Reviews with content warning for Sexual violence - Off Season

Reviews tagging 'Sexual violence'

Off Season by Jack Ketchum

32 reviews

johanh's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional tense fast-paced

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

3.5

Pretty intense.

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mystericliterature's review against another edition

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dark tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No

1.5

I wasn't sure if I'd like this book because I'm not a big fan of the "cannibalistic hillbilly" trope (despite loving the original The Texas Chain Saw Massacre), and it seems as though I was correct. Off Season is the first novel I have read from Jack Ketchum, and I am underwhelmed.

Despite being left with them for Parts I and II, the characters are uninteresting and one-dimensional. We spend so much of the novel with them, yet I did not feel attached to any of them. It is almost like the "Final Destination" franchise, where you are just waiting for the characters to meet a gruesome end. But when you have no attachment to the characters, their eventual end means nothing to you.

I must also say that Ketchum is terrible at writing women. If I were to take a shot every time a woman's breasts were mentioned for no reason, I would not have written this. There is a peculiar sexualization to the women of Off Season; I suppose I should not be surprised given the sexualization of women is often prevalent in horror media, yet it still made me sigh. We will be here all day if I get into that, however, so I will not.

Overall, Ketchum's Off Season was disappointing for me. If you are someone who just wants to see cannibals kill and eat, you may have a good time. But if you're searching for more substance, you will not find it here.

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moopant's review against another edition

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dark tense fast-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? No

3.75

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cheziknowles's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional fast-paced

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

4.0

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jackpumpkinhead's review against another edition

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challenging dark tense 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

3.5

This book is sick and twisted, I know. And it's quite misogynistic and very weird about sex.

So, it's an 80s horror movie in book form. If that's your thing, it's wildly fun. A short, quick read set over the course of one awful night. Home invasion-wilderness-cannibal madness. I'd question how this didn't get adapted, but well..

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wyabook234's review against another edition

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challenging 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? No

4.5

With Ketchum, he makes a great offering from the woods with his book titled Off Season. How as an author, Ketchum doesn't hold back on showing the brutality of these cannibals as they target a gathering of friends as their latest meals. With how these characters are struggling to eat and survive; it means that no one can be safe from the savagery of nature or civilization. Almost all of their ends are met in a descriptively graphic, disturbing manner with how these characters are burned, bitten, and chewed up. However, Off Season's not having reliance on plot armour doesn't make up for how the story is conveyed in writing prose that sometimes veers off into being clunky or needlessly focused on the sexualization of the female vacationers. Furthermore, the characters can also be seen as pretty flat, which can hurt the need for the audience to connect with these characters as they struggle to stay alive in Maine's wilderness.

With that being said of Off Season, it seems that Ketchum knows how to build up the suspense and when to escalate the tension to be more effective as opposed to having the gore instantly explode on his pages. These dreadful scenes of tension can be either the scene of the cannibals watching Carla and Jim having sex or one of the cannibals playing with Marije like she is a piece of meat before she gets the upper hand by biting into his privates. Scenes like these can be most effective as they are being used to build up for a quick getaway into another shocking situation.

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