Reviews tagging 'Child abuse'

Once There Were Wolves by Charlotte McConaghy

51 reviews

livcashmere's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Great read! The characters were strong with a naturally woven development throughout the novel. I saw the twist coming at the end but it was still depicted much more beautifully than I anticipated. A lot of similar novels these days tend to be very pretentious with their prose, and I feel like it would have been easy to do that in this novel, especially seeing as the main character is a wolf scientist with a phd. However, the writing was truly elegant without being overdone. The only reason this didn’t score higher is because I felt that some  characters acted in ways that went against the type of personality that the author described, making the plot a little unbelievable at times. Overall though an excellent book, a solid 4 stars and I will definitely be recommending this to friends!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Rape, Sexual violence, Violence, and Murder

audreads100's review against another edition

dark emotional 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? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual violence, and Violence

Moderate: Pregnancy

Minor: Child abuse

lolamosk's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious slow-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Domestic abuse, Gore, and Rape

Moderate: Child abuse

Minor: Suicide and Death of parent

_inge's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

3.5 stars. This read like a Gothic novel, there was a dark, tense atmosphere throughout. The characters were morally grey in a believable way and the decor was set really well. I actually liked how it showed women who lived with traumas and how that changed their perspective of men as a whole, it was interesting to see the other side to that for a change. I liked the conversations about rewilding projects too. So overall this was an enjoyable read. It simply didn’t blow me away. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Murder, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

jalensera's review against another edition

dark emotional informative sad tense medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape and Sexual assault

Moderate: Animal death, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Infertility, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Torture, and Blood

jess_d84's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious slow-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Rape, Grief, Murder, and Pregnancy

Minor: Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Infidelity, Toxic relationship, Violence, Dementia, and Death of parent

mikah_wazowski's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

1.5

I thought (and the synopsis said) that this would be a mystery novel about someone who reintroduces wolves into the Scotland Highlands and ends up trying to absolve them of murder-then in doing so discovers it’s her lover who is the prime suspect. Ok. Sure. That’s maybe 150 pages of this story though. The majority of this book is an exploration of why people do absolutely horrible things to each other-and it doesn’t even do that well. I wanted to like someone. I ended up liking one side character and the wolves and that was it. All of that is fine but then when the

pregnancy, sexual assault, and physical and emotional abuse

become the main crux of the story, I was done. The descriptions of birth, assault, and abuse are needlessly graphic, starting with the first sentence. And I understand why, I just didn’t like it and don’t think it was handled well at all. I wanted a story about wolves and I got another story about how terrible people are :( 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Death, Domestic abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Murder, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Child abuse, Rape, Suicide, Grief, and Death of parent

kit_colibri's review against another edition

dark emotional slow-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Gore, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual violence, Suicide, Blood, Grief, Murder, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Infidelity and Death of parent

Minor: Drug use

kaiyakaiyo's review against another edition

reflective sad slow-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? Yes

Very incredibly bad trauma porn with a side of halfbaked white womanly climate change opinions 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Rape, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Animal death, Child abuse, Incest, Mental illness, Sexual violence, Dementia, Death of parent, and Pregnancy

cyntismiles's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad 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

5.0

I don't remember why I placed a hold on this book (other than I saw it was nominated for a Goodreads award and I thought something about it looked interesting?? Very vague) but I couldn't be more happy that I did! For most of this book, I was thinking this would probably be around the 4-5 star mark because I was enjoying it more and more but the last 10% of the book really solidified its place as a 5-star book for me!

What did I like about this book? It had a little bit of everything that interests me? 

First, before I gush about it, a note: A large topic of this book is abuse (with some more graphic details) and there were generally pretty graphic sensations described which was disturbing to read. I would recommend knowing that going in and avoiding if that is not something you want to read. 

Okay now for the gushing. This book had so many of my interests! 
--Intrigue and lots of mystery (how did we get from the childhood characters to the now? Clearly something occurred). 
--Wolves! I may be basic but literally anything with wolves does have my interest
--Love (I will NOT be giving anything away by going any further!)
--Knitting :)
--The motif of the dark woods (I cannot read enough of these books)
--An emotional journey for more than 1 character
--A murder mystery! The murderer is not who I suspected and I typically have a suspicion
--Once again, the ending. I thought things were going in so many different directions in the last 20% of the book and it all got wrapped up and I was sad and pleased and content

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Rape, Sexual violence, Violence, and Murder

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, and Murder