Reviews with content warning for Gore - Malice

Okay, when I heard "Sleeping Beauty reimagined from the villain's perspective" this is not what I expected... in the best way possible! What an incredible book!

I've been in the worst slump with fantasy lately. Almost every book I've read has fallen flat or I've lost my interest a quarter of the way through. That was certainly not the case with Malice. I loved every second and had a tough time putting it down. There was never a dull moment, the story didn't drag, and the characters were exquisite!

It's actually a little tough for me to write an in-depth review about this because there was literally nothing I disliked about the book. I almost feel like that's enough of a review. It's sapphic (with mostly closed-door sexual content). It's a great twist on a classic fairytale. There are predictable moments but also ones that blow your mind. It's overall just an incredible book that deserves way more hype!

I seriously can't wait to get my hands on Misrule. I'm dying to find out what happens next for these characters!

Content Warnings

redheadorganist's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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juliamb's review against another edition

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adventurous dark 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? It's complicated

4.5

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catmac15's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad 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

5.0

One of the best sapphic books I've ever read! The world-building and magic systems were so well done. This book was also 500+ pages and I finished it in less than 3 days (that's pretty quick for me, especially with school) and I couldn't put it down, especially the last 100 or so pages really were the selling point of the book for me. The author did such a good job of taking a story we all know so well (Sleeping Beauty) and giving a whole new spin to it. One thing about retellings is that there's a chance that they would be too predictable because we know the original story and we might end up with a copy-and-paste situation but Malice is the complete opposite. I look forward to the release of the 2nd book!

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lagiven's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional 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

4.25

This was a beautiful, Sapphic retelling of Sleeping Beauty, and I love that the evil fairy was the protagonist. Alyce's character arc is strong, and her descent into villainy was well paced. I loved how good and evil blurred throughout the book. I also appreciated that even some antagonistic characters were given backstories to explain their actions. Aurora was a great juxtaposition from the classic fairy tale princess, and the relationship between her and Alyce was excellent in how they accepted and trusted each other. There was some insta-love type stuff, but that does come with fairy tale stories. My only real con was that the last quarter of the book felt very rushed. It jumped from twist to twist, so there wasn't much time to register what had just happened before the characters were thrown into a new, crazy scene. That being said, I sped through this book in a few days, and I can't wait for its sequel to be released.

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cameronreads's review against another edition

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adventurous dark 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? No

4.0

I really enjoyed this! It was definitely one of the most interesting retellings I've ever read - I loved how it twisted the source material, staying true to it but also being its own original story. I loved how the plot progressed - there was one major plot point that I guessed very early on, but there was plenty of twists I wasn't expecting! The story itself was really interesting and I was completely engaged throughout the book. I loved the take on villainy it presented and I found I adored reading from the villain's perspective, especially because sometimes I find the typical hero's morals get in the way some times which really annoys me, and that absolutely wasn't the case here. The main character Alyce was great and progressed so much as the story went on as well, and I really really loved the romance and the pacing of it. I loved the ending so so much, it was exactly what I wanted to happen!
However, I did have a couple of issues: there was a little bit of info dumping, not enough that it was hard to read or boring but just took me out of it a little; there was that one character centred plot twist that was painfully obvious and could have been less so; there were quite a lot of time skips and training montages, which isn't a major problem just something I'm not a big fan of; and there were a couple of instances where Alyce assumed what Aurora was thinking and made mistakes, which does annoy me. Overall though, I did really like this book and would one hundred percent recommend, and I'm waiting in anticipation for the sequel!

Content Warnings

make_believer's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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