minimicropup's reviews
479 reviews

challenging dark emotional mysterious medium-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? It's complicated

4.5

I was ready to rant about this spinning wheels going nowhere and how I hated the main character…but that ending changed everything for me. I wanna re-read it now. But I can also see that approach being one of those love it or hate it things.

Energy: Moralizing. Pessimistic. Defensive.

🐺 Growls: Interrupting conversation with tangents/backstory/reflection. Having to back-read to remind myself of someone’s question when the main character finally got around to answering it. Withholding every little thing to make cliffhangers. Annoyingly cutting off mid-podcast or transcript/chat just when something was about to be said. Hazel reacting to said things all next chapter while we were completely left out.

🐕 Howls: Spoon-fed commentary sometimes. Spotify playlist was at the very end!! Felt disengaged and left out of the story for the first 40%.

🐩 Tail Wags: That ending. How much I was complaining about this book until the ending made it all fall into place. Realistic mixed media and comments sections. Realistic portrayal of older gen detective dismissing younger gen just because he doesn’t ‘get it’ and that makes him insecure. Mixed media formatting on page. Having a Spotify playlist to go with the book.

Scene: 🇺🇸 Set in Phoenix, Arizona, parts of California and the surrounding area.

Perspective: A struggling 28-year-old who rejected growing up in their mother’s social media spotlight. Their younger sibling got caught up in it and they feel responsible when their sibling suddenly stops posting. Also get Hazel’s memories and mixed media throughout.

Timeline: Mostly summer 2023 with flashbacks to 2010 when the family first went viral.

🤓 Reader Role: The outsider. Getting snippets of what is happening overshadowed by Hazel’s perspective and interpretations.

🔥 Fuel: Deliberately keeping info out of reach to build suspense, ending chapters just before a reveal. Trainwreck intrigue and Hazel reflecting on relationship with her family. Where is Evie? Is she safe or in danger?

📖 Cred: Hyper-realistic

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Family photos. Beige. McMansions. Hard drives. Desert sunset. True crime podcast. Salad. Lurking in the comments. Sponsored content. Journals.

Reflective storytelling style
Epistolary reveals (reddit-style posts, texts, podcasts, blogs).
Trail of clues
Pretentious, holier-than-thou protagonist (ymmv).
Shadowed by fame, tragic past
Unhinged mothers
Complicated sibling bonds
Sketchy therapy
Culty MLM-ish energy
Commentary around social media stardom, growing up online
Twisty open-to-reader-interpretation conclusions
Exploring mental and cognitive effects of influencer & content creation careers

Content Heads-Up: Cyberbullying, trolling. Child abuse (exploitation, labour, invasion of privacy). Voyeurism. Loss of parent (as child; as teen). Narcissistic parent. Narcissism. Emotional incest. Narcissism. Car accident (fatal). Grief. Dismissive law enforcement. Body shaming (restricting food, criticizing hunger & consumption). Depression. Generational trauma. Social media addiction. Online stalking, obsession. False accusation (sexual harassment). Cannabis use (smoking; very brief). Early-onset Alzheimer’s disease (brief mention). Alcohol (self-medicating).

Rep: American. Pale, golden, tan, and ambiguous skin tones. Acne. Mixed ethnicity (half-Mexican). Childfree by choice. Lesbian. Heterosexual. Cisgender.

📚 Format: Library Digital

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Our Wicked Histories by Amy Goldsmith

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dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

5.0

I loved this. I almost didn’t read it because I thought it’d be over-the-top mean girl vitriol and high school politics. This is not that. It was surprisingly deep, thoughtful, and spooky too.

Energy: Consoling. Diligent. Impassioned.

🐕 Howls: Flashbacks can feel disruptive because they seem to happen out of nowhere and have same characters and a studio too. Life-or-death moment where a character stops to interview the Big Bad for the reader’s sake instead of taking the chance to escape (doesn’t happen for long, but still lol).

🐩 Tail Wags: Eerie, immersive atmosphere. Effortless imaginings. Believable friends, dialogue, and group dynamics. Scary (and fun) to read at night.

Scene: 🇮🇪 Set in ancestral estate at Wren Hall in Ireland

Perspective: A high school student facing expulsion from their elite high school (and their friend group) after a drunken incident. An invite extended by their former friend to join everyone at their family estate for a Samhain/Halloween party is meant to make amends and help everyone to move past it.

