Reviews tagging 'Suicide'

Book of Night by Holly Black

2 reviews

allianni's review against another edition

fast-paced

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

2.0

Over all the book had a relatively interesting premise and promising start. The “twists and turns” that happened during it were not exciting to discover and things that I didn’t connect did not feel rewarding. 

The characters are certainly built to not be likable. They are bad people who do bad things. I am unsure if the author wants the reader to like them despite the bad things. The characters are essentially bad people fighting worse people.

Another issue I took with this book is that Black very clearly does not know how to write a “curvy” (as she describes Charlie) lead female character. Charlie was described/described herself as having  “too much in [insert body part here]” and that it was crazy that a hot guy like her boyfriend would be interested in her. As a woman who falls into the category of Charlie’s size (which is eventually explicitly stated) I can attest to the fact that there are better ways to write characters like her.

I also felt like certain points were exhausted by the author repeating them over and over again. The ending was disappointing and it felt as if there were many things explained away. 

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Content Warnings

Minor: Incest, Suicide, Torture, Vomit, and Kidnapping

Strange amount of child neglect that does not really get dealt with.

There is incest that is complicated? Again this is a spoiler! It is very heavily implied that Red has sex with Adeline. While Red and Remy are not the same person, Red is from Remy and takes the shape of Remy, so its very hard for me to say that the sexual relationship Red and Adeline have is not incestuous (or at least close enough to warrant a warning). It also adds literally nothing to plot for them to be related.

aliciaw's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

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

3.0

The volume of telling, not showing especially in the first half of the book was too much. I wasn't rooting for Charlie and her character development felt pretty flat. Perhaps in part it was that app name dropping happened without any necessity: Facebook, YouTube, Patreon, Slack, Zoom.. all of these could have been written in a way that won't require the reader to be aware of the apps. It dates the book and requires the reader to be aware of these things as they are now regardless of when they pick up the book or any familiarity with them. Urban Fantasy with a robust magic system and morally ambiguous characters can be made without need to change things in any reprints due to the rate of change in technology. The premise was good, but the execution could have been tightened up and more time spent on the magic system. It needed a better ratio of showing over telling. I had to push myself to keep reading it because if this had been my introduction to the author, I would have dnf'd it by around the 20% mark. I don't know if I'll pick up anything else in the series but this was a miss for me. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Blood, Murder, and Gaslighting

Minor: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, and Suicide