faeriviera's review against another edition
medium-paced
2.5
I was REALLY enjoying this book, but then the final twist happened.
It was really disappointing because I loved the idea of what was essentially Scooby Doo meets Stephen King's It, ESPECIALLY given the build up to a sapphic romance, but a bad ending can truly ruin a story for me.
Spoiler
After all the build up that made it seem like somehow their dead friend was behind it all, we find out it was an author they had befriended along their journey, and she was in fact someone who had a sex change surgery to hide her original identity. Considering how queer friendly they seemed to be trying to be with the main couple, the sudden turn into transphobia was really jarring, and also the twist felt like it was just there for the sake of there being a twistIt was really disappointing because I loved the idea of what was essentially Scooby Doo meets Stephen King's It, ESPECIALLY given the build up to a sapphic romance, but a bad ending can truly ruin a story for me.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Transphobia
emsim's review against another edition
nope. this book is already handling gender, sexuality, and mental health poorly in the first 10%.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence
Moderate: Transphobia, Sexual harassment, Sexual assault, and Drug use
wooter42's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
funny
slow-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
2.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Transphobia and Death
chloe_s's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
This book had a really solid mystery at its core but fell down on quite a few elements of its execution. Others have brought up most of my comments - the variable quality of the writing (including experimentation with breaking that fourth wall and script format which didn't really pay off), the repeated focus on one of the character's red hair and some very shaky handling of queer and native american content.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence
Minor: Transphobia and Racism
marykendrick666_'s review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Transphobia, Violence, and Mental illness
Moderate: Cursing, Homophobia, Ableism, Blood, Body horror, Suicide, and Toxic friendship
pageglue's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
funny
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
Uggghh so much potential! A great premise ruined by this piece of shit author.
Meddling Kids is basically an adult horror Scooby Doo novel, featuring the kinds of shenanigans that the gang got up to. The only praise I’ll give is that the plot was very gripping, enough to take me to end of this 450 page book, but even that was spoilt by its stupid ending.
While the writing was often cinematic, it also drew a lot of attention to itself, for instance ‘the wheezer (a monster) didn’t even make it until the end of this paragraph.” There were also these random switches to giving the dialogue in the form of a screenplay, including directions for the actors in parenthesis, which was just so weird.
There’s so much offensive shit in this book too. At first I thought it was emulating the vernacular of the 90s, and it felt unnecessary but not out of place. But there’s some rough intersexphobia and transphobia as well that basically casts two characters as crazy/evil freaks.
Don’t read this awful book.
INSTEAD, read The Lamb Will Slaughter the Lion, and it’s sequel, The Barrow Will Send What it May by Margaret Killjoy. A gang of queer, anarchist punks solve supernatural mysteries. It’s a great time with some very cool characters. The biggest issue is that they’re both novellas, and I so wanted more!
Meddling Kids is basically an adult horror Scooby Doo novel, featuring the kinds of shenanigans that the gang got up to. The only praise I’ll give is that the plot was very gripping, enough to take me to end of this 450 page book, but even that was spoilt by its stupid ending.
While the writing was often cinematic, it also drew a lot of attention to itself, for instance ‘the wheezer (a monster) didn’t even make it until the end of this paragraph.” There were also these random switches to giving the dialogue in the form of a screenplay, including directions for the actors in parenthesis, which was just so weird.
There’s so much offensive shit in this book too. At first I thought it was emulating the vernacular of the 90s, and it felt unnecessary but not out of place. But there’s some rough intersexphobia and transphobia as well that basically casts two characters as crazy/evil freaks.
Don’t read this awful book.
INSTEAD, read The Lamb Will Slaughter the Lion, and it’s sequel, The Barrow Will Send What it May by Margaret Killjoy. A gang of queer, anarchist punks solve supernatural mysteries. It’s a great time with some very cool characters. The biggest issue is that they’re both novellas, and I so wanted more!