Timeline: Current (2020s) in late autumn, with flashbacks to the past summer.

🤓 Reader Role: Sympathetic listener, following the highs and lows of the main character’s journey and challenges.

🗺️ World-Building: Cinematic and immersive

🔥 Fuel: Gradually revealing backstory. Character and friend evolutions. Strange, creepy, ominous happenings. What did Meg do? Where are some of the friends? Why is their host being strange? Will romance rekindle… should it? Is something out to get them?

📖 Cred: Psychological folklore/cultural realism

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Rain. Dust. Halloween costumes. Slimy lake water. Art studios. Paint on canvas. Hyacinths. Mildewed air. Howling winds. Cobwebs. Soggy turf. Jack-o’-lanterns. Woodsmoke. Muddy footprints.

Intimate, reflective young adult stories
Character/friendship study
Hot-and-cold, will-he-or-won’t-he forbidden love
Jump scares and things that go bump in the night
Irish folk horror
Isolated gothic mansion hauntings
Mysterious deaths
Psychological unraveling
Drunken night missing memory
Puzzling events and murders with multiple motives
A few dream sequences
Historical ghostly vengeance
High school fall from grace
Love triangle tensions
Books to read on a cold, rainy day

Content Heads-Up: Misogyny, body shaming (clothing, style, ‘slut’-shaming). Prejudice, classism (against local Irish, housekeeping staff, custodians). Anger/rage. Alcohol, intoxication (parties, social drinking). Elitism. Nicotine (cigarettes). Drug use (off page very brief mention; coke). Bullying (ghosting, snide comments, relational aggression aka mean-girling). Flooding. Drowning. Starvation, poverty, famine (off page, mention). Murder. Death. Sexual content (brief descriptions; making out, first time, arousal). Vomit. Drugging. Psychopathy/personality disorder. Eating disorder (implied; excessive weight loss).

Rep: British. Irish. Pale and freckled skin tones. Cisgender. Heterosexual. Gay.

📚 Format: Library Digital

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No Road Home by John Fram

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dark mysterious fast-paced

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

2.0

The first 40% I was loving this, but it stalled out hard in the second half. I kept thinking ‘I already KNOW this, I already READ this…are there just 200 more pages of this?’. It was wayyy too long, spending time convoluting the previously intriguing moments.

Energy: Caustic. Irrational. Taut.

🐺 Growls: Slogging through previously establish plot points and clues felt pointless. Poorly edited and seemed unfinished at times (obvious typos, some moments were so repetitive it made me wonder if it was just missed during editing after moving things around?). Too much going on…like, religious/possession explanation then dropping it for ‘they’re insane’, wait no, actually ‘it’s a conspiracy’…all within sub-plots built on sub-plots. Overanalyzing and overexplaining.

🐕 Howls: Dumb main character making irrational decisions (annoying in combo with the repetitive plot points). High stakes moments didn’t feel that way… the main character reacted to life-or-death moments with the same energy as getting lunch at Cracker Barrel. Seemed like it was going for a mix of OTT/bizarro satire + psychological thriller but it ended up watering down both approaches.

🐩 Tail Wags: Building mystery and intrigue. Creepy family dynamics. Threading the ‘Get Out’ energy throughout the first 40%. Anchoring large cast of characters. Creepy immersive atmosphere. Writing style.

Scene: 🇺🇸 Set in Hebron, Texas at estate of rich mega-church family.

Perspective: A single parent of a 7-year-old who has recently married into a mega-church family after a whirlwind romance. They are visiting their spouse’s family ahead of their honeymoon. Near the end we get perspectives of family members and staff.

Timeline: Current (2020s)

🤓 Reader Role: Observing from the sidelines.

🗺️ World-Building: Immersive and atmospheric for ~25% becoming less so over time.

🔥 Fuel: Withholding (but giving us enough clues to infer). Interlocking mysteries, twists and turns. Race against time quests. Can Toby find a way out despite the storm and save himself and his son? Will he be blamed for the deaths? Who is responsible for the murders?

📖 Cred: Over-the-top gothic

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Emerald lake. Spray paint. Saran Wrap. Memory palaces. Rain. Golf carts. Crash of thunder. Origami rose. Bas-relief art. Water stains. Wall sconces.

