Reviews tagging 'Sexual content'

Wake Up and Open Your Eyes by Clay McLeod Chapman

49 reviews

randeerebecca's review

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

1.0

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minimicropup's review against another edition

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

3.5

This was horrible (in the best way). There were bizarre symbolic horrors (that mirror a little too closely what life next door looks like right now 🥺) and social commentary with lots of disturbing and thought-provoking moments. I just didn’t like the very end, it felt too overstuffed and chaotic.

 Energy: Disturbed. Jaunty. Controversial.
 
🐺 Growls: The end piled on so many horror themes on top of the social message. All those layers of trauma, commentary, and surreal events got too chaotic for me. The ending felt kinda preachy or soapboxy, but I also didn’t fully get it either so maybe I’m missing the point. The audiobook made the eerie scenes accidentally funny, which didn’t happen in the text (I wish they had real background sounds in audio instead of making the narrator mimic them).
 
🐕 Howls: The random tangents like nursery rhymes, grotesque comparisons, and unhinged sex stuff sometimes felt a bit too silly or satirical. Some scene transitions were unclear, so I got lost on where everyone was and who was there. The action scenes had those moments where everything's happening fast but then there's a long pause for reflection or thinking it through (I pictured everyone just frozen mid-action).
 
🐩 Tail Wags: The surreal, intensely symbolic horror. The disturbing action scenes. The mix of grotesque imagery, apocalyptic chaos, haunted media tropes, and references to other horror works (including recent ones!). The fever-dream quality. The pointed commentary.
 
Scene: 🇺🇸 Mostly in Virginia, USA
Perspectives (5): A Brooklynite returning to their childhood home to check on their parents after they stop responding. Their brother who gets hooked on news channels they don't usually watch. Their spouse who finds an online wellness group while in their spiritual purpose seeking era. Their teenage kid, pushed out by their peer group, making friends and feeling validated online. Their 7-year-old who senses something's off at home. Plus, snippets of videos, social media, and reactions from different people online.
Timeline: November 15 – December 20. The 2010s or 2020s. Linear and Then & Now moments. 
🔥 Fuel: What happened to the main characters’ parents? How did they get that way? Why are others starting to behave similarly? How does this happen? Will our main characters survive? How much will politics play into who succumbs and who thrives?
📖 Cred: Speculative surrealism
 
Mood Reading Match-Up:
Cable news. Drool. Yoga Mama. Doom scrolling. Oiliness. DMs. Baby ghost. Anderson Cooper.
  • Being told a story, invisible in the room watching things unfold. Almost like the narrator jumps out of the story and speaks to the reader sometimes (third person).
  • Watching different generations of a family unravel
  • Fragmented, lyrical, ironic, nonsensical writing style
  • Chaotic, compromised, spiralling, and unhinged characters
  • White people gone wrong
  • Close calls, contagion, and conspiracy
  • Descent into madness, distorted reality fever dream
  • Grimdark and grotesque
  • Humans are the real horror
  • Fake news, toxic news cycle, possessed media
  • Psychological apocalyptic social mystery
  • Real world with a twist, ripped from the headlines quality
  • Unknown, undead menace, viral survival drama
 
Content Heads-Up: Acne (insecurity). Animal cruelty, death (dog). Body horror, gore, fluids. Cannibalism. Child death. Food horror. Homophobia (character opinions). Incest (attempted). Political commentary. Self-harm (psychosis/trance). Sexual content (lewd, orgy, with objects, mindless). Societal collapse. Transphobia (character comments, opinions). Violence, massacre, mass shootings. Vomit.
 
Rep: American. Haitian American (peripheral). Cis. Hetero. Bronze, pale, spray tanned, and tan skin tones.
 
📚 Format: Library Digital
 
My musings 💖 powered by puppy snuggles 🐶

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teastained's review

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

4.5

Although a bit redundant, the point of the story was less allegorical than it was overtly hammered away at the entire time. It was still a fast paced, engaging, and enjoyable read. 
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novellearts's review against another edition

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challenging dark funny reflective tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

I think this is more like a 3.5/5 star read which is such a bummer because when I first started this book, I really thought that it was going to end up being a 4 or 5 star book for me. I think I’m going to round down though to 3 stars to keep it consistent with my GR rating.

This starts off pretty action-packed and immediately the concept gripped me. If you didn’t pick up on the not-so-subtle hints, this book is a political satire on MAGA and Fox News. I thought this aspect was great, I loved the absurdity of the brainwashing and insanity that overtook these characters. I’m also sure that if the audience that this book is written about reads this, they are going to absolutely hate this book.

The main reason I knocked off points for this book was that it felt incredibly repetitive and almost became tedious in the middle chunk of this story. The first part was fantastic, I was completely zoned into the story, but once I got to the middle, I found my mind wandering because I just didn’t feel as though I was reading anything ground-breaking. The story felt like it stalled for me. The ending did pick back up a bit but it wasn’t as strong as the start.

I did enjoy the humor in this too and there were certainly a good amount of “WTF” moments and gore. I think this is probably a book that a lot of people would want to check the trigger warnings for. For example, there is a family dog in this book. The dog does
not live. And to take it even further, the family eats the dog. It’s not incredibly graphic, it’s more so mentioned instead of described. There is no detailed scene about the killing of the dog or anything like that.

There’s also some pretty graphic scenes about child deaths and school shootings.

I do think this book was worth reading even though it lost some of its appeal to me in the middle.
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summerangel's review

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dark lighthearted tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This book would be great for someone who doesn’t have a weak stomach. Even I had trouble eating dinner after reading some of these chapters. The first chapter will shock you, but once you get through that it slowly brings in the absolute chaos that is this book. It’s vivid and morbidly entertaining narration will keep you coming back for more.
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ghostsymposium's review

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

4.5

Now THAT’s how you write an apocalypse story - no skimping on the details!!! You want colorful carnage and unarousing sexuality? At points it almost tops over to “too on the nose”, but I think it keeps its footing and doesn’t wimp out on the ending. Avoids the trap it seems to be headed into of typifying right vs. left and nails the landing. Thanks clay!
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darkdahlia9's review

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I was made aware of the explicit dog death and I do not wish to finish at this time
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buckynwd's review

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny reflective tense 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

5.0

This is not an easy read but stick in to the end. This book seems like a satire of the far-right but in reality it lampoons us all. Thought provoking stuff. 
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mottthefox's review

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DNFing at 85% I just can’t do it anymore. I should have dnf at the part with the dog. No actually I should have DNFed at 13% when the first mum jumped her son, and tried do the nasty! He got away, but I just shouted have give up sooner.
This book just wasn’t for me.
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v_nerdbooks's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny tense fast-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? It's complicated

4.5

 If you are part of a cult, wear a little red hat, and worship an orange maniac, you will *HATE* this book.
However, it will also show you what people actually think about you, soooo maybe give it a go 🤷

I personally loved it, it is a bit of fun, but granted in these times, especially in the centre of it all, American folks may want to wait a while as it is a little close to home at the moment 😬

Let's just say that people get sucked into right-wing propaganda by watching "Facts News" (insert zombie voice saying Juuuussttt the Faaaaccccttsssss" here 😳)

If you think it sounds familiar, it is, there is a hidden person called E who's anonymous, and gets into people's heads.

If you have friends/family that have fallen down the Fox News rabbit hole, this may be a little too much for you 😬 
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