Reviews tagging 'Animal cruelty'

Hex by Thomas Olde Heuvelt

21 reviews

cosmicpanda's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Animal cruelty, Domestic abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Islamophobia, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Gun violence, Toxic relationship, Murder, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicide attempt, Toxic friendship, Violence, Body horror, Confinement, Death, Blood, Child death, Medical content, Vomit, Forced institutionalization, Gore, Grief, Mental illness, Physical abuse, and Racial slurs

kellyofcali's review

challenging dark mysterious tense fast-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? Yes

3.25

I really like the first three-quarters of this - a horrifying slow burn. It is pretty brutal and gruesome, so beware if you don't like sort of gory and generally troubling horror. However, the end suddenly shot off the rails into chaos, feeling out of character with the book and frankly losing me a bit - I preferred the slower build.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Gore, Forced institutionalization, Gun violence, Blood, Suicide attempt, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Mass/school shootings, Confinement, Child death, Grief, Bullying, Violence, Torture, Injury/Injury detail, Fire/Fire injury, Death, Suicidal thoughts, Mental illness, Animal death, Suicide, Sexual assault, Physical abuse, and Animal cruelty

Minor: Religious bigotry and Rape

turtleofhades's review against another edition

dark emotional tense slow-paced

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

4.75

This book. This book is gonna leave me with nightmares for the next little while.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Grief, Religious bigotry, Child death, Death, Suicidal thoughts, Self harm, and Suicide

Moderate: Child abuse, Grief, Gun violence, Animal death, Bullying, Toxic relationship, Misogyny, Forced institutionalization, Sexual harassment, Child death, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Abandonment, Gun violence, Domestic abuse, Islamophobia, Torture, Animal cruelty, Blood, Cursing, Mental illness, Classism, Death, Grief, Misogyny, Murder, Physical abuse, and Sexism

monstersinspace's review

dark sad tense slow-paced

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

2.0

This book is very obviously written by a man, and a man obsessed with Steven King no less. It reads like a book written in 1970, casual sexism and all. There are only three named female characters who actually get to talk. The constant unnecessary groping of the character who was a victim of domestic violence was so unnecessary and added nothing to the story. I only suffered through the meandering end in the hope that something satisfying would come about from the witch, but was let down completely. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Forced institutionalization, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Torture, Violence, Animal cruelty, Child death, Death, Fatphobia, Animal death, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Physical abuse, Sexism, Body shaming, Bullying, Domestic abuse, Fire/Fire injury, and Gun violence

thee_neohasidist's review

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious tense medium-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Animal cruelty

Moderate: Child abuse and Animal death

geerbeer's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

2.75

Leuk boek. Baalde alleen van de mega misogyne teksten, de onnodige dan die niet echt een punt maken behalve shockeren. Vooral nieuwsgierig heel de tijd, ik vond het in het begin een beetje 'eary', maar niet eng voor de rest van het boek.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Misogyny, Child death, Body horror, Animal cruelty, Death, Rape, Blood, Animal death, Suicide attempt, Suicide, and Sexual violence

Moderate: Physical abuse and Racism

tbd24's review

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

2.0

First things first, if you haven’t read this book yet, check the trigger warnings bc hot damn. Literally everything is graphic.

I have a difficult time rating this because i feel like, technically, in some ways, it was a pretty good book. The writing was lush and evocative, and sense of horror well maintained and accentuated with moments of humor or banality or otherwise. However, I feel like the book had a lot of problems with realistic character choices. Tyler and Jaden are the only two people who feel like fully realized characters who have motive and personality and make wise and unwise choices. Every other named character makes choices that are convenient to the plot and every unnamed background character (the citizens of black springs, who seem to number in the thousands??) are just a faceless mass of mob mentality. I feel like the author spent little time convincing me that thousands of people would make the irrational choices they did, and more time moralizing that humanity is stupid and hopeless and violent. I am already biased against this opinion so i guess take this with a grain of salt. The last 25% of the book is just hitting you over the head with “people are stupid and violent and humanity sucks”, down to steve’s final decision to

let his wife and son die in a fire for literally no reason, after already realizing that Catherine had no power over the situation

. I understand this is a horror novel but it’s just truly boring to me when authors act like the end is fated and don’t even bother to make the characters choices make sense.