Detailed character descriptions
Repeating, reexamining, rehashing style stories
Hits of ‘Succession’ energy family saga
Culture clash and social commentary on gender, childhood, religious corruption, and bigotry
Evangelicals not practicing what they preach
Whodunnit closed circle mystery
Isolated dark-and-stormy-night surreal mansion
Mentally yelling at the main character for their rational thinking skills (or lack thereof)
Amateur sleuthing in a race against time to prove innocence
Inheritance conspiracies, ominous prophecies, kids saying creepy things, ghosty vibes
Unsettling normalcy of meeting your spouse’s family, double crossed with ‘Get Out’ energy
Gothic rich people behaving badly mysteries

Content Heads-Up: Car accident (off page brief mention; fatal). Intoxicated driving. Religious bigotry (homophobia, racism, ‘conversion’). Loss of sibling. Forced gender roles. Addiction, overdose (off page, recall). Drug abuse (anxiety meds, sedatives). Stroke (on page). Death. Murder. Nicotine (vaping, cigarettes). Physical assault, domestic abuse. False accusation. Dementia/memory loss. Bullying, toxic masculinity. Classism. Brain tumour (brief mention). Bribery/corruption (law enforcement). Infidelity (brief mention). Occult. Incest. Natural disasters (flooding).

Rep: White and mixed race American (Black and White). Gay. Heterosexual. Cisgender.

📚 Format: Library Digital

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What Have You Done? by Shari Lapena

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dark emotional mysterious sad fast-paced

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

3.0

Looking past some of my least liked tropes and narration quirks, this was intriguing despite being predictable.

Energy: Impartial. Distressed. Sorrowful.

🐺 Growls: The beyond the grave angle felt out of place/OTT just for heartstring tugs.

🐕 Howls: Robotic overenunciation on audio, especially for younger characters. Everyone speaks with the same tone, even teens (almost too proper). Hand-holding style commentary after hard-hitting plot points. Obvious red herrings and over-hinting (subtle, but in that way where if you read a lot of books in this genre, it might seem like it’s loudly hinting).

🐩 Tail Wags: Steady momentum of twists and reveals. No shortage of suspects without feeling contrived. True crime style realism. Rapid but easy to follow perspective shifts.

Scene: 🇺🇸 Set in rural Vermont.

Perspectives (multiple): The victim, their parent and friends, and the potential suspects along with their circle of friends/family. An e-journal written by the victim’s friend.

Timeline: October 2022. Linear (mostly).

🤓 Reader Role: Fly on the wall. Knowing more than any one character, privy to private thoughts and conversations.

🗺️ World-Building: Barely there. Could be any small town/rural area. Mostly based on dialogue and thoughts. Vibes, season, and location were lacking but you can imagine them on your own without interruption if you want.

🔥 Fuel: Relatable tragedy. Subtle withholding and red herrings. What happened to Diana and who did it? Why?

📖 Cred: Realistic with a sprinkling of paranormal

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Hayfield. Vultures. Phone pings. Slamming doors. Ouija board wine glass. Knock on door. Living rooms. Meetings.

Clear, linear storytelling
False accusations and hidden motives
Small town paranoia everyone knows everyone
Whodunnit murder mystery
Scandal, rumours, betrayals, and tragedy
Creepy teqcher icks
Beyond the grave perspectives
True crime style fiction

Content Heads-Up: Corpse (discovery, description). Loss of child (teen), grief (descriptive). Potential false accusation. Sexual harassment of minors, threats. Vomit. Betrayal. Infidelity. Blackmail. Murder. Corruption (institutional).

Rep: Americans. Ambiguously described characters. Cisgender. Heterosexual.

📚 Format: Library Audio

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Incidents Around the House by Josh Malerman

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challenging dark emotional sad tense fast-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? No

3.5

This was so captivating and scary until about 40% or so. Then it changed tone in a way that replaced spooks with sadness.

Energy: Ashamed. Erratic. Impressionable.

🐕 Howls: Real Mommy with her repetitive self-pitying taking away from the other plot points. Execution of symbolism & commentary around parenthood and marriage (too soon, took away from spooks and became sad and kinda predictable).

🐩 Tail Wags: Creepy goings-on. Seeing the world through a child’s perspective (and being able to infer things as an adult). The concept for Other Mommy. First quarter where Bela doesn’t understand the dangers and her parents are unaware thinking it’s normal kid stuff. Complex parent-child and spousal dynamics. Covert Real Mommy. Overt Other Mommy. Audio narration. The ending.

