Reviews tagging 'Kidnapping'

The Book of Life by Deborah Harkness

28 reviews

fkshg8465's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional inspiring 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

5.0

These two make the best fictional power couple. Yes, I am bothered by the women’s to requirement to obey their husbands per vampire laws, but it’s clear there’s a lot of room for interpretation, at least with Diana and Matthew. Really excited to see what the fourth book will bring. Three weeks left to wait at the library.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Body horror, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Drug abuse, Gore, Hate crime, Infertility, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicide, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Outing, Abandonment, Alcohol, War, and Injury/Injury detail

siglerbooknook's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional tense slow-paced

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

4.25

!!!CONTAINS MINOR SPOILERS!!!

This book has proved complicated to review. I have many conflicting thoughts and feelings now that I've finished the whole story.

While the ending wasn't completely satisfying it does make sense, both with the plot, and with the way the main characters have been built. Several goals from all 3 books felt very rushed. Big bads that have been overwhelmingly powerful for 3 books were a cliffnote in the ending.

Of all the characters in the book I liked Diana and Matthew the least. Their personalities while well rounded, are very similar to how they were in the beginning of the first book. I don't feel like they grew much. By this book I felt like Matthew should have learned to have some faith in Diana and Diana should stop second guessing everything.
The side characters however, completely make up for it. I love almost every other character in the book, even if some feel like completely different people from the last time we saw them.

I felt like the plot dragged a little in the middle. We spend the entire second book on Diana learning to use her magic, so further learning in this book felt repetitive. I didn't really need to know how she comes up with words and ingredients for spells multiple times to understand she was growing as a witch.

I did love the big reveal at the end. Harkness does a wonderful job pulling all the tiny clues together. Any detail can be tied back to the reveal beautifully. I do wish she'd answered a few of the broader questions in a little more detail, like what daemons, witches, and vampires are.

Over all I enjoyed the story and am mostly satisfied with the ending.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Torture, Violence, and Stalking

Moderate: Child death, Confinement, Death, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Medical content, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Eating disorder, Miscarriage, Misogyny, and Kidnapping

torturedreadersdept's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Death, Misogyny, Torture, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Murder, Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, Dysphoria, and Injury/Injury detail

smargopittman's review against another edition

dark medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No

2.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture

Moderate: Child death, Rape, Sexual violence, Violence, Blood, and Kidnapping

gillian_aftanas's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• 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: Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Death, Gore, Mental illness, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Medical trauma, Murder, Pregnancy, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Confinement and Alcohol

Minor: Animal death, Drug use, Genocide, Homophobia, Antisemitism, Death of parent, Lesbophobia, and Classism

aduqu's review against another edition

slow-paced

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

3.0

This book is a product of the early 2010's, when paranormal romances with chosen one heroines were a dime a dozen. Diana Bishop is not exactly a Mary Sue, but this book will beat you over the head with how special and chosen she is.

It's a fun read if you like paranormal romances and don't think about it to hard. I definitely rolled my eyes a LOT reading this, but it was always entertaining.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Child death and Rape

Minor: Vomit

laurenfink's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional 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

4.5

I really love this series but it’s just a little to convenient how some of the plot lines work out

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Rape, Blood, Kidnapping, Murder, and Pregnancy

oksmithie's review against another edition

adventurous funny mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

This was a final book of a trilogy that did not disappoint. There were some things that seemed over the top and unnecessary, but all-in-all, I was not mad at where the story/characters ended up (as is often the case for me with trilogies). This will be a trilogy that I will re-read… all 1500+ pages. The audiobook is also well done (for all three installments). I used a combo of paper and audiobook to read this trilogy. It was the only way I could get through it and still have a life! Well worth the commitment! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Confinement, Death, Infertility, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Rape, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Kidnapping, Religious bigotry, Murder, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

There is one scene of kidnapping of a male character and his torture in particular that includes most of the graphic content.

It did not feel unnecessary or manipulative by the author (it was manipulative by the story’s villain).

booknerderika's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Death, Gore, Torture, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Kidnapping, Murder, Pregnancy, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Miscarriage

Minor: Misogyny, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Antisemitism, and War

darquedreamer's review against another edition

adventurous emotional 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

5.0

And, I can't believe it's finally over! This was my favorite in the trilogy by far! My only complaint was that the last 70 pages or so felt a little rushed in comparison to the rest of the trilogy, but, other than that, I loved it!

I loved that everything from the first two books was brought together and that the best of both worlds was present. I was in awe of how the author managed to keep everything together across so many pages and how she managed to gently recap the first two books so nothing was forgotten or missed. I found myself laughing and smiling and tearing up the most during this one, and I definitely finished it the fastest. This one alone makes the trilogy worth reading, and I can't wait to reread it in the future. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Rape

Minor: Kidnapping