YMMV / The Lord of Opium

• The Scrappy: Listen, definitely. Although to be fair she does get much better in that regard by the book's end.
• Squick:
  • El Bicho touching Matt's face with his melted hand stump.
  • Cockroaching, although it was apparently never used on anyone.
• Tear Jerker: Mirasol's death.
  • A still-traumatized Chacho finding his long-lost father only to discover he's a low-functioning eejit.
  • Matt finding out that Tam Lin was microchipped and thus his death probably wasn't a Heroic Suicide but an I Must Scream situation.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Major Beltran the pilot who is quickly presented as a scheming contrarian and then killed off rather than getting any character development.
  • The Ascended Extra Rivas family (one of the technicians who created Matt and his children) who ultimately come across as not as developed as they could have been and villains despite the lack of need for it in the plot.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • Matt maybe being challenged and/or aided by any potential remaining Alcrans (descendants of El Patron's younger children who abandoned the family at some point in the past, or possibly any kids Benito had as a result of his implied Really Gets Around behavior).
  • Glass Eye Dabengwa being the father of Fani (the woman forced to marry Benito Alcran, and one of those who was poisoned) could have had some real intensity to it (especially if she was meant to be one of the daughters of the wife Listen was cloned from). Instead, it's just commented how Dabengwa has a lot of daughters and is guilty of so much Parental Neglect that he won't even remember her and indeed, he never does. While this does establish the evilness of the guy, having him remember and have some reaction alter on could have been interesting.