Reviews with content warning for Death - Burntcoat

Reviews tagging 'Death'

pam_pam_85's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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flissrobyn's review

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot

5.0

I read this after it was recommended by StoryGraph. It’s not my usual read, and I went in not knowing what to expect.

My only response is… wow. I finished it within 4 hours of starting it, and couldn’t tear myself away.

It was confusing to start, and that felt intentional. The lack of chapters left you having to really try to figure out at which point of time you were in.

The book is written as if a letter to someone. As the book progressed, in tandem you learned more about the narrator, and their life and illness. It was mysterious and haunting.

The first half read like a love letter, and then it becomes clear that it’s not.

The story, the writing, made me feel a lot of emotions, and I’m still reeling from it!

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memol's review

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dark emotional medium-paced

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

2.0

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micaelabrody's review against another edition

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challenging dark reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character

4.0

a while ago there was a tumblr post i read saying:

At my core I need to shut the hell up and read a short novel that changes me forever (allsadnshit)

i can now share that burntcoat is one of those novels.

like many i think i was skeptical of "the covid novel" but i think this one pulled it off. by maintaining a laser focus on one person, it didn't try to really capture the scale and scope of a pandemic, just the personal effects. i did feel that halit was underdeveloped considering how much of a presence he was, so he felt more like a symbol of "body of another" more than a person in his own right. this could have been intentional but considering the careful thought put into the body of edith and her mother, it felt a little flat.

many reviews on here at first glance seem to focus on the "bodily fluids." yes, there were a lot of bodily fluids i guess - though at 3/4 of the way through i did specifically note that i didn't feel like it was more than usual for an adult contemporary that focused on a sexual relationship. once the focus shifted to the sickness ("nova") it increased, but it felt appropriate. i constantly reference the article that talked about characters having bodily functions in the handmaid's tale - this book really follows up on that; it is unflinching in the face of shit and semen and piss. without that, it would have fallen so flat. the entire focus is on the body. even her giant witch sculpture is controversial because of its aggressive use of breasts and vagina. why write a book about a deadly illness - two, if you count her mom - and avoid the inherent grossness of still being alive??

(similarly - i saw a review complaining it was in 2nd person. IT IS NOT IN 2ND PERSON. it is in 1st person!! she is addressing a character as "you"! this isn't uncommon! they're totally different!!! I do not think it means what you think it means.gif)

this was especially effective because the novel really felt like a gothic horror story, where the sickness was the ghost in the haunted house. (her mommy issues, which i personally had been hoping to avoid but were objectively done well, were another haunting, and the aforementioned narrow focus on edith's experience and her home really drove home the eeriness of isolation.) the pacing didn't quite match up as it felt a little end-heavy, and the constant double line breaks really hindered developing a rhythm in the otherwise gorgeous prose, but they didn't have a significant impact in the overall vibe and atmosphere, especially once the plot really kicked into high gear around page 100.

i think this book is understandably not for everyone and at times it was tough to read - at a personal level, i've read a lot of Mother or Grandmother stuff recently and i'm in desperate need of a reprieve - but it worked as a tense and unsettling elegy. yes, a short & quick book, a slice of devastation.

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