Reviews with content warning for Medical trauma - Fantasticland

Reviews tagging 'Medical trauma'

Fantasticland by Mike Bockoven

8 reviews

ande13's review against another edition

dark medium-paced

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

3.0

I would say this book was very “middle of the road” for me. I didn’t love it, but I didn’t hate it either. The interview-style format was good, but I found myself having to flip back to remind myself of some of the other characters being referenced. I think I would have enjoyed the book more if it were either more of an ensemble with shorter chapters that we would keep coming back to, or if we would have seen the whole story play out from start to finish from one person’s perspective, then the next, etc. it felt like a strange choice to me to end one character’s story and then pick up at that same point somewhere else. I know other books do it well, but this just felt disjointed to me.

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bookishloz's review against another edition

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challenging dark sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

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catsy2022's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

2.5

Rating: B-

Fantasticland is a retrospective fictional horror novel presented as a series of interviews by Adam Jakes, a reporter doing a piece on the fiasco that was Fantasticland. During the late 2010s, Fantasticland, a theme park built in Florida in the 1970s, was hit by Hurricane Sadie and isolated from rescue services, who deemed the park livable due to the supplies that were reported to be in the park.

I think this book is probably best digested as audio, due to the formatting of the story. It unravels through successive interviews from people who were outside the park to those on the edge inside and then finally with the leaders of each faction in the park. I personally found the book a bit of a slog to get through and I think the structure might have been better if we worked backwards from inside the park to outside, rather than hearing the same story over and over again from the interviewees.

I wasn't particularly shocked or moved by the story, but I found the speed at which people resorted to violence a bit unbelievable, especially when the overall message of the book is that modern people can't cope without social media. (So they turn to violence and tribalism.)

It was fine to read, I would probably only recommend it if you wanted to read another book like World War Z, and if it was real, you'd probably hear about it on a true crime podcast.

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ktdakotareads's review against another edition

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dark medium-paced

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

3.5

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beth_waller97's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional 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

5.0

Man, I had to google whether this event was actually real because I was horrified. Luckily, it is just fiction. What an insane story, but so believable and you can actually imagine this happening in this day an age.

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