Reviews tagging 'Racial slurs'

The Stand by Stephen King

73 reviews

urnee's review against another edition

challenging dark sad slow-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

1.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicide, Torture, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Excrement, Police brutality, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Cannibalism, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, Car accident, Death of parent, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

lilashelly's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

I generally don't read Stephen King. I don't like his writing style, I find it to be very pretentious. But a friend at work told me this is his favorite horror book so I gave it a shot. I actually did enjoy the plot, but there's so much that feels so dragged out and a lot of filler. And I get that it was written in 1990, but a lot of the racial terms felt unnecessarily added.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Child death, Chronic illness, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicide, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Medical content, Trafficking, Grief, Medical trauma, Car accident, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

shelfofunread's review against another edition

I can admire what King is doing in The Stand and, at times, I was really enjoying this. But OMG if this book bogged down with just a ton of unnecessary detail. For ever snipped that is a moment of brilliant characterisation or powerful insight, I felt there were pages where nothing really happened in terms of either moving the action along or developing the characters. Add in that the female characters felt extremely underdeveloped and that I have over 700 pages left to go and I opted to nope out of this one. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Forced institutionalization, Medical trauma, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Misogyny, Sexism, Sexual content, Religious bigotry, and Death of parent

Minor: Ableism, Racial slurs, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, and War

bmpicc's review against another edition

challenging dark slow-paced

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

2.0

Meh.

I read the uncut version so perhaps without the extra 400 pages it wouldn't have dragged as much.

Breakdown of civilization and rebuilding it: Cool.
Relationships: You know I love to read about them, but these folks were lacking in character development (for me). 

The lesson here is this. I need to stick to King's shorter works. I should have just reread 'Carrie'.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Racial slurs, Rape, and Violence

doctoracula's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional 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? It's complicated

4.0

At time the story felt dated but overall the adventure of the book was engaging. I found it eerily similar in some ways to COVID in the earlier parts of the book which then evolved into a more apocalyptic story. Some chapters felt drawn out but that wasn't frequently the case in almost 48 hour audiobook!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Miscarriage, Racial slurs, Rape, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Violence, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Pandemic/Epidemic

_leitmotif_'s review against another edition

i’d never read a steven king book before, and this one seems to be considered his best/fan’s favorite. it was a slow week in my libby holds and it was available for an immediate borrow.

writing style and story are so engaging, i get why king has such a rabid fan base…AND NO ONE SHOULD READ THIS BOOK.  

it is deeply racist and misogynistic to its core. like grossly, blatantly so. casually, ‘i definitely meant to do this/it’s so rooted in me i also didn’t even notice’ so. and it’s not just the relentless use of racial slurs in the dialog, and the description of women’s bodies and gross sexualized pov’s written for some of the female characters, it’s how the Black and brown characters are written and the positionality they take up in the story; covering all bases; from ‘thug’ to ‘magical being’, all as foils to the white characters. 

oh, and this book is ALSO riddled with horrible ablism and fatphobia. all around fucking trash. 

he wrote this in the 70’s. i get it, people felt REAL free to be super open with their white supremacy and misogyny. perhaps he’s grown? and even if so, where is the rewrite/updated version of this story or the disavowal? 

disgusting.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Fatphobia, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, and Sexual assault

calypso_reads's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional tense slow-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

4.5

Definitely in my Top 5 for favorite books. It’s got everything you could want from a book: mystery, romance, adventure, magic. Well worth the 1k+ pages

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, Body horror, Confinement, Cursing, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Racial slurs, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Excrement, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Murder, Pregnancy, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

As usual, Stephen King has unprotected sex with racial slurs. Just something to be aware of

bookish_manda's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense slow-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

2.5

I had several people recommend this Stephen King book to me, including my history teacher friend from high school. This is my fourth King book, and at this point I’ve enjoyed reading 50% of them. I’m a fantasy and dystopian fan, but I think I mostly like King’s high fantasy books (Fairytale and The Eyes of the Dragon). I really didn’t like Gunslinger. 

 As far as The Stand goes, I don’t think this book was worth the many hours of listening. I opted to listen to the 2008 complete and uncut edition, and I think that was a mistake. A forty eight hour audiobook is really long. Especially a Stephen King audiobook… 

I liked this book better than Gunslinger, but there were so many things that bothered me about The Stand. It was originally published in 1978, but 2024 me struggled getting passed the old-school norms of misogyny, religious influence, rape, and language towards minorities (persons of color and persons with disability). 

I think I will need to try King’s later books and non-fantasy/dystopian books (excluding any future high fantasy books). 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape and Suicide

Moderate: Racial slurs and Sexism

scipio_africanus's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful sad 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? No

5.0

Damn good story. My first time reading Stephen King, and he didnt disappoint. From the synopsis I went in expecting it to be overly sentimental, corny, cartoonish, or just plain weak the way The Postman ended up being but was pleasantly surprised with the direction King took the story and the characters. I see why King is so successful. Great writing and a great time. Will def be exploring him more.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, and Violence

Moderate: Death, Suicide, Grief, Death of parent, and Murder

dflemmons's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual content, Trafficking, Cannibalism, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Body horror, Bullying, Domestic abuse, Fatphobia, Gore, Murder, and Pregnancy