Reviews tagging 'Suicide'

Swan Song by Robert R. McCammon

6 reviews

erebus53's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

1.25

Sometimes going in blind to a book is not the best idea. I think much of my disappointment with the book was because I went in thinking it was dystopian science-fiction but instead it was a Christian Morality-Tale Horror.

When I was 10 I wrote an adventure story that involved interesting ideas that were not physically possible. The storytelling was fun but the content was childishly inaccurate and embarrassingly naïve, and that this book reminded me of that story, more than once, says a lot about the delivery. I wanted to be able to root for the survivors but, their world was inconsistent. The people were living out of cans, and all the crops were dead, but yet there was a horse? What was it eating.. nothing much ever went in its front end or out the back.

Once I had reconciled myself to science not quite lining up, I could sit back and enjoy the supernatural bits. My favourite part of the story was a tarot card reading which was, at least vaguely accurate in how they work. I got the impression the author cracked a book for that one. There are also a few objects that are used as scrying implements, which lead the stories of two people to meet up. I tend to like things with clouded prophecies so this hit the spot.

The psychology in this was just... bad. You have a child who starts off twisted, and gets worse. There is a war vet who is obviously addled, a bag-lady who has repressed the memory of a traumatic event, a woman with recurring nightmares and hallucinations about her own trauma, and an escaped  megalomaniacal asylum inmate who is crazy like a fox. In the effort to create monsters I feel like the author has made ridiculous caricatures that don't reflect reality. If only it was fun I might forgive it, but no. This is not Batman. Oh well.

The book is one of juxtaposed horror and hope. I wish it were that simple, but the horror runs deep in the psychology of 1987. There is so much unintentional horror that leaks through; Pro-Wrestling, pro-military, sex-shame, fat-shame, drug fear, casual Racism, lack of consent, casual misogyny, the criminally insane, male effeminacy as monstrosity...

CW:
When combined with the intentional horror that (in no order) contained, homelessness, neo-Nazis, nukes, torture, insanity, infanticide, pedophilia, racial slurs, slavery (and sexual slavery), body horror, mutation (things with extra heads and legs), mutilation (corpses and living people), maiming, senseless violence, cannibalism, animal death, Grooming, rape, child death, starvation, just more and more death, war, more war,
and their tanks and their bombs, and their bombs and their guns.
Have I mentioned how much I dislike battles? I'll say it again for those in the back.

Our constant companion in all this, is an evil shapeshifting being who is unnamed, but hinted about all through the book. The recurring use of Biblical quotes would have been amusing for me but often explained overtly. I had a chuckle when it was subtle but rolled my eyes hard every time I felt like the author was saying "you see what I did there!?" and it felt like he was explaining the joke. At one point a character is given a coat of many colours and I was glad that he didn't explain that one.

OK, this was published in 1987 and I'd like to give it latitude because things like The Walking Dead and even McCarthy's The Road, have done it all better since, but really it's not that well written. The unspoken wish from the get go is "Please, Mr President, don't nuke us!", which is the most honest wish of the 1980s even if Reagan is never mentioned by name. Also.. this book is too damned long to be this lame.. why am I a masochist? I'm going to have to slam this like that Whale book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Cancer, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Mental illness, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Antisemitism, Medical content, Dementia, Kidnapping, Grief, Cannibalism, Medical trauma, Car accident, Death of parent, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Fire/Fire injury, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

andrew_corduroy's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

This took me so long to get through. Partially because I am easily distracted by other, shorter books when faced with something as thick as this, but also because Robert McCammon wrote something so viscerally plausible that I could only read chunks at a time. It’s dark. At times very dark,

with even the character of a devil incarnate doing less than some of the humans.

Book One was the slow part. There are very tense parts that I ate up

(the wolves and supermarket scenes especially)

but the majority was slow. Once I started Book Two I got pulled in and finished the book much faster than anticipated.

The characters are strongly written, well-defined and clearly fleshed out. The noble and ignoble alike get their time. The setting is thoughtfully explored and no details are spared (it’s 900 pages, of course there’s people emptying shit-buckets) and despite the fact it took me 4 months to read, I genuinely think that I’ll spend time thinking about it well after I finish it.

If you like post-apocalyptic fiction, you should read this.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Death, Drug abuse, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Racial slurs, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Murder, and War

Moderate: Confinement, Suicide, and Cannibalism

flexxington's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Trafficking, Suicide attempt, War, and Injury/Injury detail

luciemtss's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Sexual violence, Suicide, Violence, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Death of parent and Alcohol

cbug412's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional tense medium-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

5.0

If you're looking for a book chronicling the end of the world via nuclear fallout, this may be up your alley. Fairly gruesome but also quite heartwarming at times. A lot of people compare it to King's The Stand, but any way you look at it, it's the classic good vs. evil story. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Mental illness, Racial slurs, Rape, Sexual content, Slavery, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Cannibalism, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, Car accident, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Fire/Fire injury, and War

ripxreads's review against another edition

adventurous dark fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child death, Death, Racial slurs, Racism, Violence, Death of parent, and Murder

Moderate: Drug abuse, Drug use, Genocide, Pedophilia, Suicide, Torture, Toxic relationship, Suicide attempt, Sexual harassment, and War

Minor: Homophobia and Rape