Scene: 🇺🇸 Michigan, USA

Perspective: An 8-year-old who has lived with Other Mommy all their life. Recently Other Mommy has started to frighten them, but they’re also distracted by their mission to ensure their parents remain in love. Also get the perspective of their actual mother.

Timeline: Linear. Current.

🤓 Reader Role: Deep in Bela’s mind, tagging along with her and seeing the world through her perspective.

🗺️ World-Building: Eerie. Atmospheric. Vibes.

🔥 Fuel: Twists and turns. Escalating stakes. Revelatory backstories. Atmospheric tension. Unreliable narrator (because she’s a kid and doesn’t understand some things). What happens when your imaginary friend turns on you? And is no longer imaginary?

📖 Cred: Gothic-ish psychological speculative.

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Stinky bathroom. Family-friendly movie nights. Shadows. Carnations. Muffled party sounds downstairs. Creaking ceiling. Closet doors. Hairy arms. Car rides. Dark nights. Grandma’s house.

Things that go bump in the night
What if the creepy things kids say were real?
Unhinged imaginary friend
Through the eyes of a child
On-the run psychological horror
Purification, rituals, possession
Family life spiraling out of control
How far would you go for your child? Your family?
Examination of consequence, optimism vs pessimism, morality, and good vs evil

Content Heads-Up: Infidelity (descriptive). Alcohol, cannabis use (party). Pet death (very brief recall; cat). Endangered child.

Rep: Ambiguous described Americans. Cisgender. Heterosexual.

📚 Format: Library Audio

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I Was a Teenage Slasher by Stephen Graham Jones

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adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious reflective 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

4.5

I loved reading this and the writing style. Felt so torn rooting for and being horrified by Tolly!

Energy: Enigmatic. Contemplative. Scrupulous.

🐕 Howls: Slower reflective pace mid-way (especially with the sounds).

🐩 Tail Wags: Quasi-breaking the fourth wall style. Eager to tell the tale main character. Tangents, distractions. Written like how real people speak. Using withholding to build intrigue without being exhaustion. Exploring horror and slasher genre in a fun and thought-provoking way.

🤔 Random Thoughts:

The main character is writing this on an old computer, and was never a star pupil. The grammar isn’t perfect, things are written in streams of consciousness at times with tangents within tangents. I loved that because it made it feel real, but it could be frustrating for some readers. I had to read slower than usual, but it was worth it for that added character dimension.

Scene: 🇺🇸 Tiny town of Lamesa, West Texas.

Perspective: A 17-year-old chilling with their Bestie on lazy summer nights when a party foul turns into a living nightmare.

Timeline: July 1989

🤓 Reader Role: Empathetic listener. Tolly telling us the story that he’s writing to Amber.

🗺️ World-Building: Cinematic. Atmospheric. Intimate.

🔥 Fuel: Withholding-style foreshadowing. Moral quandaries. Dynamic relationships between characters. And strangely relatable dilemmas. What drives the slasher? What if it was contagious?

📖 Cred: Suspended disbelief realism.

Mood Reading Match-Up:

House party. Rum and coke. Peanuts. Cowboy hats. Oily stench. Blacktop. Tumbleweed. Chicken wire. Llama stares. Motors revving. Knives. Pozole. Grain elevators. Mesquite.

Long chapters (not dense though)
Linear day by day stories
Beyond the grave vengeance
Teen slasher horror come to life
Immersive, nostalgic setting
Breaking 4th wall(ish) writing style
Character study of a reluctant predator
Kill scenes highlighting the Chase
Intertwining destinies and tragic friendships
The monster within psychological coming-of-age horror

Content Heads-Up: Loss of parent, grief. Car accident (fatal). Gore, body horror, blood. Nicotine (chewing, cigarettes). Vomit (graphic). Allergic reaction (descriptive). Murder. Racism (covert, systemic). Animal death (very brief; birds, canines, wildlife). Head injury. Homophobia (off page mention; shaming, outing, abuse from family, ‘conversion’).

Rep: Food allergies. Cisgender. Heterosexual. Dark and pale skin tones. Indigenous-White and White Americans.

📚 Format: Library Hardcover

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How to Love a Jamaican by Alexia Arthurs

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emotional informative lighthearted reflective relaxing sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

I liked all the different perspectives and the slice of life feels woven throughout these stories.

Mood Reading Match-Up:
Fragrant soup. Brooklyn streets. Sea kissing shore. Plantain and bread and eggs. Mermaids. Coconut drops. Cornmeal porridge. Rotting pears. Clean air. Singing.

