Reviews tagging 'Toxic friendship'

The Blood Trials by N.E. Davenport

7 reviews

chanlo1994's review

adventurous dark emotional 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

4.25

I had a good guess for the twist at the end, and I was STILL wrong. Ikenna, my girl, you're so angsty, and yet it makes you such a powerful character. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Bullying, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Panic attacks/disorders, Racial slurs, Sexism, Sexual content, Torture, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Xenophobia, Blood, Vomit, Police brutality, Kidnapping, Grief, Cannibalism, Death of parent, Murder, Gaslighting, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Genocide, Slavery, and Toxic friendship

Assassination, death of pregnant woman, forced drugging

msrae89's review against another edition

adventurous dark sad tense slow-paced

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

3.0

I really wanted to like this book and I was excited to read it, but, ultimately, this book just wasn’t for me. 
Pros: -The book is pretty well written; it is a little repetitive at times but it makes sense within the narrative. 
-The themes the book is exploring are really interesting and done in an unobtrusive way. What I mean by that is I never felt as if the book was preaching to me. 
-The themes themselves were really interesting and interconnected with one another seamlessly. Racism, colonialism, military and military propaganda, sexism, classism, trauma, all work together to tell a very interesting story. 
-The ending was engaging and set up the second book nicely. 
However, that’s about where my enjoyment of the book ended. 
Cons: The MC, Ikenna, is 19 and very traumatized, and while it makes sense for the narrative, I found it very repetitive and annoying. This might be, in part, bc I’m in my 30’s and I have an harder time relating to younger MCs.  Though, really, I didn’t find any of the characters interesting or engaging. I couldn’t even “love to hate” any of them. 
-The book is oddly and aggressively compulsory heterosexual and cisgender. As far as I can tell queer people just don’t exist in the book’s universe, and as a queer person I prefer to read books with queer representation. Even just a passing statement that queer people exist would be more than this book has. Maybe they are in book 2 but after starting it I doubt it based on the little I’ve read so far. 
-The “romance” is just bad. First off, it’s unethical. Reed is Ikenna’s superior officer, which he acknowledges. Reed was also the mentee of Ikenna’s deceased grandfather which creates a weird situation for them. It feels a little freudian. Also, Reed is boring! And all of this awkward tension leads to a sudden sex scene. I’m not here to yuck anyone’s yum, but this just wasn’t for me and I skipped it. 
Overall it was a good idea with flat characters and dense story. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Emotional abuse, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racism, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, Toxic friendship, Colonisation, War, and Classism

lesliehirgelt's review

adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Death, Gun violence, Hate crime, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Cannibalism, Alcohol, and Classism

Minor: Toxic friendship

risaleel's review

adventurous dark tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, and War

Moderate: Bullying, Gore, Gun violence, Misogyny, Racism, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Physical abuse, Sexism, Sexual content, Medical trauma, Gaslighting, and Toxic friendship

librarybookscene's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark inspiring mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Racism, Sexism, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Colonisation, War, and Classism

kbairbooks's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Wow! Between this and Queen of Nothing I’ve been reading some of the most vicious, blood thirsty, and VIOLENT books I’ve ever read. It makes for a really intense experience. The backstabbing, betrayal, who can be trusted, political agenda absolute beast this book is took me by storm. I couldn’t put it down! I was gripped and at the end I was staring into space experiencing this book. Incredible storytelling, incredible challenges, incredible strength and resilience in times of adversary. Wow.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Bullying, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Cannibalism, Death of parent, Murder, Outing, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

shaipanda's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

Ok this book is bat shit insaneeee - I absolutely loved it but definitely did not expect exactly how dark it is so keep that I mind if you read this. However despite that, I really loved Kenna and this was a superrr engaging book. Despite it being  darker than I tend to prefer I’ll almost definitely read the sequel when it comes out cause omg so well doneee :) 
However I will say I personally didn’t give it a 5 star because of how unlikeable pretty much every character is at various parts of the story (including Kenna occasionally lol) and I tend to prefer to at least somewhat like the characters I’m reading about 
Oh also reallyyyy look at the trigger warnings fr cause this book is insanely dark and has no issues killing off characters 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Gore, Hate crime, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Torture, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Gaslighting, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Sexual content, Vomit, Cannibalism, and War

Minor: Toxic friendship