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takarakei's review against another edition
adventurous
medium-paced
- 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
3.75
This read like a very pointed story directed at The Author Who Shall Not Be Named…Which like I’m here for! A world like ours but there are witches (the witches are in power) the warlocks (aka men) are like a separate thing. Set in the UK…. And the whole plot revolves around inclusion of trans people (or lack there of) in a binary system.
It felt a tad dated or basic in terms of discussions of trans people, but that’s definitely my opinion as someone who knows trans/non-binary people irl and interacts with the community. For the average person perhaps this will be a great starting point to trans inclusion and why it matters especially in feminism.
I wish the magic system was explained a bit better. The witches seemed to be able to do almost anything which just seemed a bit too convenient at parts. I would also say it generally leans much more character driven vs plot even tho there is some plot. I did appreciate the multiple POVs cause I think that structure really worked for this story. I can’t say whether I will continue the series or not
It felt a tad dated or basic in terms of discussions of trans people, but that’s definitely my opinion as someone who knows trans/non-binary people irl and interacts with the community. For the average person perhaps this will be a great starting point to trans inclusion and why it matters especially in feminism.
I wish the magic system was explained a bit better. The witches seemed to be able to do almost anything which just seemed a bit too convenient at parts. I would also say it generally leans much more character driven vs plot even tho there is some plot. I did appreciate the multiple POVs cause I think that structure really worked for this story. I can’t say whether I will continue the series or not
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Transphobia, and Violence
Moderate: Child abuse, Misogyny, Racism, Sexism, Grief, Murder, Toxic friendship, and War
Minor: Domestic abuse, Infidelity, and Dysphoria
fourhand13's review against another edition
medium-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
Not too bad by any means, I felt engaged throughout and this was a pretty easy read.
I feel like a lot of people are jumping the gun to be like "thing bad so that means book bad >:(" with any of the iffy things depicted (e.g.gender essentialism, prison and punishment system etc.) and it's like this is only book 1. I have a good bit of faith that some of those things will be tackled in the following installments of the series, bit hard to deconstruct every systemic issue in 450 pages.
The dialogue comes across as quite cheesy and stereotypical at times and I do think the writing quality went down a touch towards the end with the action scenes but over all, not the worst read.
I beg the next person who has sex in this series uses lube
Aside from the openly noted content warnings I will say that if you have an aversion to animal death skip chapter 1 (niamh's first one) at least and possibly parts of chapter 21.
Also if you're susceptible to paranoia about having people read your thoughts, this might be a miss too cos there's a LOT of that.
I feel like a lot of people are jumping the gun to be like "thing bad so that means book bad >:(" with any of the iffy things depicted (e.g.
The dialogue comes across as quite cheesy and stereotypical at times and I do think the writing quality went down a touch towards the end with the action scenes but over all, not the worst read.
Aside from the openly noted content warnings I will say that if you have an aversion to animal death skip chapter 1 (niamh's first one) at least and possibly parts of chapter 21.
Also if you're susceptible to paranoia about having people read your thoughts, this might be a miss too cos there's a LOT of that.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Transphobia, Forced institutionalization, Car accident, Murder, and Outing
Moderate: Child abuse, Infidelity, Misogyny, Violence, Grief, and War
Minor: Injury/Injury detail
tw for mind reading/ invasion of thoughts,danajoy's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Transphobia, Violence, Medical trauma, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Death, Infidelity, Misogyny, Grief, Fire/Fire injury, and War
wizardfire08's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
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? Yes
4.0
This had some turns and it is quite descriptive. I would take caution at the accuracy of the TERF and transphobic characters. It is necessary to the plot but it is ugly. On a more positive note, this is such a beautiful story and world. The realness of some themes and connection to reality is sad but that also means the love, hope and fighting to be who you are is true/ worth it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Misogyny, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, and War
Moderate: Deadnaming, Racism, and Religious bigotry
queerreaderchaos's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse, Death, Homophobia, Misogyny, Racism, Sexual content, Grief, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Classism
shae_purcell's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
I didn't like this book as much as I thought I might. I enjoyed the multi-POV chapters and the diverse representation. I liked a lot of the characters and relationships. I don't know what it is. It fell a little flat for me, like the characters could have been fleshed out more maybe.
A word of warning: Don't go into this expecting a tidy ending. It ends on a huge cliffhanger. I was ready to start the second book until I was halfway through that last chapter. Now I'm really irritated and thinking about taking a break. I'm sure as an author you want readers to be so excited for the next book that they'll run out and pick up a copy immediately. This ending didn't make me excited for the next book. It makes me dread reading it, even though I still kind of want to hang out with the characters a bit more. I may pick it up eventually but I'll feel sour about it.
