Reviews tagging 'Death'

Firebreak by Nicole Kornher-Stace

16 reviews

theintrovertsbooks's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Gore, Domestic abuse, Murder, Alcohol, Terminal illness, Slavery, Police brutality, Death of parent, Cursing, Child abuse, Blood, Abandonment, Vomit, Torture, Kidnapping, War, Violence, Suicide, Physical abuse, Medical trauma, Mass/school shootings, Child death, Body horror, Gun violence, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Fire/Fire injury, Death, and Confinement

Minor: Car accident

obtoosegoose's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fire/Fire injury, Death, Violence, and Gun violence

Moderate: Child death, Death of parent, and Medical content

Minor: Suicidal thoughts

anniereads221's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional reflective tense medium-paced

• Loveable characters? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Grief, Violence, Blood, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Death, Murder, Torture, and War

Capitalistic society Rationing

rebyreadsandwrites's review against another edition

challenging dark tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, War, Alcohol, Police brutality, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Fire/Fire injury, Death, Blood, Kidnapping, Cursing, Body horror, Death of parent, and Confinement

Moderate: Child abuse, Child death, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Medical content, and Murder

Minor: Excrement and Torture

embee3's review

adventurous dark emotional funny informative tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Medical trauma, Medical content, Grief, Fire/Fire injury, Cursing, Child death, Child abuse, Blood, Gore, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, War, Violence, Torture, Police brutality, Death, Death of parent, and Body horror

achillea's review

dark emotional hopeful sad medium-paced

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

5.0

edit (2nd read): feel like i'm being flayed alive by this book. twice already
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you know that feeling when your back is really stiff but you don't know just how stiff until you get a massage and they crack your spine and it sounds like someone stepped on a bag of cornflakes. reading this book felt like that

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, and Violence

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, War, and Grief

Minor: Death of parent, Gun violence, Medical content, Child death, Confinement, Physical abuse, and Police brutality

starccato's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Fire/Fire injury, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Body horror, Child abuse, Murder, Death, Gore, Grief, Police brutality, Violence, War, Gaslighting, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Physical abuse, and Torture

Moderate: Death of parent, Suicidal thoughts, Alcohol, and Medical trauma

frantic_vampire's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

This book was brutal. It just kept hitting with everything that it had. There was hardly anytime to catch your breath. I had to put it down for a while because it just got way to intense and a little to real after watching the news coverage of Russia invading Ukraine.

I really liked Mal as a main character. She’s a kind of antisocial gamer/streamer who cusses a lot and I love that about her. Mal was just so real, I loved her ability to simultaneously be flipping out about everything that’s happening and not giving a single fuck about fucking shit up as much as possible for the corporation. 

As brutal as this book was, it doesn’t even begin to compare to the ending. I understand why it had to happen that way, but damn if I didn’t want things to go another way. And as much as I wanted that ending to be different, it was still really satisfying and open ended enough that I could almost see what would happen next if this was a series. All in all this was a fantastic read and I’m giving this a four out of five stars.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Gore, Gun violence, Medical trauma, Panic attacks/disorders, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Mass/school shootings, Murder, Police brutality, Violence, War, Blood, Body horror, Classism, Gaslighting, and Torture

Moderate: Child death, Confinement, and Terminal illness

rkreads's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

Thank you to Netgally and the publisher for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. 
I really enjoyed the world building and the nature of this dystopian future. Unfortunately, to the author's credit, it didn't feel very far off from something that could actually happen, considering the world that we live in the way certain companies have a very real dominance. I think both the world building (both in game and irl) and charicter development are were this book really shines. 
There were times that the plot felt a little dragged out/ the book felt a bit long but overall I really enjoyed it and felt that it was very well constructed. 
I think this book is going to get a lot of comparison to books like READY PLAYER ONE and WARCROSS, which makes sense to me but I think it is important to go into it knowing that the "game" part of the book takes a back seat to the irl stuff and that it is basically non existent in the 2nd half of the book. I think that was a very good choice on the part of the author but it is important that people don't go into it with the wrong expectations. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood, Death, Gaslighting, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Torture, and Violence

Minor: Child death

eegah's review

adventurous dark sad fast-paced

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

4.5

This is the book I wish Ready Player One was. If you like the whole concept of VR in a dystopia, this is a much meatier look at hypercapitalism and exploitation. None of that wink-nudge nerd reference stuff here. Just world-building and plot at a breakneck pace. A much more digestible speculative fiction read in the vein of Cory Doctorow's "For the Win" I'd say.

Admittedly this isn't the perfect read. It's not a hard sci-fi book so details on tech and science are quite spotty. The prose also sometimes got in the way of my experience

Spoiler

(I really can't unsee "fuckedest", and how that was actually in this book)

. But it was extremely enjoyable, so much so that I couldn't put it down and read it in a day. Would recommend. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Death of parent, Gore, Gun violence, Torture, and Violence