Reviews tagging 'Child abuse'

The Foxhole Court by Nora Sakavic

229 reviews

bookish_bonnie's review against another edition

dark emotional funny medium-paced

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

5.0

There’s an oddly addicting element to this series. 

“But it’s not realistic!” You cry. “That’s not how this works, like, at all! All the characters are insane!” 

Yet readers everywhere turn another page. And another. Eventually, they finish the series, and each of them know it’s only a matter of time before they’ll pick it up again… 

So is the curse of reading All For The Game. My friend passed it on to me. Now I shall pass it on to all of you. Good luck. 🫡

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Ableism, Addiction, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Cursing, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Violence, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Death, Grief, and Death of parent

camo_mila's review against another edition

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? Yes

SPOILERS AHEAD

Awful. I sincerely don’t have anything praiseworthy to say about this book.

• The writing isn’t good; it’s rambled and confusing. There’s no character description, setting, or any element to actually make the book decent. Nothing really happens, there’s no progression, and it’s incredibly dragged out. The structure is also poor, and thank god the book is at least short.
• This book is a disservice to mental health. It’s incredibly misguided, presenting a stereotypical view of mental health, psychology, and patients (with “psychotic” being thrown around on nearly every page), as well as mental health medications, their effects, and descriptions.
• Not a single character is likable. Maybe Neil comes the closest, but his easy interest in Andrew annoyed me, as they had no chemistry and Andrew kept being awful.
• The whole approach to drugs, sports, gangs, mafia, and everything else used as a plot point is so far-fetched and removed from reality that creating a different world and calling it fantasy might have been better.
• It’s too toxic, even for me. The slurs being used, the only openly gay character using r*pe as a joke and harassing other guys at almost every opportunity, and the way “Andrew’s group” kept being abusive and generally awful—mostly to Neil, but to other characters too—were all unbearable.
• And lastly, something that really made me feel sick and that I wish I’d known about beforehand, as I have personal experience with it: the drugging scene. It was entirely uncalled for, unnecessary, and overall disturbing. Say what you will, but the fact that Neil was drugged, pushed around, forcefully kissed, then blacked out and still forgave them so easily? Absolutely not. No and no. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Bullying, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Kidnapping, Toxic friendship, and Sexual harassment

m_riaelle's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad 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? Yes

5.0

This is for the first three books of the All for the Game Series.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

I can't distinguish properly the TW if it's major, moderate or minor.

chris_reads's review against another edition

challenging dark lighthearted mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.5

This book has a lot of interesting components, so I can see why it's so popular. I can also see why it's divisive. The main character and his backstory were really compelling to me, but most of the side characters were anywhere from fine (not enough page time) to extremely unlikable. I can tell some of them are clearly set up for further development, but I have a low tolerance for smug, controlling types, which this book is packed with. The exception I can think of is the coach. He was pretty good. I don't love that the one confirmed gay—and not white—character, who is set up as the friendly, non-threatening one had to

sexually assault the main character while he was drugged (I get that he's not the only one at fault for that fucked up situation but the other characters motives for doing this were a lot less selfish but still treated as the violation they were)

and it's just brushed off afterwards. 

So yeah. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Bullying, Drug abuse, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Child abuse, Drug use, Violence, Medical content, Death of parent, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol

Minor: Ableism, Physical abuse, Blood, Vomit, Acephobia/Arophobia, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

veeples's review against another edition

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

2.0

This book makes a pretty fast pace fun read. Not much happens, it’s more set up for other books, obviously. But enjoyable enough!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Child abuse, Death of parent, and Alcohol

Moderate: Drug abuse, Drug use, Misogyny, Sexual assault, Violence, and Fire/Fire injury

annergregor's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious slow-paced

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

2.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Drug use, and Sexual assault

danaslitlist's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional fast-paced

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

4.5

I see a lot of reviews saying this book was confusing or too complicated to follow, and I’m calling bullshit on that. If y’all can read your high fantasy romance, you’re gonna be okay with this series. Grow up.

I’m also seeing reviews trying to downplay the enjoyment of the book because it’s not something they’d thought they’d enjoy which I’m gonna say is a bullshit way to review a book. If you like it, own it! Enjoy the series!

I went into this with the assumption I’d either hate it or I’d think it was fine, but I wasn’t prepared to actively enjoy it as much as I did. I found the characters interesting and was honestly invested so much in their relationships and personal issues. The fact that half these characters are by design unlikable and flawed is incredibly brave on the author.

 While I’m not a huge sports fan, I found the fictional sport of Exy pretty straight forward and easy to visualize when it was occurring on page but this book is primarily character driven with Exy being the setting. The mafia element while surprising and seemingly “out of nowhere” in terms of trying to describe it to others actually made sense and worked fine. 

The writing is solid and had some genuinely beautiful lines and moments. 

This book does has some flaws, namely the use of the r-slur on occasion since it was published back when the use of that word wasn’t so frowned upon. There were a few repetitive moments as well, but not enough to throw me out of my immersion or enjoyment.

Basically; enjoy this for what it is! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Violence, Blood, Death of parent, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Homophobia, Vomit, and Murder

wickedgrumpy's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes

3.0

I am confused but also intrigued.  It is a bit hard to visualize the sport itself but the self-destructive characters have been really compelling and there is a lot of mystery in their backstories that seems messy and complicated.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Ableism, Addiction, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

hariyek's review against another edition

dark emotional funny tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use

Minor: Child abuse, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Homophobia, Death of parent, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

kai_lynn127's review against another edition

dark emotional funny mysterious tense medium-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

5.0

This is the first book in one of my favourite series of all time!

The plot is amazing (if not slightly unhinged) and the story's development is so well thought out that you really get to know and love each and every member of its found family.

Neil Josten (the chaotic gremlin that he is) is the main character and unreliable narrator that come to both want to protect and also throttle, and his love interest, Andrew Minyard deserves the world.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Body horror, Bullying, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Stalking, Car accident, Death of parent, Murder, Gaslighting, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

This book is has very heavy themes and alot of trigger warnings, so be careful to check all the triggers beforehand.