Beyond this, the main problem I had throughout the whole book was the authors blatant sexism. The only woman in this book with anything like power or agency was the literal witch, who’s literally wrapped in chains with her mouth and eyes sewn shut. Every description of a woman fell neatly into category of “ugly old hag”, “mom”, or “sexual object with no personality”.  Not even any bitches! Sometimes women would cross contaminate, and be an ugly old hag who was at least worth it for the tits, or a mom who still put out every night for her husband. Even in moments when it made absolutely no sense, the author found a way to get a woman naked (ie;

the head council guy groping Griselda bizarrely, Jocelyn having a hallucination of being fucked by a boar, or the fact that she was inexplicably naked at the end???? literally why was she naked???

). Obviously the first red flags were that none of Tyler’s friends were girls, and Matt apparently had no friends, and all of the adult women were hysterical and/or completely reliant on their husbands, but I was lulled into a sense of hope by  Catherine being possibly powerful and maybe secretly the moral was that people discredit women but noooo the author made sure to remind you that catherine was a woman with tits too. Like, it was so jarring every time it happens bc I’d be immersed in a tense scene and then completely taken out because the author just HAD to mention boobies RIGHT NOW ( I literally laughed out loud at

the jocelyn/boar scene, i was so excited to have a moment of her pov and her taking action but nope fucked by a boar and as soon as she finds a man she becomes completely feeble again

). I just quite literally felt like the author never imagined anyone but a white cis man reading his book. I don’t even want to talk about Griselda. 

Anyway yeah I think that’s it. Some very stunning moments of evocative writing. Some equally stunning moments of sexism, nihilism, and general senseless violence. Not really my thing

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Murder, Animal cruelty, Child death, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Xenophobia, Fire/Fire injury, Racism, Forced institutionalization, Police brutality, Racial slurs, Rape, Religious bigotry, Self harm, Sexual harassment, Suicide, Medical trauma, Pandemic/Epidemic, Blood, Gore, Child abuse, Death, Grief, Islamophobia, Physical abuse, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Torture, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Domestic abuse, Fatphobia, Excrement, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Suicide attempt, and Violence

stijn's review against another edition

dark reflective 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

Holy shit, this is dark. 

It is a lot to comprehend, and I'm almost in shock by the ending? So no detailed review, but it is a great horror novel.

Time to read something lighthearted 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Bullying, Child death, Cursing, Blood, Gore, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Domestic abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Suicidal thoughts, Pregnancy, Animal cruelty, Body horror, and Death

theaceofpages's review against another edition

dark tense slow-paced

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

3.0

I don't know how I feel about tis book. I loved the premise but it just kind of fell flat. Apparently the original version was slightly different so I wonder how much was lost in translation and translocation.

A witch that came with the Dutch settlers has been haunting a small town that the residents can't leave. They track her every move with cameras and an app. She has, however, been relatively harmless since her eyes and mouth were sewn shut, although her whispers cause suicidality. That is until a group of teenage boys decide to taunt her and unleash her full power.

The writing is okay. But there's a lot of nothing too. Most of the story happens in the last 100 pages or so. The author also seems to have a strange obsession with nipples for some reason? Male and female, adult and child. A lot of the descriptions are rather disgusting and upsetting. But it's a horror so I guess it's to be expected. I was kind of rooting for the witch with how the boys were treating her. I'm not sure why they had to be so cruel (although, to be fair, some were worse than others). Other than the witch this seems like a nice place to live.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Suicide, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Torture, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Child death, Gore, Sexual assault, and Violence

Moderate: Toxic friendship

Minor: Colonisation

mccalab's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Body horror, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide

Minor: Domestic abuse

Does not pass Bechdel test