blewballoon's Reviews (763)

The short stories are very wholesome and cozy. This would be fine for quite young audiences, but I enjoyed it as an adult. I will probably read the rest of the series. It was a nice palate cleanser during spooky season between actual horror books. 

I didn't like Cackle, so I was skeptical going into this book, but very pleasantly surprised. The characters were likeable and felt like whole people. The plot was engaging with little mysteries and things to keep you in suspense. The prose was lovely and some of the more difficult topics were handled elegantly with a good final message. Fantastic werewolf stuff and enough body horror to make it feel like a Halloween read, but nothing gratuitous or overly disturbing. Very glad I gave Rachel Harrison another shot. 

I listened to this on audiobook because I loved reading Gideon the Ninth by the same author, and I wanted to get a feel for this narrator since I know she (Moira Quirk) narrates The Locked Tomb series. First of all, Moira Quirk is fantastic and I'd listen to just about anything she narrated. As far as the story, it's an interesting examination of fairy-tale tropes. As might be expected if you've read anything else by Tamsyn Muir, it can be quite dark while also being sarcastic and humorous.

User kellate summed it up in my opinion by saying "All of this over some milquetoast man??????" So many unlikable characters making nonsensical decisions.

The main plot is essentially three women doing way too much (leaving their entire life behind, murder, suicide, offering their infant child to a sea god??) for a man who is average at best and a selfish gambler at worst.

I was really excited for a ghost story on the Titanic and this is so very far from what I wanted. Even the gay boxer plotline wasn't done well enough to save it.

I absolutely loved this gender-flipped queer sci-fi fantasy version of Sherlock Holmes. I listened to this on audiobook and the narrator was perfect. I loved how many insane scenarios the characters ended up in, and I loved how pure hearted Wyndham (Watson) was. I do wish Shaharazad Haas (Sherlock) showed a bit more compassion, but I understand what the portrayal was going for. Overall, I had a great time the entire time and I wish this had become a series. 

As I was reading this book, I thought I would describe it as "unhinged." It starts out sane enough with a main character who feels like a person. A person who is in a bad place emotionally, but still a person you can relate to. As she is thrust into more bizarre situations and interactions, it is harder to understand why she does what she does. In some instances she's obtusely passive and ignores what should not be ignored. In others she's overly confrontational and aggressive. I started to lose my sympathy and understanding of her and any of the other characters and never really got it back. The side characters and Sophie never feel completely fleshed out. Sophie is so performative and mysterious you never get closure on what she's really like underneath it all. I did like the ending, and I flew through the book, it was easy to read and kept me engaged even if a lot of the time I was just asking myself "wtf?" 

This book seemed super popular when I bought it, and I generally like gothic horror so it seemed like a safe bet, and ultimately I don't regret reading it. I like that while the story does have a lot of traditional gothic horror elements, the setting and main character felt fresh. The heroine is bold, confident, and smart. I read What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher around the same time and they both have similar plot elements based on the Fall of the House of Usher. I think they are each unique enough to stand on their own. Mexican Gothic deals more with the horrors of misogyny and colonialism blended with the actual horror elements. This won't be a top favorite for me because there were some scenes that felt too gross and disquieting for me to want to re-read, but it's nothing too gratuitous or horrific.

I bought this book immediately upon seeing it in a book store because I recognized the art style from some comics I saw on tumblr a while ago that I loved. The comic I remembered the most was included in the book, too, which is great. I was on a trip at the time and bought it right before getting on the bus and finished it during the long bus ride. I love the art style, I loved the interesting fantasy world, and I loved the queer relationship portrayal. 

I really enjoyed when the artist was posting this series on their social media, and I'm really happy to have them all in a nicely packaged collection.

I had seen some of the panels in this comic on tumblr a while back, and I wanted to have a collection of the full story. The packaging is lovely as well.