Reviews tagging 'Drug use'

La biblioteca del Monte Char by Scott Hawkins

41 reviews

onlyincursive's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious sad 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

A wild ride from start to finish. This book is for the readers who grew up on stories about kids with powers (e.g. Animorphs, Percy Jackson) and who want the adult version. The type of book that I would recommend to everyone - if only the content warning list wasn’t so long!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Fire/Fire injury, Drug use, Animal cruelty, Toxic relationship, Suicide, Injury/Injury detail, Animal death, Murder, Gaslighting, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Gore, Blood, Body horror, Child death, Death, Violence, Kidnapping, Child abuse, Death of parent, Suicide attempt, Medical content, Mass/school shootings, Torture, and Physical abuse

Moderate: Addiction, Confinement, Cursing, Rape, Drug abuse, Xenophobia, Car accident, War, Toxic friendship, and Suicidal thoughts

Minor: Misogyny, Bullying, Classism, Mental illness, Xenophobia, Police brutality, Islamophobia, and Pregnancy

This book is hard to warn for. Be especially aware that there is torture and murder of children

(many of whom are effectively immortal and experience this torture and murder multiple times)

, as well as a lot of animal death

(including many, many dogs)

.

chalkletters's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious fast-paced

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

3.0

It's pure coincidence that both my book clubs picked books with 'library' in the title in the same month, and that neither of them actually spend all that much time in a library or doing any reading. Of the two (The Library at Mount Char and The Library of the Dead), this book is far more action-orientated, which is even more surprising for a book supposedly about librarians. (At least in book form; film and TV librarians are quite often action heroes!) 

Scott Hawkins plunges readers straight into Caroline's life after Father (not her biological parent) goes missing, with only brief flashbacks to provide backstory. There's a lot of darkness in both the past and present, and it's interesting to see how it has affected all of Father's adopted children. By midway through the novel, it's obvious that there is a plan being enacted, even if the details of that plan aren't given. The introduction of other perspective characters complicates things. Erwin is even more of an action star than Caroline: a literal war hero who would feel at home in Modern Warfare or could be played by Dwayne Johnson. It makes The Library at Mount Char feel like two very different books smashed together, which certainly keeps things interesting! 

While it's never exactly clear what the 'win condition' of the novel is going to be, Scott Hawkins definitely throws in a late curveball once the titular library is actually reached. Up until that point, the character arcs feel like they're moving in a particular direction. After it, everything is up in the air and the final ending is far more bleak for everyone involved than might have been anticipated. The bleakness in itself isn't necessarily bad — Steve’s ending is beautiful, in a very bittersweet kind of way — but it does feel as though the novel swerved dramatically from the track it previously seemed to be following.

Despite the lack of what I'll call 'library aesthetic', I was never bored with The Library at Mount Char. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Animal death, Fire/Fire injury, Child abuse, Suicide, and Death

Moderate: Blood, Bullying, Sexual violence, Animal cruelty, Drug use, Violence, Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Death of parent, Gun violence, and Rape

Minor: Car accident and Addiction

missdanielle's review against another edition

challenging dark funny mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Death, and Violence

Moderate: Rape, Child death, and Drug use

Minor: Torture and Sexual violence

3martini's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Cursing, Sexual content, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Sexual violence, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Torture, Suicide, Sexual assault, Physical abuse, Gore, Emotional abuse, Death of parent, and Child abuse

Moderate: Rape, Vomit, Drug use, and Gun violence

valjeanval's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark tense slow-paced

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

4.0

Bizarre, bloody, and a serious page turner. A dark tale of what and why are humans with lots to say on the nature of power and vengeance. The violence and gore are too much for me at times, but still a great book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Emotional abuse, Murder, Animal death, Animal cruelty, Injury/Injury detail, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Violence, Medical trauma, Physical abuse, Suicide, Child abuse, Child death, Death, and Torture

Moderate: Sexual violence, Kidnapping, Toxic friendship, Drug use, Gaslighting, Medical content, Rape, Self harm, Confinement, Grief, Sexual assault, Vomit, Alcohol, and Gun violence

soupqueen's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense slow-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

A very slow start. I didn’t really care about Steve’s chapters to begin with, but as the story started coming together everything started feeling more interesting. The epilogue was perhaps unnecessary, but it still felt like it added a little something to the end.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Violence, and Blood

Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, Death of parent, Child death, Cursing, Fire/Fire injury, Death, Drug use, Gore, Gun violence, Murder, Physical abuse, Suicide, Suicide attempt, and Animal death

jet_nebula's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Drug use, Gun violence, Animal death, Violence, Animal cruelty, Murder, Child death, Child abuse, Death of parent, and Suicide

Moderate: Rape and Alcohol

storyorc's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

This book makes exorbitant promises and delivers things adjacent to those promises in a surprising and thrilling way. Hawkins pushes the limits of what a reader can stomach in both the fantastical and the moral sense yet the book has its own near-nihilistic sense of humour. His characters are weird and often harsh but never quite unsympathetic.

My only complaints are the huge loss in momentum between the last two acts and that the first chapter had me hungry for much more interaction between Carolyn's terminally messed up 'family'. 

If you like stories like The Old Guard, the ending of IT, Harrow the Ninth, Wild Seed, and/or Sandman, or have any interest in exploring how abysmally human morals scale when people live too long and get too strong (and can handle some existential dread), pick this up.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Injury/Injury detail, Rape, Torture, Toxic relationship, and Suicide

Moderate: Drug use

Minor: Police brutality

rhimineecat's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious medium-paced

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

5.0

Well this might have been the weirdest and most unhinged book I ever read. In the most fucked up way you could ever possibly imagine. Suppose this one will haunt me for a while.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Physical abuse, Torture, Suicide, Blood, Animal death, and Violence

Moderate: Rape, Drug use, Injury/Injury detail, Death of parent, and Domestic abuse

Minor: Child death

heckgoshdang's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fire/Fire injury, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Animal cruelty, Kidnapping, Suicide attempt, Body horror, Death of parent, Drug use, Gaslighting, Grief, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Murder, Sexual content, Suicide, Child death, Emotional abuse, Animal death, Blood, Child abuse, Death, Mental illness, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Drug abuse, Rape, Sexual violence, and Violence