Stream of consciousness essays and memories
Random(ish), open-ended, or ambiguous conclusions
Slice of life snapshots
Nostalgic, existential, reflective vibes
Morally grey characters
Social commentary and struggles
Jamaican (and Caribbean) culture
Emotional lives of diverse people from children to young adults to elders
Reflecting on family dynamics and relationship decisions
Vignette style short stories

Content Heads-Up: Racism (colourism, discussion/debate, bias). Eating disorder (bulimia). Sexual assault (groping; very brief off page). Sexual content (consenting; brief on page). Homophobia (character comments, discomfort). Miscarriage (very brief off page). Loss of a child, grief. Adult/minor relationship. Cheating, infidelity (brief mentions). Double standards, hypocritical gender roles. Breast cancer (on page, mention). Body shaming (character opinions; fat, skinny, short, flat). Classism (prejudice, bias, rejection). Domestic abuse. Drug use.

Rep: Jamaican. Jamaican-American. Black and White Americans. Chinese-American. Second generation culture. Cisgender. Heterosexual. Gay. Lesbian. Bisexual. Dark, brown, light, coffee, albino, red, and pale skin tones.

📚 Format: Kindle

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Blood Oranges by J.M. Cannon

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dark mysterious tense fast-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

4.0

This was a pretty good read. I loved the writing style and how the mysteries build-up.

Energy: Concerned. Distressed. Peculiar.

🐕 Howls: The ending (the very last thing to happen) is a huge cliffhanger! The action scenes felt a little cliché, over-the-top good vs evil compared to the rest of the story.

🐩 Tail Wags: Cinematic, sensory writing. The initial mysteries and how we jump between them.

🤓 Reader Role: Piecing together the puzzle on the sidelines watching characters with the narrator filling us in. We know more than the characters (usually).

🗺️ World-Building: Sensory, cinematic, foreboding, lush.

🔥 Fuel: Escalating stakes, cliffhangers, twists and turns.

📖 Cred: Plausible to suspended disbelief

Scene: 🇺🇸 Suburbs and swamps of Orlando, Florida

Perspective: A divorced 27-year old living in their evangelical mega-church pastor family’s pool house when their 8-year old sister goes missing. A dedicated detective investigating two bizarre male deaths on an old citrus farm nearby.

Timeline: Current. Linear timeline.

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Whisky sour. Decay. Hot humid days. Orange trees. News crews. Mosquitos. Swamps. Murky water. Alligators. Tinted windows.

Fast-paced mysterious deaths in Florida swamps
Law & Order style sleuthing alongside the detectives
Immersive summery/tropical settings
Behind closed doors wealthy mega-church family drama
Missing child suspense
Conspiracies, Christianity, and capitalism
Short chapters
Good vs evil, against the odds survival-action scenes
Dark secret open-ended conclusion
Mix of morally grey and unlikeable characters with ones to root for

Content Heads-Up: Corpse (discovery, scent). Alcohol. Stroke. Depression, anxiety. Missing child, missing teen. Murder. Fire (building). Child abuse (foster system). Incest. Kidnapping. Blood, injury.

Rep: White and Latin American. Cisgender. Heterosexual. Pale and tan skin tones.

📚 Format: Kindle Unlimited

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The Haunting of Velkwood by Gwendolyn Kiste

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dark emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

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

3.0

It’s not bad, it’s just more character-focused, sad, and romance-driven than I expected. I found it hard to stay interested sometimes.

Energy: Perplexed. Despondent. Solemn.

Scene: 🗺️ Unspecified location of the suburban development of Velkwood Street and surrounding area

Perspective (1): An adult who agrees to assist on a research grant by returning to their childhood neighbourhood that is inaccessible to most, eventually dragging their fellow survivors into the mix.

⏱️ Timeline: Current day (2024is). November outside Velkwood vicinity, summer in Velkwood vicinity.

🐺 Growls: Wasn’t feeling the romance despite being romance-driven. Romance felt forced, like Tabitha didn’t really care. Monotone/flat characters sometimes. Audio narrator (flat and not expressive).

🐕 Howls: Didn’t feel invested in the characters. Annoying hinting/withholding about ‘what they did’ and who’s to blame. Circling writing style (same thing being said slightly different ways too many times). Precocious child speaking like fully grown.

