jonbar94's reviews
220 reviews

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

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

4.25

Ghosts by Edith Wharton

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challenging dark reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

Dawn by Octavia E. Butler

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dark mysterious reflective 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

5.0

Bath Haus by P.J. Vernon

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challenging lighthearted sad fast-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

2.5

Flowers in the Attic by V.C. Andrews

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dark mysterious sad fast-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

4.0

A Series of Unfortunate Events doesn’t seem so bad now.
The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

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

3.25

I like how nothing happens for the first half of the book and then by the time creepy stuff comes around you’re already kinda out of it. Everyone laughs too much whenever something scary happens?? “Haha that was weird. We are having such a strange time :) “
The October Country by Ray Bradbury

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

3.75

Some good spooky reads, but also some real duds. The stories that are good though are GOOD and worth reading the collection for.
Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth

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challenging funny mysterious fast-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? No

4.25

Is Emily Danforth a storytelling genius? She might be. Watch her whip and play with the novel format as she slips in and out of two timelines, whispers to the reader in footnotes, and remind us how fiction and reality are more entwined than we think. A gothic gay ghost of a time—it’s much weirder than I imagined, and more fun as a result.
The Moment of Psycho: How Alfred Hitchcock Taught America to Love Murder by David Thomson

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 27%.
A lot of rambling!
The Filmmaker's Book of the Dead: How to Make Your Own Heart-Racing Horror Movie by Danny Draven

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4.0

Pretty nifty little book. I learned about some filmmaking pointers that you usually don’t see in these things. It’s helpful when an actual film director writes one of these how to guides because there’s a lot of insight that would’ve have made it in otherwise.