Reviews with content warning for Incest - The Paper Palace

this is one very difficult book to review for a few reasons.

the first thing i really noticed about this novel was its writing. the author wrote some really beautiful sentences, especially those focusing on nature imagery, however there were also plenty of sentences that were either prose overkill or simply did not make sense. this, coupled with the incessant back and forth timelines, sometimes spanning years, did not help me follow these characters’ journeys.

secondly, the triggering content. there was unnecessary amounts of graphic sexual abuse and emotional neglect of children. i understand the message the novel was trying to portray with this - how trauma can tremendously shape lives, but the imagery was not needed.

furthermore, none of the characters were very likeable. they were very much one-dimensional to me. this made it difficult to empathise with any of their choices. for some characters, their distastefulness worked well in the story e.g. elle’s parents, her stepparents etc. but for others, readers almost needed to be won over for the story to excel e.g. i certainly felt that peter was bland and his only character traits were being english and vulgar; jonas was presented as a total sweetheart as a child but as an adult, there was no charisma.

and then the ending. i don’t usually mind ambiguous endings, but this left too many loose ends in its wake!

Content Warnings

angelasunshine's review against another edition

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dark sad slow-paced

3.0

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cordee's review against another edition

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dark reflective sad medium-paced

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

1.5

This book was not for me. I disliked all of the characters and I couldn’t buy into the so-called « love story « between the main character and her childhood friend. The plot just frustrated me.

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abbiekwilliams's review against another edition

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challenging dark reflective tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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kate_not_kate's review against another edition

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dark tense medium-paced

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? It's complicated

4.25

Potentially with spoilers.

Nope it was definitely not the summer read I was hoping to get. 3 different underage girls are getting rapped. One by her stepdad, other by the brother and main character by her stepbrother. Till the end I don’t understand why she blamed herself what happened with her “DeFiNeTlY not a serial killer” (yes he could be the one) stepbrother.

The real good part of the book was Jonas and Anna. The stories with them were really interesting to read.

But still, be prepared to read a book where in the second chapter a 9 year old girl is forced to give bj her stepdad and where parents don’t see all the abuse that happens.

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tiffy22's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-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

5.0

Amazing story! Really hard to read at some points, but the characters were so thoroughly written about deeply. I couldn't put it down. I'm not sure on the ending though!

Content Warnings

lavienne's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

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

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