Reviews tagging 'Blood'

A Soul of Ash and Blood: A Blood and Ash Novel by Jennifer L. Armentrout

17 reviews

moonybritney's review against another edition

adventurous funny hopeful tense fast-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

5.0

I devour the books in the Blood and Ash series as soon as I get my hands on them and this one was no different. When reading the first book, I thought it would be nice to get one from Cas' perspective and I'm glad we did.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Classism, Cursing, and Blood

Moderate: Grief, Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, and Sexual content

Minor: Body shaming, Child death, and Kidnapping

yarisbooksandbevs's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny reflective medium-paced

• 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

I really enjoyed seeing things from Cas’s perspective. Especially after knowing everything we know. I kind of liked this one better than the first.  It was nice to see what he was going through and a little bit into why he made the decisions he did. The ending really surprised me and I did not see it coming.

Spoiler

I love the bond the three of them have. I wasn’t expecting Cas to shift and I just want to know if she recognized them! I will be heartbroken if she doesn’t

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Cursing, Grief, Torture, Blood, Death, Death of parent, Violence, Mental illness, and Sexual content

Moderate: Alcohol, Self harm, Confinement, Gore, Suicidal thoughts, Classism, Kidnapping, and Panic attacks/disorders

Minor: Body shaming, Child death, and Stalking

wackly93's review against another edition

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Sexual content, and Blood

Moderate: Murder, Physical abuse, Emotional abuse, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

katelynndzindzio's review against another edition

adventurous dark lighthearted mysterious reflective 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Violence, Torture, and Blood

taryn_g's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Violence, Child death, Gore, and Death

Moderate: Self harm, Sexual content, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, War, Kidnapping, and Confinement

Minor: Misogyny

hyperashley's review against another edition

adventurous tense fast-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood

kdez's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective 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? It's complicated

4.75

From Blood and Ash is my favourite of this series, so getting to relive it through Hawke’s POV was such a delight! I loved getting to see his take on events and the feelings he had while going through it all. Especially my favourite scenes. Each of those felt like a little treat ❤️

I also appreciate how it was a bit of a breather. There’s so much that happens in this series CONSTANTLY so just getting to experience this walk down memory lane was much needed.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Self harm, Sexual content, Cursing, Torture, Blood, Child death, Murder, Death, Injury/Injury detail, and Violence

Moderate: Death of parent, Suicidal thoughts, Physical abuse, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Grief, War, and Alcohol

Minor: Rape, Body shaming, Pregnancy, and Sexual violence

janeywaneyb's review against another edition

emotional reflective fast-paced

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

2.5

Let's be honest this is just a retelling of From Blood and Ash but in Casteel's voice. Nothing happens, even the normal cliffhanger isn't that great, that you don't already know, I maybe have a little bit more love for Kieran. It was good to revisit the start of their relationship and hear how Cas fell in love with Poppy but reads a little like fan fiction. I'm still not convinced this book was needed. I would have preferred for the story to be moved on and for us to meet the Primals and gods but especially Nyktos, Sera and Kolis. 

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Content Warnings

Minor: Gaslighting, Emotional abuse, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Mental illness, Death, Body shaming, Sexual violence, Physical abuse, Confinement, and Blood

cryosphinx's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

4.25

I loved this and was so happy to experience FBAA again but from Casteel's perspective. No surprise here, it was advertised as such. Because of the POV shift, I'd say the flashbacks were evenly split between filling in information from Casteel's POV and just retelling a scene with his monologue instead of Poppy. But I loved it and it may be my favorite of the series.

There is some present day that takes place every few chapters which makes the book still a bridge between books 4 and 6.

I feel like the inner monologue was much less repetitive from Casteel's perspective that Poppy's which makes it a bit more polished. I'll also still complain that random modern jargon is very weird (I mean...at one point a character says spoiler alert...). And I would have liked more substance from the present day sections since they were pretty sparse until the last couple sections.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Sexual content, Violence, Blood, and Murder

Moderate: Self harm and Death

Minor: Death of parent

stardust_heidi's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.25

First of all, I am screaming at the last chapter. S C R E A M I N G. Both at the chapter and at JLA, because how DARE, lmao. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyy. I feel even more unsettled now than I did after TWOTQ. Rude. 

Overall, I enjoyed this book. I did find a lot of the repeated scenes quite tedious, even if they were from Casteel's POV. We already know most of those scenes intimately, and while yes, they were all from Poppy's perspective before, I don't know that ALL of them needed to be from Cas's POV. I did enjoy a few of the big ones, like the craven attack/night on the rise and then after Poppy stabs him in New Haven. Those were great. 

The moments I enjoyed the most were the new scenes, especially those with Kieran. I loved experiencing their bond from Casteel's perspective and how Kieran just kind of *knew* things were different about Poppy from the beginning. It also opened up a whole avenue of questions I'd silently pondered to myself before and blew them out in the open -- especially during the explicit scenes with Cas and Kieran. Hot damn. 

But that last chapter. Holy. Fuck. I think Emil said it best: "What in the fuckity fuck?" Lmao. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Violence, Death, Grief, Blood, Gore, Murder, Sexual content, Torture, Child death, and Emotional abuse

Minor: Self harm and Sexual assault