Reviews tagging 'Grief'

The Perfect Nanny: A Novel by Leïla Slimani

6 reviews

honeymoan's review against another edition

dark emotional 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

3.75

you really wouldn’t expect anything that has happened in this book. the foreshadowing is brilliantly done and even if you can kind of guess what could happen, you’d never expect it to be as cruel as it was.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gaslighting, Mental illness, Pregnancy, Death, Violence, Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Body horror, Classism, Emotional abuse, Murder, Physical abuse, Grief, Gore, and Injury/Injury detail

pipss's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Physical abuse

Moderate: Emotional abuse and Grief

mandi4886's review against another edition

dark sad tense medium-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Child abuse, Mental illness, Murder, Blood, Classism, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Self harm, Suicide attempt, Gore, and Suicidal thoughts

Moderate: Racism, Sexual content, Stalking, Misogyny, Pregnancy, Xenophobia, Sexism, Toxic friendship, and Suicide

rakizaka's review against another edition

dark sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• 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

4.0

ending felt rushed

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Murder, Suicide attempt, Violence, Blood, Child abuse, and Child death

Moderate: Transphobia, Alcohol, Fatphobia, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Xenophobia, and Sexism

Minor: Racial slurs, Sexual content, Alcoholism, Eating disorder, and Medical content

untitledlullaby's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

 I have no qualms with the book. The writing was fine the characters were complicated (which I enjoy) nothing much really happens. I wish I knew what happened to the parents afterward or what happens at the trial and what sentence she got (or if she even woke up) 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Child abuse, Child death, Blood, Death, Grief, Pregnancy, Suicide attempt, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Abortion

writtenontheflyleaves's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.25

 Lullaby by Leïla Slimani 🔪
🌟🌟🌟
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I finished this one before work this morning - overall a quick and engaging read but not one that fully captivated me!
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🔪 The plot: Louise has always seemed like the perfect nanny. She is quiet and efficient and transforms the lives of the families she works for for the better - until the day that she snaps and brutally murders the two children in her care. The novel assembles a fractured picture of the events leading up to the murders; of Louise herself, her employers, and the people drifting on the outskirts of the tragedy, trying to understand what happened.
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I’m usually a big fan of a mystery told backwards. It’s fun to know the destination but have no idea how you got there, and Lullaby is exceptional in its unravelling of the psychological webs that are woven between the characters. But what undoes this story for me is its ending. It took me by surprise how quickly it seemed to wrap up, and although I love some poignant ambiguity at the end of my novels, I don’t feel like the reader gets a satisfying answer for what drives Louise to such an atrocity. My lasting impression is of a sort of amorphous bleakness - it’s moving in its own way, but not especially satisfying.
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That said, there were lots of things I thought were masterful here. Slimani is completely unflinching in her portrayal of the power dynamics between employer and employee: the parents’ simultaneous admiration of Louise and their bourgeois disdain for her. There’s something sickening about all of the characters, but they all provoke pathos too, which is a really engaging thing for a thriller like this to do.
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👩‍👧‍👦 Read it if you like character-driven novels that are a bit on the dark side, and aren’t averse to some real open endings.
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🚫 Avoid it if you like your thrillers to be pacey and have a killer ending (no pun intended). 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Violence

Moderate: Mental illness, Blood, and Grief

Minor: Racial slurs, Racism, and Suicide