Reviews tagging 'Suicide'

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

174 reviews

voxvenati's review against another edition

mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

This was a refreshing experience. It was tense, gruesome (at times), and full of heart. 

Two things I was not really expecting going in, that there was quite a lot of: basketball and animal death - specifically

lots of dogs and elk

.

I was not a huge fan of the pacing. Front bit was good, middle dragged, end was good. Perhaps contributing to this, the early parts of the book set up like it was going to be something like four short stories tied together by this vengeful entity, but the second half of the book was not split up. It was all one story at that point. 

Quite a lot of descriptions of gore, some really tense scenes, but just didn’t hit that scary vibe. Unfortunate it couldn’t hit all three points, but I did like SGJ’s style. It flowed quite naturally. 

I liked the entity. I thought she was neat. I wish I had been more on her side, but I just liked some of the characters too much to agree with her. 

Really solid read despite me not knowing or caring about basketball. Not scary, but a little graphic, so maybe check trigger warnings if you use them. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Death, Gun violence, Suicide, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Alcoholism, Body horror, Gore, Racism, Violence, and Alcohol

Minor: Pregnancy

nialystic's review against another edition

adventurous dark

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Murder, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Hate crime, Miscarriage, Racial slurs, and Colonisation

Minor: Addiction, Infidelity, and Suicide

emmajewish's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

3.0

I couldn't really form an attachment to the characters, and the audiobook got me all sorts of turned around with who's who! The ending was drawn out but also maintained tension...which I admire in a confused way.

On the surface, it's a lesson in why family annihilation is ALWAYS a bad idea - regardless of species. But there's deep folklore and Native American heritage that is worthwhile in this book. If I pick it up again, it will be a physical copy, though! I think some of the POV is lost in narration.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Death, Suicide, Blood, and Murder

Minor: Racism

spinebreakr's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

I was enthralled with this right up until

elk head woman transformed into a human.

which unfortunately is pretty early on in the book. 
The writing was tense and emotional. You could really feel the weight of generational trauma resting on the shoulders of the main characters. The way it informs all their actions is raw and drawn from a very real place. The character work is super well done. But ultimately, the monster in the story is not nearly so scary as what the men do to the ones they love. 

Once we started getting chapters from the perspective of the monster, I had such a hard time being scared of her. I came to this book expecting horror and I just wasn't gripped at any point. The gore was pretty visceral at times. Very graphic, and overdone in some spots. For example

Scalping Shaney with a motorcycle??

Yeah it was horrific, but also so wildly over the top, it immediately pulled me out of the story. 

Overall, I feel like it started off strong but lost direction a little as it went. 
I still recommend. But only If when you read this book you treat it like a Halloween-esque slasher film. Do that and you'll have a great time. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Violence, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Hate crime, Suicide, Grief, Pregnancy, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, and Colonisation

pipettesandpages's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense fast-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? Yes

5.0

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones follows a group of friends who committed an act that betrays their culture, traditions and their elders. While some of these characters are more haunted than others from this event, all will be subjected to atone for the act committed in their youth.

This book had me picking my jaw up off the floor so many times! Jones has created this raw and gritty story on what happens when a tradition is broken and the attempts to run away from it. While you are with some of the characters more than others, each one is met with a horror that I could not imagine encountering. Watching this characters descend into madness was both horrifying and intriguing. 

The first several chapters in the book is slow, but once it hits the fan, the book is so action packed and unpredictable in the best way possible. I love how Jones weaved Blackfeet tradition throughout the story. I want to read more of his work!! I will warn that there is extremely graphic events involving animals and those parts are the hardest to get through. I was not initially warned about this going in.

I know many of the complaints about this book is the way in which it was written. It is a very relaxed way of story telling, almost like someone is telling you ghost stories by a fire. I ultimately think this way of telling the story only highlights Indigenous traditions as well as making you feel like you are present in the moment.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Gun violence, Violence, Blood, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Cursing, Death, Mental illness, Suicide, Police brutality, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Pregnancy, and Alcohol

Minor: Drug use

insideunder's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Alcohol

Minor: Addiction, Alcoholism, and Genocide

wannah_hallace's review against another edition

challenging dark tense medium-paced

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

4.0

The writing style was unique and made me slow down to absorb what I was reading. I really like how the story developed and couldn't put it down during the tense scenes.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Gore, Gun violence, Racism, Suicide, Violence, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

corrieroe's review against another edition

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? Yes

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Animal death, Body horror, Gore, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Stalking, Suicide attempt, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Pregnancy

queerfucker's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective 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

4.75

The only good Indian is a dead Indian.

This book is everything. While the first half of the book probably doesn’t pass the bechdel test, it makes up for it in the characters. they’re good people with shitty choices and qualities, they’re REAL. The sense of dread of being a native american man knowing your death is just around the corner drips on every page. It’s difficult to get into, the mind fuck of not knowing what you’re seeing is confusing at first, but when you get past that it has perfect pacing. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Gore, Gun violence, Racism, and Violence

Moderate: Cursing and Suicide

montybonty's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious 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? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, and Alcohol

Moderate: Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Vomit, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Pregnancy

Minor: Addiction, Genocide, Kidnapping, and Car accident