Reviews tagging 'Medical content'

The Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey

121 reviews

spuriousdiphthongs's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense 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? Yes

3.0

Ahh, this sucked me in so fast, but I ended it feeling disappointed in much of the plot. Well-written and easy to read though, I'd recommend for fans of Lucy Foley, etc. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Physical abuse, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Murder, Pregnancy, and Gaslighting

Moderate: Abortion and Alcohol

maelstrom712's review against another edition

dark emotional informative mysterious medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship

Moderate: Child abuse, Infidelity, Blood, Medical content, and Gaslighting

Minor: Alcohol

clairebau's review against another edition

dark hopeful tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I think this may be the perfect book. Just the right amount of speculative/sci-fi stuff for me to go absolutely feral over it, incredibly written characters, emotional plot points. Also, everything in this book just... made sense. Character motivations were logical and well-rounded. Both Evelyn's exposition and the book's symbolism were perfectly, gorgeously done. The twists and reveals were picture-perfect. I love this book. I love Evelyn and Martine. I love to hate Nathan. God, I loved this book.

Jurassic Park with humans, pretty much.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Gore, Misogyny, Medical content, Murder, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

maddie_can_read's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

Really interesting book. Enjoyed the science fiction concepts and themes it explored. Enjoyed that it brought up themes of childhood trauma to explain how the main character became so

rigid, mean, intense etc

However I found the writing slogged a bit when talking about the main characters feelings and I found her main insufferable at points

I knew Evelyn wasn't supposed to be lovable, but oh my god, I could not stand her! At the beginning I was even hoping that Martine was going to kill her and take her place or something lol. Wished we saw Martine's perspective. Enjoyed the ending. Some really good scenes like them dealing with the bodies. Also wished the lab assistant came back.

The audiobook narration wasn't my personal favourite, the narrator sounded like they were about to start sobbing multiple times throughout and it gave it a bit of an odd vibe.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Infidelity, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

sjeast17's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny tense fast-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Medical content, Death of parent, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

eachz's review against another edition

dark slow-paced

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

3.25

I really struggled on and off with finishing this book but ultimately I landed on the side of liking it. A lot of the things that bothered me or seemed confusing early on made a bit more sense when all the pieces started to click together in the end. It was hard at times to get through the first ~half but I think the author ultimately did a good job of exploring the themes they were aiming to explore.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, and Medical content

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Blood, Murder, and Pregnancy

morag's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.5

 This book is a bit of an acquired taste, and I'm not sure that I acquired it by the end. If you love reading books with horrible main characters you are meant to hate, you'll love this. If not, this is going to be upsetting from start to finish.

I do think this book is relatively successful at what it sets out to do. It explores cycles of abuse, misogyny (both external and internal), and, obviously, the ethics of cloning. Martine's storyline really pulled me in, and every revelation about what her life was like got me more and more invested. The place she ended up in by the end still sticks with me. I wanted to pry the book open, pull her out of it, and weld the door shut after her. That speaks volumes for the effectiveness of Gailey's writing. 

That being said, the main character, Evelyn, is written as a cold, uncaring asshole, and that is done so effectively that it makes the novel hard to read. If you need your main characters to be even remotely likable or empathetic, you will not like this one. I do understand that Evelyn is intended to be this way, but on a personal level, it was just too much. I couldn't stomach a second read of this.

Overall, this is a brutal examination of misogyny, abuse, and personhood. It won't be for everyone, but if you're ready for a tough read, it'll deliver. 

(Cross-posted on Goodreads)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Misogyny, and Suicide

Moderate: Infidelity, Medical content, Medical trauma, and Murder

talonsontypewriters's review against another edition

dark tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Infidelity, Blood, Medical content, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Child abuse, Misogyny, Sexism, Violence, and Pregnancy

Minor: Infertility, Vomit, Car accident, Abortion, and Alcohol

sn03's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pregnancy and Gaslighting

Moderate: Suicide, Medical content, Grief, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Abortion

rockyc5's review against another edition

dark emotional tense medium-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? Yes

3.75

Other than that I thought I had better ideas of what to do to solve the problems the characters faced than what they came up with, THIS BOOK IS AWESOME. I think it's fair to say it's totally unique even as books about

clones

multiply. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content

Moderate: Death, Infidelity, Toxic relationship, Murder, and Pregnancy

Minor: Emotional abuse, Suicide, and Death of parent