Reviews tagging 'Grief'

Dark by V.E. Schwab

56 reviews

uselesspirateraven's review against another edition

adventurous emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, and War

Moderate: Confinement, Emotional abuse, Gore, and Gaslighting

Minor: Child death and Homophobia

robin_reads's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious 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? N/A

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail

kelsids's review against another edition

adventurous emotional 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood

Moderate: Death, Homophobia, Violence, and Death of parent

Minor: Torture, Grief, Fire/Fire injury, and Pandemic/Epidemic

readingwithkaitlyn's review against another edition

adventurous sad medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gore, Mental illness, Self harm, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Colonisation, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Medical content, and Classism

Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Homophobia, Misogyny, Slavery, Vomit, and Pregnancy

imaginaryalchemist's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.25

The Shades of Magic Trilogy comes to a close in A Conjuring of Light. It was a fun fantasy ride! 

I'll start with the things I did like. First, I love the characters. They had good chemistry and played off each other well. I enjoyed the banter between Kell and Alucard. I know some people didn't like Lila, but I did, I thought she was fun and pretty badass. I saw the romance between her and Kell coming a mile away but I still enjoyed it. I thought they were good together.

Speaking of romance, I loved the subplot with Rhy and Alucard. I feel VE Schwab handled it tastefully. Speaking as a queer person, queer romance often feels like it's pandering to us. 

I really wanted more time with these characters. In my opinion, Schwab's character writing is pretty strong. They felt like they could be real people, even the background characters. Rhy ended up being my favorite.

I nearly started crying when his parents died, I felt so bad for him. I wanted to reach into the book and give him a hug. My boy suffered so much.

Now for some of my criticisms. For the story, I enjoyed it overall but felt it dragged at some points. The ship voyage in particular seemed to go on for a bit too long. 

I also had a lot of unanswered questions at the end.

I was hoping Kell would naturally remember his past - since he was told the memory spell should wear off over time and he burned the note on how to remove it. I wanted to know where he actually came from, and what his birth name was. I also don't recall Lila's missing eye being fully addressed. I had a theory that the black stone that appeared in book one would end up being the eye. I haven't read the sequel trilogy so I don't know if the question is answered there.

So, overall I really liked this trilogy! It was the first thing I'd read from VE Schwab and I'll definitely read more of her work in the future. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent

Moderate: Body horror, Child death, Confinement, Death, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Blood, Grief, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Cursing and Alcohol

zoeelora's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny sad 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: Alcoholism, Body horror, Death, Gore, Physical abuse, Self harm, Slavery, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Medical content, Kidnapping, Death of parent, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Fire/Fire injury, and Abandonment

kittykels's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-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

3.75

I really struggled to complete this series, especially this last book. It amazes me that a book can be simultaneously captivating and boring. I have a hard time putting into words how I feel about it. The world and characters are full of magic and intrigue, yet the writing tends to extend too far, dragging you past the point of interest and into boredom. I want so badly to love this series and everything that happens in it, but it was a chore to read it through to the end. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, and Alcohol

keya_caivalur's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring mysterious sad 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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Violence, and Death of parent

Moderate: Confinement, Gore, Sexual content, Torture, Grief, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Suicide

whiterabbitslibrary's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious 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? No

4.5

Loved this, a great end to the series. But it was long and there was a lot happening. I had to keep going back to check things earlier in the book and even earlier in the series a couple of times. Just a warning that it’s a brain engaged kind of book! In the plus side we get so many delightfully fleshed out characters and some really good development for our main gang who I love deeply with all my heart.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Child abuse, Child death, Gore, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Kidnapping, and Pandemic/Epidemic

skillyillian's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious sad 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

i debated on lowering the score because some moments of this felt a bit slow, but they weren't even that slow, and even then i loved the slow moments so much that i decided i'm sticking with five stars. schwab's writing is ethereal. they write like delilah bard says her name. i loved this book from start to finish, from character development to problem solving to the way schwab is still worldbuilding down to the very last chapter, there was not one single sentence where i went "eh, take it or leave it" throughout this whole read.

i had moments where i was seriously frustrated with the characters, but it made me love them all the more, bc they were doing things that perfectly fit them and just showed how fleshed-out these characters really are. lila's my favorite fictional character of all time at this point. kell, alucard, rhy, and holland are all the great loves of my life as well but no one can top lila. i'm also biased bc we're birthday twins, but that didn't affect my rating. probably.

the romance subplots were phenomenal. the magic system was as stunning and fantastical as in the first two books. an absolutely incredible, thrilling finale to my new favorite series. i immediately bought the fragile threads of power and can't wait to dive back into this world. i cried for the characters, i cheered for them, this book ran me through a whirlwind of emotions and i will be recovering for a long time to come. even the slower parts, like the flashbacks, still captivated my attention and had me craving more. that might not sound like it makes sense but if you read it you'll get it. and you should absolutely read it. there was not one thing in this book that i felt like didn't belong.

i read this series through KU, bought the paperbacks to annotate, and got the collector's edition box set. schwab is my new favorite author, this is my new favorite series, and i'm never changing my mind. i will recommend this series, and all of their books, until the day i die.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gore, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body horror, Cursing, Self harm, and Sexual content

Minor: Confinement, Kidnapping, and Alcohol