A word of warning: Don't go into this expecting a tidy ending. It ends on a huge cliffhanger. I was ready to start the second book until I was halfway through that last chapter. Now I'm really irritated and thinking about taking a break. I'm sure as an author you want readers to be so excited for the next book that they'll run out and pick up a copy immediately. This ending didn't make me excited for the next book. It makes me dread reading it, even though I still kind of want to hang out with the characters a bit more. I may pick it up eventually but I'll feel sour about it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Sexual content, Transphobia, Blood, Medical content, Outing, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Misogyny, Murder, and Fire/Fire injury
Minor: Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Incest, Racism, Self harm, Suicide, Torture, Islamophobia, Lesbophobia, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Colonisation, War, Classism, and Pandemic/Epidemic
There is a lot of intentional misgendering in the chapters told from thesacredgriefsociety's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- 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
really enjoyed this book but WISH there were some spoilers attached at the beginning as i wasn’t prepared for the grief discussions around partner loss nor the transphobia within its pages.
this was a darker book than i initially expected it to be but good nonetheless. the characters grow (some for the worse) and a few twists/surprises leave you wondering what the hell could happen next.
this was a darker book than i initially expected it to be but good nonetheless. the characters grow (some for the worse) and a few twists/surprises leave you wondering what the hell could happen next.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Transphobia and Grief
Moderate: Misogyny and Racism
cumminsn's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
It is honestly sort of difficult to put into words my exact feelings on this book. Parts of it I liked quite a bit, while others had me physically rolling my eyes. The magic is very fun, and the lore of witches and how they connect to the earth and to each other I found compelling and interesting. But, once the conflict of the story started to come to a head, I found myself enjoying the book less and less. The villains almost become… cartoonish, in a way? It felt like the author was really trying to push home how terrible the antagonist is by just repeatedly having her state her transphobic viewpoints to the point where it was very irritating and tiresome even for me, a cisgender woman.
While there is very positive transgender, and LGBT in general, representation here, there is also rampant transphobia that I could see being very triggering to some. Also, the overuse of swearing and pop culture references took away from my immersion as well. For a book that has different characters that it switches perspectives between, I sometimes found myself having a hard time remembering who was who, with no very large differences in tone from one character to the next. Other than the antagonist, of course. The fact that she was evil was about the most obvious thing in the whole book.
I guess what disappointed me is that there wasn’t quite enough Fantasy to balance out the in-your-face politics that were constantly surfacing. I was more interested in the lore of the world, but the story seemed to stumble over itself to try and include as much political-correctness as possible that some of the characters didn’t even feel like genuine characters and more like just stereotypes being included for the sake of it, which was sad to read. Some of the language used, particularly internet-type wording and references, will likely not age well either.
I forced myself to finish this one. I was invested enough to want to do it, but I don’t know that I’ll be reaching for the sequel right away, if it all. In the end, I felt underwhelmed.
While there is very positive transgender, and LGBT in general, representation here, there is also rampant transphobia that I could see being very triggering to some. Also, the overuse of swearing and pop culture references took away from my immersion as well. For a book that has different characters that it switches perspectives between, I sometimes found myself having a hard time remembering who was who, with no very large differences in tone from one character to the next. Other than the antagonist, of course. The fact that she was evil was about the most obvious thing in the whole book.
I guess what disappointed me is that there wasn’t quite enough Fantasy to balance out the in-your-face politics that were constantly surfacing. I was more interested in the lore of the world, but the story seemed to stumble over itself to try and include as much political-correctness as possible that some of the characters didn’t even feel like genuine characters and more like just stereotypes being included for the sake of it, which was sad to read. Some of the language used, particularly internet-type wording and references, will likely not age well either.
I forced myself to finish this one. I was invested enough to want to do it, but I don’t know that I’ll be reaching for the sequel right away, if it all. In the end, I felt underwhelmed.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cursing, Hate crime, Misogyny, Sexism, Transphobia, Blood, Kidnapping, Car accident, and Toxic friendship
Moderate: Body horror and Alcohol
Minor: Medical content, Death of parent, Murder, Outing, Gaslighting, and Injury/Injury detail
sfdogmom's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
5.0
fantastic book. Very well written.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Hate crime, Misogyny, Racism, Sexual content, Transphobia, Murder, Outing, and Gaslighting
Minor: Kidnapping
janeywaneyb's review
adventurous
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.5
Hmmm....you can't like every book you read. The story is good but the characters...jeez! These characters are insufferable, they spend most of the book harping on about their own woeful problems which I found so hard to care about.
I think there is meant to be a feminist liberal feel to this book but it comes across as preachy and almost uneducated like reading the lefty version of the Daily Mail. I get what the author is trying to do and there is a good try at discussing the social issues especially around transphobia, which is handled well, but having so many issues trying to have space in a book made it clunky and awkward.
There are paragraphs of moaning self-reflection from every character as they obsess over then men in their lives, their childhoods and the "greater good". The references to the 90's pop culture also wears thin. I stuck with it as the actual story was good and when they start being kick-ass witches I was all for it. I don't think I'll be heading for the next book any time soon.
I think there is meant to be a feminist liberal feel to this book but it comes across as preachy and almost uneducated like reading the lefty version of the Daily Mail. I get what the author is trying to do and there is a good try at discussing the social issues especially around transphobia, which is handled well, but having so many issues trying to have space in a book made it clunky and awkward.
There are paragraphs of moaning self-reflection from every character as they obsess over then men in their lives, their childhoods and the "greater good". The references to the 90's pop culture also wears thin. I stuck with it as the actual story was good and when they start being kick-ass witches I was all for it. I don't think I'll be heading for the next book any time soon.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism and Transphobia
Moderate: Misogyny