Reviews tagging 'Pedophilia'

Veren vangit by Anne Rice

77 reviews

handove's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense slow-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

3.5

i'm almost as confused on my feelings about this book as i was about the book itself.

i read this to satiate the growing brainrot from the tv show and it's very different, but i can see the base inspiration. as a whole, it was beautifully written and had some really poignant passages, but also it was boring as shit.

it was incredibly confusing at some points, notably a bit after louis arrives in europe; the long paragraphs of angsting did make it a bit hard to decipher. what the fuck happened with madeleine.

one good thing: it was homoerotic as hell, and even occasionally blasphemous. thank you for your service, anne rice.

other gripes:

• anne rice really dug herself a hole by making feeding so erotic and a literal allegory for sex while also having her characters feed on children all the while
• louis and claudia's relationship is creepy as fuck. he refers to her as his lover and wonders what it would be like if she was his paramour, so.
• i felt rather detached at some point due to everything quite literally being dialogue told to the interviewer, which made it hard to get through
• lestat :( miss you problematic babygirl
• not really a gripe with the book per se but i cannot tell you how much it threw me off whenever louis or armand were described as white, which was. a LOT.
• i know this was part of the effect, but the ending was just really unsatisfying imo. it didn't feel worth it to read a book as long as iwtv and there was nothing else.

well now i'm going to go have my heart broken by the show goodbye

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Gore, Pedophilia, and Blood

Moderate: Slavery

abookplaylist's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective sad slow-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

3.5

" La grande avventura della nostra vita. Che cosa significa morire quando si può vivere fino alla fine del mondo? Che cos'è la fine del mondo se non  un modo di dire, che chissà anche soltanto cos'è il mondo stesso? Mai ho già vissuto due secoli e ho visto le illusioni dell'uno completamente distrutte dall'altro, sono stato eternamente giovane ed eternamente vecchio, senza possedere illusioni, facendo Ottimo per attimo come un orologio d'argento che batte nel vuoto; quadrante, lancette delicatamente intagliate, nessuno guarda, e che non guardano nessuno, illuminate da una luce che non era luce, come la luce alla quale Dio crea il mondo prima di aver creato la luce. Tic tac, tic tac, tic tac, la precisione dell'orologio, in una stanza vasta come l'universo "

Anne Rice ha uno stile sublime ma ha un grosso difetto: la sua narrazione è molto lenta.
Penso che ad una certa ho talmente sentito pesante Louis come personaggio da aver pensato che forse era meglio Lestat.
Dopo la lettura di questo volume mi è venuta un'insana voglia di farmi un veloce rewatch del film e iniziare la serie TV uscita qualche anno fa.
È stata una lettura sofferta che continuerò in tutta calma, anche perché sono davvero curiosa come continuano le vicende.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Child death, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Infidelity, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Blood, Kidnapping, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Bullying, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Hate crime, Infidelity, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Stalking, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, and Abandonment

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Hate crime, Infidelity, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Violence, Stalking, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Fire/Fire injury, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail

scifi_rat's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

2.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, and Blood

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Pedophilia, Slavery, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Animal death, Racism, Religious bigotry, and Stalking

eyebrightt's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective tense medium-paced

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Cannibalism, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Pedophilia, Slavery, and Suicidal thoughts

Minor: Racism

brjedi26's review against another edition

dark slow-paced

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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship and Blood

Moderate: Pedophilia and Fire/Fire injury

amy_munro's review against another edition

challenging dark tense slow-paced

• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

I think I’d have liked this book more if the tv show wasn’t the best thing I’ve ever watched. No way this book can compare 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pedophilia and Racism

rosenrot's review against another edition

dark mysterious 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

3.0

Overall a slow read. 
Louis is not as interesting a character as he makes himself out to be.
Deals with the unreliability of memory, catholic guilt and morals. 
He is constantly struggling with his vampiric nature and his need to drink blood and bring death vs. his own moral superiority and general aloofness. 
Because the world is being told through Louis and he isn't as interested in the history of vampires and his own struggle with existence it is at times hard to symphatize with him as a character. 

His inner thoughts about Claudia become very uncomfortable, especially when you keep in mind that she is physically 5. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Death, Emotional abuse, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Grief, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, and Abandonment

Moderate: Mental illness, Pedophilia, Racism, and Slavery

emrysreads's review against another edition

dark emotional medium-paced

• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No

3.5

I came to this book from the TV series, so I may be biased. I found the first part of four of Interview With The Vampire (which is actually half of the book) slow and a bit boring. There's so much that can be done with vampiric turning and yet I felt the most interesting thing was that they shit themselves. I enjoyed the second half of the book more<spolier>, especially Claudia's death, which was so visceral and hit me a lot harder than in the series. I also enjoyed the repeated arson, and the little glimmers of the Lestat we come to know in later books through Louis' biased retelling. I'm glad I read this book so I can read the rest of TVC and I can understand the TV series better, but I don't know if I'll be rereading it aside from certain chapters. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Gore, Pedophilia, Racism, and Violence

sarahrifen's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

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

3.75

 Very well written book, but felt myself trudging through it. Amazing ending though. Couldn’t get past the weird relationship with Claudia…

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pedophilia

smaber23's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

I love New Orleans, I love vampires, so of course reading this felt like destiny.

Rice is a powerful author whose eloquent prose and captivating imagery will leave you breathless. To say this novel is a tragedy is an understatement and it is clear she wrote it from a place of profound grief. 

Like her predecessor Mary Shelley, Anne Rice was inspired to write a novel about life, death, and immortality following the loss of her child. She inserts her late daughter into the novel as Claudia, an immortal child who fully develops mentally but is eternally cursed with an adolescent body. She is raised by her two gay dads (jokes) Louis and Lestat, the former a depressed and tortured soul serving as our narrator, the latter a flamboyant hedonist who wants nothing more than to suck the marrow from life (or undead-ness) itself.

I don't recommend this novel for everyone as it can be supremely triggering for survivors of CSA. It is abundantly clear Rice desperately tried to keep her daughter alive into adulthood through Claudia, who continues to evolve sexually and emotionally beneath arrested physical development. Grief can create amazing art and, in spite of these harrowing depictions, this is no exception.

If you feel called to read this, I implore you to do so. You will walk away with a different impression of life, death, and beauty.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Pedophilia, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Gaslighting, and Classism

Moderate: Racism and Slavery

Minor: Alcohol