teresa0623's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Graphic: Physical abuse, Sexual assault, and Emotional abuse
femme4fleurs's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Graphic: Child abuse, Rape, Self harm, Abandonment, and Physical abuse
caitforshort's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
1.0
Spoiler
two of our protagonists (Kane and Lark) seriously injuring each other and/or themselves at the behest of a cult leader to charge up their “magic”, our third protagonist (Calvin) brutally beating Lark at Lark’s behest to charge up Lark’s “magic” and then never bringing it up again, Lark being raped by a cult elder while Kane watches and gets hard, Kane being raped by the cult leader so she can collect his semen, and description after description of the forced chastity cages Kane and Lark wear- Nova somehow purchased an entire plot of land that used to be a zoo in the middle of Baltimore, turned it into a compound that no one was allowed to enter or leave, told her followers to shoot at helicopters with arrows, and was never stopped. The FBI and other governmental agencies were aware that children in the compound were not being documented or sent to school and that people were being essentially held prisoner, and no one did anything for at least twenty-five years, because, what…they didn’t have an insider to testify? It was private land? I have no idea.
- There is no way on god’s green earth that an FBI agent who would be allowed to kick off an investigation into said cult leader’s cult, lead a raid on the cult and keep the members in pseudo-detention at a random hotel, and then chase after an escaped cult member with two other former cult members and no backup or supervision. It would not happen. It undercut so much of the tension in the book through sheer implausibility.
Spoiler
was the daughter of a cult leader - The intricacies of how people were convinced to join the cult and then how Nova kept them there were never explained. She told the original members she had magic, which got them to join, but she somehow managed to convince them that the outside world was full of monsters and FOEs even though presumably they had lived in the outside world for most of their lives. She took children away from their parents and trained them with swords and potions to fight monsters, but the only example of how she kept parents from protesting was that she un-Anointed the children of parents who resisted (basically, took away their status as special monster hunters). None of this makes sense.
- Cult members were sometimes ignorant of very basic things (straws, the internet, dogs) but very aware of other things (cars, highways, pronoun usage). It was beyond jarring to have a member of an abusive sex cult introduce himself as “Lark, he/him” while telling people on the street that he was there to save them from monsters. I want nonbinary representation in books. I want trans representation in books. I don’t want that representation to feel disingenously and almost offensively shoehorned in. Is Nova, abusive sex cult leader and child rapist, somehow progressive enough to teach all her disciples about gender identity?
- The magic. Calling the magic in this book a magic system is generous — at no point is it clear how magic functions, where it comes from, what its limitations are, what it can do, or how real it is. A huge driving force in the book is Calvin, random cosplayer who meets Lark by accident, trying to figure out if magic is real, while Kane simulatenously tries to figure out if the magic he’d grown up believing in was a lie.
Spoiler
Nova told the cult that magic comes from pain, and she forced cult members to hurt each other to fuel their magic; it would make sense, given this, that magic isn’t real, and that it’s a tactic she uses to make herself special and worth following. However, it’s clear that Lark’s magic is actually real, although sometimes his spells work and sometimes they don’t. He can heal wounds, unlock doors, cast protective wards, influence peoples’ thoughts, and communicate telepathically, all with magic. At the end of the book, he kills an enormous monster that emerges from a rift in the highway, and there’s no indication that this is meant to be a metaphor. It’s implied, towards the end, that magic doesn’t actually come from pain, but if magic is real, then Nova did, to some extent, possess secret and incredible knowledge; this wildly undercuts any point the book is trying to make about brainwashing, manipulation, and abuse.
The characters were also, across the board, flimsy and two-dimensional. Lark was an absolute zealot until suddenly he realized, just because
Spoiler
Calvin had really good sex with himSpoiler
go on the run from the FBI and become a wanted fugitive on the off-chance that an escaped, armed cult member has real magicAnd, to top it all off, the peripheral passersby seem bafflingly willing to help Lark, armed cult escapee on a journey to kill monsters, avoid the police. They feed him, clothe him, post Instagram stories supporting him, and literally barricade a highway so the FBI can’t get to him. Helping him is treated like helping an oppressed person and the language used to talk about it is very anti-cop, in the specific way that modern progressive activists might be anti-cop. I am all for anti-cop rhetoric and this felt like a wildly disingenous use of it.
Sometimes I don’t like books for personal, subjective reasons. Sometimes I’m not interested in the subject matter, or the writing isn’t for me, or I just don’t vibe with the story. This is not one of those books. This book is straight-up terrible, reading it is a bad time, and I do not recommend it to anyone. I will go to my grave wondering how on earth it got published by Tor.
Graphic: Physical abuse, Rape, and Self harm
bethmalena's review against another edition
- 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
3.5
Graphic: Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Violence, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Gun violence, and Physical abuse
abbyaroza's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
4.0
Graphic: Physical abuse, Child abuse, and Sexual assault
alsoapples's review against another edition
- 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
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Child abuse, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, and Trafficking
Moderate: Gaslighting, Incest, Religious bigotry, Self harm, Violence, Torture, and Toxic relationship
cfell's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Graphic: Blood, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Child abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Self harm, Rape, Sexual assault, and Sexual content
spacebetweenpages's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Graphic: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Self harm, Sexual content, Torture, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Rape, and Sexual assault
charlieleelee's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Graphic: Gaslighting, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, and Rape
phyllis_lam's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.25
Graphic: Rape, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Torture, and Physical abuse