Content Warnings
Moderate: Transphobia and Sexism
sierrrarosebaby's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
ngl found this super boring and really hard to read. the transphobic comments in the beginning were super unnecessary and made me real uncomfortable
Content Warnings
Graphic: Suicide, Mental illness, and Death
Minor: Transphobia
buttermellow's review against another edition
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
1.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore
Moderate: Transphobia
emily_journals's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
The concept of this book really intrigued me. Scooby-Doo with Lovecraftian elements where the monsters MIGHT BE (and likely are) real? Sign me up!
Except this book was so disappointing in execution. From reading other reviews, I'm so glad I read the audiobook version of this, because the stage direction inserts and made up words weren't as noticeable, so I'll give the narrator mad props for making those things really unnoticeable. I thought the book started off on the right track, but around the halfway point in this book is when I really started noticing all the negatives.
First off, for being set in the 90s (and flashback-esque scenes from the 70s), I personally did not feel much nostalgia around any certain time period. This book really could have mostly been grabbed out of the 90s and plopped into modern day with very little change, which is 100% fine, EXCEPT this book promises to be nostalgic (which I personally did not find it to be).
Secondly, the ending of this book was an absolute mess. Everything that happened in the last ~20% of the book was so chaotic and unbelievable and hard to follow.
Seriously, so much of the end of this book was just fight scene after fight scene, with little substantial buffer between, which I personally find really boring to read (or listen to) for a significant amount of time, especially when every fight scene is "gang fights creatures, then run, then fight new hoard of same creatures, then run.... repeat".
Lastly, this book has some pretty awful and dangerous discussion and representation of mental health, trans people, and queer people. The mental health discussion in this book is unnuanced and the whole introduction scene to the asylum has some very problematic descriptions of people with and without mental health issues. The main villain ended up using transness as a device to live forever and be evil, which was super unnecessary and could have been entirely avoided and is a very pointed decision from the author. The lesbian character in this book is also very much a caricature of a "typical lesbian" media portrayal, and the sapphic relationship seemed like something that a man would write as a fantasy of a sapphic relationship.
Overall, I wish I had done more research into this book before picking it up instead of taking the promises given by the author/publisher at face value, and beyond that, I wish I had given up on this book sooner.
Except this book was so disappointing in execution. From reading other reviews, I'm so glad I read the audiobook version of this, because the stage direction inserts and made up words weren't as noticeable, so I'll give the narrator mad props for making those things really unnoticeable. I thought the book started off on the right track, but around the halfway point in this book is when I really started noticing all the negatives.
First off, for being set in the 90s (and flashback-esque scenes from the 70s), I personally did not feel much nostalgia around any certain time period. This book really could have mostly been grabbed out of the 90s and plopped into modern day with very little change, which is 100% fine, EXCEPT this book promises to be nostalgic (which I personally did not find it to be).
Secondly, the ending of this book was an absolute mess. Everything that happened in the last ~20% of the book was so chaotic and unbelievable and hard to follow.
Spoiler
People were dying and being resurrected left and right, dogs were getting possessed by demons/angels/random protector beings(?), rituals were being cast, people were living forever; it was all just TOO MUCH going on.Seriously, so much of the end of this book was just fight scene after fight scene, with little substantial buffer between, which I personally find really boring to read (or listen to) for a significant amount of time, especially when every fight scene is "gang fights creatures, then run, then fight new hoard of same creatures, then run.... repeat".
Lastly, this book has some pretty awful and dangerous discussion and representation of mental health, trans people, and queer people. The mental health discussion in this book is unnuanced and the whole introduction scene to the asylum has some very problematic descriptions of people with and without mental health issues. The main villain ended up using transness as a device to live forever and be evil, which was super unnecessary and could have been entirely avoided and is a very pointed decision from the author. The lesbian character in this book is also very much a caricature of a "typical lesbian" media portrayal, and the sapphic relationship seemed like something that a man would write as a fantasy of a sapphic relationship.
Overall, I wish I had done more research into this book before picking it up instead of taking the promises given by the author/publisher at face value, and beyond that, I wish I had given up on this book sooner.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Blood, Death, Mental illness, Violence, Grief, and Injury/injury detail
Moderate: Confinement, Lesbophobia, Panic attacks/disorders, and Transphobia