careohleen's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Graphic: Confinement, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Homophobia, and Kidnapping
Moderate: Death, Mental illness, Murder, Physical abuse, and Torture
Minor: Racism and Schizophrenia/Psychosis
chrisljm's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Graphic: Death, Fire/Fire injury, and Gun violence
Moderate: Confinement, Cursing, Excrement, Gaslighting, Kidnapping, Mental illness, Murder, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Violence, Child death, Emotional abuse, and Vomit
Minor: Slavery, Suicide, Blood, Panic attacks/disorders, and Torture
allegrabelle's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
Enjoyable, fun, with an interesting plot. I would recommend for someone who wants to delve into fantasy but has found some other novels, completely devoid of a connection with our 'reality' more challenging to bite into. The overall plot was interesting, and the conclusion of the novel was still surprising, although not entirely a cliff hanger that carried through to the end of the novel.
Good dialogue, emotional characters, and a fun haunt.
Moderate: Drug use, Death, and Torture
divya_s's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Moderate: Torture and Slavery
ginny_lind's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Graphic: Torture, Confinement, Gaslighting, Murder, and Pedophilia
madmantha's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Graphic: Death, Toxic relationship, Confinement, Kidnapping, Toxic friendship, Gaslighting, Grief, Violence, Emotional abuse, Slavery, and Injury/injury detail
Moderate: Stalking, Abandonment, Child death, Cursing, Dementia, Panic attacks/disorders, Mental illness, and Murder
Minor: Blood, Vomit, Deadnaming, Torture, Trafficking, and Gun violence
The Beauty of the House is immeasurable; its Kindness infinite.k_aro's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
What an incredible book! I love slow explorations of a space, and this felt so widely built (even though there's still so much left unsaid and basically left up to interpretation) that it felt fulfilling even if not all the answers were stated. I guess it kind of reminds me of that encyclopedia full of stuff that doesn't exist that's supposed to replicate the feeling of looking through an encyclopedia as a kid for the first time.
The tension is also nicely built, and it doesn't really concern itself with three-way twists and distracting flashes, just a really nice story that follows through in its soft magic systems on what it talks about.
I also enjoyed the occasional flashes of second-person narration; that said, I'm kind of just in love with second-person narration as a device, so I'm super biased in this regard (the other 5* review I have up is for a largely second-person narrated memoir!)
Spoiler
While I'm a little unsatisfied by the unspecificity of why Ketterley did what he did, I think to some level that's not "the point" (so to speak)—he's so obsessed with something that is functionally dead that rationality is truly, on some level, false.Anyway, I'd also like to take a little bit to talk about the lovely meditation on death and obsessions with death, not just in regards to dead people but to dead ideas, concepts, language, etc. So much of our life is living, breathing, that when something dies it inevitably takes up space; but as Ketterley demonstrates, this obsession with death is actually something quite grotesque, demanding answers out of something that has already departed this world.
Of course, that's neither here nor there; Arne-Sayles is also pretty interesting in his own right, though I'm not really sure I like how his gayness is positioned as just part of him being transgressive, but I also think I like it? I don't know, I guess it kind of evokes questions about the transgressiveness of being queer in general, or maybe transgressiveness as a whole (maybe even hearkening back to that one Carmen Maria Machado essay about being queer and fat). He's definitely an interesting character!
Graphic: Death
Moderate: Confinement, Gaslighting, Kidnapping, Torture, Abandonment, Emotional abuse, and Toxic relationship
Minor: Addiction, Vomit, and Gun violence
While these look like a lot of intense content warnings, I will say that usually most of the things written above are not processed, written about, extrapolated on as abuse in itself (so to speak). The experience of the main character, while I do not want to invalidate as the things shown above, are not processed as such, partially owing to the fact that the main character does not quite process emotions or traumas in the same way you or I would; so rather than them being fact in and of themself, they are the textual reading extrapolated.mrrou's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Graphic: Kidnapping
Moderate: Torture
rieviolet's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
It is a very imaginative story and certainly very unique, I was really captured by the first half and I still enjoyed the second one, but I think that as the plot progressed and we discovered the darker aspects of it, some of the initial brillance got lost, at least for me. It was still a very enjoyable read that I had trouble putting down (a good half of it I read in just one sitting) and a very well crafted story.
I also had some personal quibbles over the treatment of certain topics (mailny the only depiction of queerness and also a quite fatphobic description at the very end of the story that really annoyed me) that dimmed my general enjoyment of the book.
Graphic: Confinement, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Kidnapping, Toxic friendship, and Toxic relationship
Moderate: Death, Violence, Torture, Gun violence, Grief, and Mental illness
Minor: Cursing, Vomit, Murder, Gore, Excrement, Fatphobia, Fire/Fire injury, and Panic attacks/disorders
mariekejee's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Confinement, Death, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, and Toxic friendship
Moderate: Kidnapping
Minor: Animal death, Child death, and Torture