A review by rnbhargava
Trese Vol 1: Murder on Balete Drive by Budjette Tan

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious sad tense medium-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? Yes

3.75

It’s a hard edged supernatural detective book set in Manila, Philippines with the protagonist Alexandra Trese solving crimes having to do with creatures from Filipino folklore

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Trafficking, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Alcohol, Blood, Car accident, Classism, Gore, Gun violence, Kidnapping, Murder, Sexual content, and Sexual violence

This book is definitely aimed at teen to older in content. It’s very hard edged and the conclusions of each case aren’t always happy. There’s plenty of violence, sex and other unsavoury things as one would expect from a supernatural crime book. It’s not perfect but there’s a lot to enjoy. I plan to read all the volumes as they slowly come out in North America.