists along with everything else. I have struggled to find any book that could have me react the way I did for so long and somehow my brain not even registering the bad things so I could let it make me happy for a brief period of time.  Im just reallly sad and exhausted I was so excited to finally get a copy of this again just to now not have a favorite book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Animal cruelty, Racism, Racial slurs, and Drug abuse

Minor: Ableism

caseyf's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny lighthearted mysterious fast-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Blood, Gore, and Violence

Moderate: Ableism

Minor: Racial slurs and Suicidal thoughts