Title: Cracked Coffins

Author: TheDeadPlace

Genre: Vampire

Quick Summary: Okay but fuck Denendrius tho

Thoughts:

This was a very difficult book for me to read, but not because of the writing style. The writing itself is fantastic. The way the topics are handled? Also fantastic. However, it's because these topics were so visceral and handled that made reading this book a challenge. 

Marianna is... a unique character. She has the type of facets and backstory that a lot of writers tend to mess up egregiously. She's stubborn. She's aggressive. She's not good at seeking help. But in this case, it works for her. See, the failing with most characters of this sort of personality is that they eventually [and often very quickly] lose it. Something - normally a person, normally a man - gets in the way of the MC and their personality falls to the wayside...

But not here. And I am unspeakably grateful for that. 

The flipside to this, though, is that while I can sympathize with her, I find it very hard to like her. For the most part I felt pretty ambivalent about her and her character, but after... I believe it was chapter 28, this ambivalence flipped to dislike. This is not a fault of the author. Really, it's just a byproduct of the type of person Marianna is. And, by far, Marianna really is a well-rounded character. That said, I reverted right back to liking her in the last couple of chapters. I hope she finds peace, somehow.

But.... it's hard to say the same about other characters. Marianna's "friends", for instance. I can barely remember their names. Honestly, I couldn't very well tell them apart aside from the fact one was more sensible than the other. I knew Jenna was dead, but that's the biggest distinction I could make. That said, considering the plot and the type of person Marianna is, developing them would be difficult. BUT it could be done.

That also leads me to a sort of problem I had: Jenna's death. I know she died. Marianna knew she died, and kinda dwelled on it. But it didn't come across like Marianna's friends were all that bothered by it. At least, not until Marianna is put in Carol's home. This, like Marianna's "friends" in general, came across shallow. I wanted to care about them and everything that happened, but found it incredibly difficult to.

Another problem I had was with Denendrius's abuse. Not the abuse itself, but the sheer lengths he goes to. When he takes Marianna to the woods [the chapter escapes me...] he assaults her within an inch of her life. Honestly, I feel like she would've been dead long before he was finished "teaching her a lesson", based on everything he does. I know she's gone through a lot, but the human body can only handle so much. I'm not saying to water it down or anything, but I feel like in these cases, less is more. Especially since we find out something else that happened in this forest towards the end of the book.

Contrariwise, Marianna's got a drug problem, but aside from cigarettes it didn't seem so much that this was an issue for her, especially later in the book. I know we can't always cover everything, and that there are other, more important parts of the book, but this is one thing that I'm not sure should be left to the wayside the way it feels like it does.

Overall, this is a very impacting read that I had to take my time with. The problems I mention didn't hamper my enjoyment of it.

But uh. Fuck Denendrius though. I really hope he's fucking dead.