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nerdkitten's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Injury/Injury detail, Xenophobia, Grief, Murder, Death of parent, Gore, Suicide, Violence, Blood, and War
Moderate: Self harm, Confinement, Stalking, Body horror, Vomit, Genocide, Bullying, and Child abuse
Minor: Ableism, Physical abuse, Rape, Kidnapping, Alcohol, Abandonment, Child death, Excrement, Medical content, and Suicide attempt
aang_arang's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
informative
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.75
There was so much I loved about this book. I went out on a limb here and read this book for my personal book club with my best friend, and neither of us are high fantasy readers but we wanted to try something different and I love beefy books. Immediately upon reading I knew I loved the writing style and execution of this book. It's very friendly to new fantasy readers and while it takes getting used to names and places, it was very engaging the entire time, and nothing ever felt like a slog to get through. Asha's storyline was my favorite. I loved seeing her journey through the different worlds and I feel like her point of views is where we gained some of the most world building.
I also really dislike when books leave you questioning for too long but this book answers just enough tiny questions to keep you chugging on. I also thing it worked in favor of the narrative style. You find out information in real time with the characters, you're never given larger overarching info that you're left sitting on waiting for the characters to find out. It really made you feel like you were apart of the journey as well.
Now that I've said that, I also thing this book lacked in many ways. This book is 680 pages of exposition. And for a book that long I really don't think that there should be unanswered questions or open plot lines to this extent. We should get a full circle story arc and line for a boom despite if it's a trilogy or not. I'm not sure I could really name what the plot was if asked. I knew we were traveling and building to something but you dont really know what that is until the very last chapters of the book. It didn't feel like the journey had stakes because I was unsure of what we were trying to build to.
There was a good world building but I can't help but feel like there are aspects to the Tols and rest of the world that are still questionable.
I'm going to sit on the book for a week and see if I feel like finishing the series.
I also really dislike when books leave you questioning for too long but this book answers just enough tiny questions to keep you chugging on. I also thing it worked in favor of the narrative style. You find out information in real time with the characters, you're never given larger overarching info that you're left sitting on waiting for the characters to find out. It really made you feel like you were apart of the journey as well.
Now that I've said that, I also thing this book lacked in many ways. This book is 680 pages of exposition. And for a book that long I really don't think that there should be unanswered questions or open plot lines to this extent. We should get a full circle story arc and line for a boom despite if it's a trilogy or not. I'm not sure I could really name what the plot was if asked. I knew we were traveling and building to something but you dont really know what that is until the very last chapters of the book. It didn't feel like the journey had stakes because I was unsure of what we were trying to build to.
There was a good world building but I can't help but feel like there are aspects to the Tols and rest of the world that are still questionable.
I'm going to sit on the book for a week and see if I feel like finishing the series.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Genocide, Torture, Murder, and War
Minor: Sexual assault and Rape
cdonegan's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.0
I really wanted to like this book. The lore was interesting but the execution lost me. The writing of the female characters wasn’t great—not “she breasted boobily down the stairs” level of badness, but I can only think of two times in this entire book that two women spoke to each other in a significant way. I swear every single woman was described as “attractive” when introduced, usually with that exact word. It made me want to scream every time!
I barely understood the motivation of most of the characters because it just wasn’t shown to us. They seemed to just react to things happening around them for most of the book, rather than taking real action themselves. Minor characters also didn’t stand out to me, making it hard to remember who people were. The book also kept a lot of things hidden from the reader, not in a way that would be satisfying to figure out later on in the book, but rather in a way that just left me lost and confused many times.
Overall, I guess enjoyed it enough to read 700 pages of it, but not enough to continue on with the trilogy. It had the potential to be great but it was a miss for me.
I barely understood the motivation of most of the characters because it just wasn’t shown to us. They seemed to just react to things happening around them for most of the book, rather than taking real action themselves. Minor characters also didn’t stand out to me, making it hard to remember who people were. The book also kept a lot of things hidden from the reader, not in a way that would be satisfying to figure out later on in the book, but rather in a way that just left me lost and confused many times.
Overall, I guess enjoyed it enough to read 700 pages of it, but not enough to continue on with the trilogy. It had the potential to be great but it was a miss for me.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Rape
lectora21's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Murder, Death of parent, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, and Death
Moderate: War
Minor: Grief, Vomit, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Rape, Torture, Bullying, and Fire/Fire injury
iono's review
adventurous
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Blood, and Murder
Moderate: Body horror, Child death, Death of parent, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Mass/school shootings, Confinement, and Hate crime
Minor: Physical abuse, Torture, Police brutality, Sexual assault, Bullying, Child abuse, Rape, Grief, and Kidnapping
rachael_knight's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Violence, and Gore
Minor: Rape
sinamile's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
5.0
1. I KNEW IT!!!!!!!!!
2. You know how sometimes you get annoyed when a character is made too special? Yeah, I want Davian to be <i>that</i> special. No, not conveniently special, like everything just works out for him, but I want him to have all the powers. I want him to be <i>that charcter</i>.
3. Truth be told, I didn't know what was happening most of the time, but I sure as hell had a good time and will definitely be reading the next book!
<blockquote><b><i>“... That’s the natural arrogance of man, sadly. We want to believe that free will means complete independence from the plans of our creator.”</i></b></blockquote>
<i><b>CW/TW:</b> bigotry, slurs, bullying, graphic description of gore, graphic description of violence, blood, death, knives/knife violence, beheading, war, genocide, ethnic cleansing, ableist slurs, bounty hunting, murder, swords/sword violence, stabbing, suicide ideation, physical abuse, PTSD, anxiety, vomiting, graphic body mutilation, child death, graphic description of wounds, mention of rape/sexual assault, graphic description of torture, castration, disfiguring, self-harm, invasion, mass murder</i>
2. You know how sometimes you get annoyed when a character is made too special? Yeah, I want Davian to be <i>that</i> special. No, not conveniently special, like everything just works out for him, but I want him to have all the powers. I want him to be <i>that charcter</i>.
3. Truth be told, I didn't know what was happening most of the time, but I sure as hell had a good time and will definitely be reading the next book!
<blockquote><b><i>“... That’s the natural arrogance of man, sadly. We want to believe that free will means complete independence from the plans of our creator.”</i></b></blockquote>
<i><b>CW/TW:</b> bigotry, slurs, bullying, graphic description of gore, graphic description of violence, blood, death, knives/knife violence, beheading, war, genocide, ethnic cleansing, ableist slurs, bounty hunting, murder, swords/sword violence, stabbing, suicide ideation, physical abuse, PTSD, anxiety, vomiting, graphic body mutilation, child death, graphic description of wounds, mention of rape/sexual assault, graphic description of torture, castration, disfiguring, self-harm, invasion, mass murder</i>
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Violence, Blood, Religious bigotry, and Physical abuse
Moderate: Suicidal thoughts and Vomit
Minor: Rape and Sexual assault
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