Reviews with content warning for Blood - Silk & Steel

Reviews tagging 'Blood'

Silk & Steel by Ariana Nash

11 reviews

freckles_13's review against another edition

emotional tense medium-paced

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

3.0

I’m really unsure how I feel about this book.
It took me a while to warm up to both of them, but I feel like Lysander is the better character since he seems to be more morally grey, and he has such mixed feelings. Eroan seemed okay but felt one dimensional to me.
It only got really good around the 80% mark, but I’ll still read the sequel to see where it goes.

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emmhardt's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-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? No

4.25

High action, gritty, smutty, and dark. The gayest game of thrones vibes but more dragons and less characters. Major warnings for sexual assault, violence, blood, torture, and incest. Not for the faint of heart but well done for what it is. Romance is very convincing and well-paced. Also THE YEARNING.

Content Warnings

potatooftheworld's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad 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? Yes

3.75

The only reason this isn’t 5 stars is because of the amount of questions there are in the narration. It’s so offputting. That and the fact that unfortunately we didn’t see the characters much in the second half of the book interacting and they keep thinking the other is dead. I love this book and although the tw are harsh and there is a lot that is not warned for, it’s a good book. My only comment is some of the narration is odd and a few other elements here and there.

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gmv's review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny tense fast-paced

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

1.5

Overall score: 1.5/5 stars

Entertainment: 5/5 stars

The writing was great.

The contents were awful.

Entertainment value is at 5 stars for all the wrong reasons.

Warning. My review is warped. Proceed with caution.

I highly enjoy Cornell Collins as the narrator—extremely high. He is my favorite narrator. I would listen to anything he says, even if the plot was utter nonsense. I have to emphasize this because he is the only reason why I continued reading the book.

It has everything I dislike. The biggest would be rape, instant love, breeding kink, one-dimensional characters, regression of character development, miscommunication, inconsistent personalities, and repetition of information we already know. I would be more forgiving if there was an actual plot or world-building, but the book is heavily character-focused, and it’s tough not to nitpick when that’s all we have.

I try to avoid the first-person view because the character often repeats the same thoughts in different situations. It’s mentally exhausting. I get it. Let’s move on. My brain wasn’t being stimulated enough, and it was getting harder to care for the characters and the little story it had. It was rape, then angst, then more rape, then dubious straight sex, then more angst, then more rape, and talking about babies, and then more rape. I wanted to read m/m to avoid the breeding kink and the straight sex, but this book reminded me, “Oh, you want the gays to have some fun? Not on my watch.”

It was marketed as a male and male romance, but all I got was vaginas in my face. I didn’t sign up for that. There was so much that I felt like I was the cuck the entire time for a straight couple. Lysander killed my favorite character. The Queen was a boss ass bitch that helped the kingdom get their shit together. And he had to go and ruin it. If the author didn’t want me to see these two having happy gay sex nor let me have my Queen doing bitchy Queen things.

Then so be it.

This led me to the entertainment I created, which made the entire thing like a high school play. I am not going to be an unwilling participant in this party.

The boys are so dramatic—to the point that it is ludicrously asinine. Cornell did a fantastic job of making the characters come alive with the flare of the melodrama, and I wanted nothing more for Eroan and Lysander to go through more pain and suffering. They only wanted to be clever with the “plot” demanded, and then they reverted back to being dumb dumbs. I pictured the actors on stage holding their script, making a face before acting it out, all fully clothed. When the scene changes, I see giant beefy bronze dragons pulling the art pieces off the stage and bringing in new props. This immensely helped with all the penis-inside-vagina sex scenes.

Then, my view changed again when the humans hit the scene.

It changed from a play to a reality TV that humans watch. And it all went downhill from there. I was constantly laughing. I imagined cameras everywhere as the dragons and elves were at each other throats. The humans are way further in advanced technology that I can NOT unsee humans from the mainland watching the drama unfold. No wonder the dragons are dying out, and there are so few elves. The humans felt sorry for them and didn’t want to overtake the island. That’s my head cannon, and I am sticking to it.

To sum it up in the words of Eroan and Lysander:

I didn’t care....
....I didn’t feel.

Content Warnings

raintje's review

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adventurous dark emotional 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

3.75

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bonriki's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional 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

3.5

I’m enjoying the slow burn and emphasis on plot and worldbuilding but there was too much sex that slowed events down. The trauma level is also heavy handed, when the setting is already bleak you’re not adding much of value by torturing your characters anew every chapter.

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nickbreniuc's review

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adventurous challenging dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? N/A
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

4.0

Who would have thought that smut can have a decent plot as well?
I was very surprised with this book, it is so taboo and basically breaks all boundaries. But since they are not human, it is also not that uncomfortable to read?
The slow burn between the main characters is excrutiating!

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beholder's review against another edition

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adventurous dark slow-paced

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

4.0

For the amount of content warnings needed, it's surprisingly not that hard to read -- it wasn't a visceral/painful read to me, that is. Of course, YMMV, but I think if you get through chapter 2 or 3 (the first one narrated by Lysander), then you can do the rest. The rest of the book is not as fucked up as those first chapters 😅

And I was expecting a slower burn, but I am not disappointed by the romance 👁️👁️

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livsdirelibrary's review against another edition

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dark medium-paced

Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

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lily_books's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense fast-paced

Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No

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