Reviews with content warning for Sexual assault - The Awakening

Reviews tagging 'Sexual assault'

The Awakening by Susanne Valenti, Caroline Peckham

37 reviews

adalora's review against another edition

fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated

0.5

It had potential as a premise then quickly falls off. The storyline is a little addicting, but some of the things that happen are unnecessary and extremely off-putting.

Content Warnings

mhackerson's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? N/A
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

0.25

I finished the book, therefore it deserved some stars but overall the typos, lack of character development, and persistent non-consensual plot points make this one of the worst books I’ve read in recent memory.

Content Warnings

kittyinatophat's review against another edition

Go to review page

funny slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? N/A
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

As a pre-review disclaimer, I want to say that everyone is entitled to enjoy whatever books they want and I also have plenty of things I love that are very off putting to others so...my word is not absolute.

I described this book to one of my friends as “it’s like eating flour”. It’s becomes very unpleasant very quickly and might poison you.

Let me tell you folks something: I am a seasoned fanfiction reader and author, who loves to go looking for the weirdest content tags. Crack fics, filler plot, poor character development and general YA cringe doesn’t phase me. I consider myself to be someone who thrives on the most ridiculous, poorly written and at times barely coherent material, the worse the better.

But this book? It humbled me. What I believed was a high tolerance for poor writing was actually just barely scratching the surface.

I admit the mistake is mostly on me: I did 0 research going into this series and I had no idea of the overall feelings of it. I just got sucked in by the cover and the fact that I’m an astrology girlie ™️.

If (keeping with the flour analogy) this book is supposed to be a cake, there’s a reason why it isn’t cake and is instead literally just flour: we are missing a lot of other key ingredients to make a cake. I’ll highlight a few:

- Set in a “dog eat dog” world where it’s “everyone for themselves”. Frequent reoccurring s*xual harassment, groping, murder, really edgy stuff. Except…the both internal and external dialogue is heavily written in a YA style. This book can truly not decide if it wants to be raw, real and uncensored or a “freshly-turned-18-Mary-Sue-adventure”.

- Switching between grammar and spellings of words? i.e. Favorite vs Favourite??? Where is the editor? It seems like there are two people involved with writing and no editor.

- We spend the majority of the book without a plot. We get it, everyone is an antagonist, this is a harsh world, but what’s the overall plot? It sometimes reads like every chapter is a clean slate and we have to reestablish the entire narrative

- There’s way, way too many characters and none of them are well written or good people so they truly have no redeeming quality.

This book is literally missing everything else to be a complete story. The eggs, butter, sugar, everything.

My biggest issue is who this is supposed to be aimed at though. Because I found myself thinking as I read “Maybe I would like this more if I was reading this 15 years ago, when I was 15”. But with the non-con and detailed sexual descriptions this shouldn’t be in the YA category at all imo. If you’re writing adults for adults, please write adult dialogue.

The only thing that changed this book’s trajectory into my DNF pile was when one of my good writing friends jumped into the hellfire with me and it shifted from “reading for literature” to “reading for trash”. I wholeheartedly recommend reading this book with someone so you have another human to process the awfulness of it with.

Once I made that switch though the book got much better to the point where I will probably continue with the series at some point, if not strictly to see what the hell becomes of this world plot that doesn’t exist and all the loose ends. But I need a deep brain cleanse first.

P.S. Everyone knows the most dramatic ass people have blue hair (from someone who has had blue hair multiple times)

Content Warnings

kaiyoung_kop's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

Zodiac academy is like if every overused book trope had a baby - and I kinda love it for that
Dead parents ✅
Twins that are very different ✅
Secret heiresses ✅
New world ✅
It was… an experience,
It was like everything in a bad YA novel in a NA scene.
But I was here for it.
I devoured this trash up.
Like it was bad in a good way?
(I know, my standards are so low they are on the floor)
At around half way through the book, I was like, wow Seth is such a golden retriever
Well uhhh… we know how that worked out…
*sighs saltily*
The book condones abuse (?) as in the main characters accept that they are going to be physically, emotionally (and even sexually) abused until they get stronger?
The ‘love interests’ were so fucking creepy.
Eg; Seth (love interest) was licking and sniffing one of the fmc when they first met?
Smh
Also the alpha wolf thing?
*dies in cringe*
At most points, it felt like bad fan-fiction
But in the best way possible
It’s absolute garbage for me, but I love it.
It’s one of those books where you have to recognise it as bad to be able to enjoy it.
It’s just an easy, fun read.
I wouldn’t recommend it for anyone with standards
But if you want a quick, bad, fun read to help you escape a reading slump, I would recommend it.

Content Warnings

bunnybird22's review against another edition

Go to review page

Content Warnings

walskishere's review against another edition

Go to review page

medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

The writing was atrocious. I'm not sure if it's lack of editing or maybe the author's first language isn't English, but the grammar is terrible. Also, it reads like Tory and Darcy are in middle school, but they are definitely in high school. If this book was intended to be middle grade, that would make sense. However, with this book's themes and scenes, there's no way this is middle grade.

I might pick up the rest of the series, or at least the next book, because it was entertaining, if terribly written and utterly unbelievable.

Content Warnings

cheriepie's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark medium-paced

Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No

0.25

Let it be said that I went in with an open mind. I heard mixed reviews on this book, and I was like, "hey, it might be trashy, but I like trashy sometimes! maybe it'll be fun!" and I was wrong. I am not this book's target audience. I'm a pretentious little queer who generally doesn't read this kind of book. In short: it's poorly written, not edited, and I have read wattpad fanfictions with more care and depth than this.

Listen, when the map at the front of the book has JPEG compression, I can't be surprised when it is a poorly written shitshow, littered with spelling and grammar errors, worldbuilding that leaves much to be desired, characters that are indistinguishable from one another, and all build up and no payoff.

Content Warnings