🐩 Tail Wags: The mystery of what happened on Velkwood St. When they first go back and the effects. Character backstories.

🤓 Reader Role: The outsider, slightly detached and being thrown in the story, overhearing Tabitha’s thoughts.

🗺️ World-Building: Eerie, immersive, sensory, cinematic

🔥 Fuel: Withholding, revelatory backstories, race against time. What happened to the neighborhood? Why can only the survivors go back? Are there any after-effects? Can they save those left behind?

📖 Cred: Gritty surrealism

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Strawberries and cream body lotion. Sun-baked concrete. Sprinklers. Desaturated colours. Windex. Bacon. Millipedes. Barbecue. Ozone.

Uneasy, sad, and haunting reflection
Emotional odyssey
Time travel
Bittersweet, tragic friendship
Circling main plot points
Coming of age forbidden love and star crossed lovers
Social commentary on suburbia, injustice of societal ‘norms’, complex parent-child and family bonds
Gradually escalating race against time survival
Hint of parallel universes and reality distortion
Surreal immersive atmosphere
Collective memory magical realism
Character-driven metamorphosis stories
The unseen menace
Inexplicable phenomena

Content Heads-Up: Loss of parent. Loss of sibling. Grief. Heart failure, cancer (brief mention). Homophobia (from caregivers, family, community). Child abuse, sexual abuse (off page; insinuated, by stepparent). Bullying (physical). Mental illness (breakdown). Parental rejection/resentment.

Rep: Ambiguously described characters. Cisgender. Lesbian. Bisexual. Heterosexual.

📚 Format: Everand Audio + Digital

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Bury Your Gays by Chuck Tingle

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious tense medium-paced

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

5.0

This one will stick with me. Also has me side-eyeing my ChatGPT...

Energy: Exacting. Astute. Intense.

Scene: 🇺🇸 Los Feliz and Hollywood, Los Angeles, California

Perspective: A screenplay writer nominated for an Oscar but navigating demands from the studio executives to kill off a main character on his successful show. We also get snippets of a screenplay featuring our main character in strange situations.

Timeline: Present-day (2024ish), with scattered flashbacks to 1996, 1999, and 2001.

🐩 Tail Wags: Action-packed without being exhausting. Over-the-top but Real. Thought-provoking sci-fi creativity. Symbolism and commentary about capitalism, art, self-acceptance, and so much more. The balance of horror genres. The character dynamics. This universe (with its own version of classics like The X-Files and Warner Bros. Studio). Audio narration with sound effects and full cast for the screenplay parts.

🤓 Reader Role: Deep in Misha’s mind piecing together the puzzle.

🗺️ World-Building: Immersive, vibey, chaotic. Less is more in the horror descriptions so they’re easier to imagine. A whole alternate universe that closely mirrors ours with nuanced lore (like Camp Damascus!).

🔥 Fuel: Character evolution, world-building, and race against time. Is Misha losing his mind or are his characters coming ot life and stalking him? How is this happening? What will the outcome be if he can’t figure it out in time?

📖 Cred: Allegorical techno sci-fi realism with a touch of satire

Mood Reading Match-Up:

British punk music. Tall grass in the breeze. Bicycle horn. Cigarette smoke. Matchbooks. Black lamb. Brunch. Airplane cabin. Mob boss. Ash. Blood. The Oscars. Studio soundstage.

Punchy, satirical, reflective writing style
Linear narrative with snippets of flashbacks & screenplay
Audiobooks with full cast and immersive sound (for some chapters)
Mind bending action and gut punch commentary
Allegory, satire, imagery
Supportive love and trust
Shattered illusion, redemption arcs
High-stakes problem-solving in a tight timeframe
Not too distant future cyber sci-fi elements
Monster terror + touch of cosmic horror + psychological horror + moments of body horror
Capitalism and conspiracies
Real world settings with a twist
Irl horrors of intelligence and not questioning algorithms (including our own)
Exploring the nuanced impact of the stories we create

Content Heads-Up: Anxiety. Outing (as teen; violence, rejection, blackmail). Homophobia (systemic, peers). Blood, injury, dismemberment. Body horror, torture, gore. Vomit. Parasites.

Rep: Asexual. Aromantic. Bisexual. Gay. Heterosexual. Cisgender. American.

📚 Format: Everand Audio + Library Hardcover

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minimicropup's reviews 479 reviews

minimicropup's reviews
479 reviews