Reviews tagging 'Child death'

The Book of Life by Deborah Harkness

41 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

nightingfae's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful informative mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Rape, Sexual assault, Torture, Violence, Blood, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

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

kirjakimalainen's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious tense 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

2.5

I enjoyed the story and writing itself, but there were things added just for shock value that came out of nowhere compared to earlier books (see content warnings)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Torture, Xenophobia, Medical content, Trafficking, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Child abuse, Child death, and War

Minor: Ableism and Racial slurs

Unnecessary detail into rape as torture in a medical setting (graphic). Threaths of raping/killing/hurting children. G-slur against Romani people used once. The name of the only disabled character is "Cripplegate" (minor character). Random medical malpractice, justifying alcohol use during pregnancy (minor). Abusive/toxic family members (moderate). Holocaust/Nazis (graphic)

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

johannaplatt's review against another edition

adventurous emotional slow-paced

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

2.5

Hate read the final book in this trilogy as I am a completionist. I did genuinely enjoy the magic system, world building and supporting characters, but Diana and Matthew are just simply not likeable for me. Everyone loves or is in love with Diana, who can do no wrong and is all powerful once she comes into her magic. Matthew remains possessive (under the guise of blood rage) and misogynistic (but this is how vampire families work).

The miracle babies are born and then largely ignored/papped off to family members.

Despite this, I likely will read the follow up, as I am a sucker for a time jump and would like to see how characters have developed 7 years in the future.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Confinement, Death, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, and Pregnancy

zoenelson's review against another edition

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? It's complicated

4.25

The trilogy, overall, was entertaining. The romance was convincing and thoughtful; the supporting cast was mostly wonderful and I enjoyed the character progression. I remain impressed by Harkness' ability to ground this fantasy in our historical and scientific knowledge. 

This particular book did a few things well: it left enough open at the end for the reader to interpret as they please; it solidified Matthew and Diana's love story; and gave us more time with the supporting cast. I did not like that Harkness introduced

another existential conflict in the form of Benjamin raping witches to create a superior creature race. It's related to the main conflict but felt manufactured and was really dark without warning; it also distracted from the main conflict, so the resolution there felt unsatisfying even though it was desirable. I felt that the final battle scene was anticlimactic because there were no real trials or tribulations. Additionally, Matthew's refusal to form a scion was merely a plot tool and thus felt superficial and drew the story out. Speaking of which, this book, to me, felt very choppy trying to tie so many loose ends together which impacted the plot and pacing.

I wanted to rate this a 4.75 because I loved the first book and parts of the second, but choices to add so many elements in the second and third books diminished what the first book set up so well. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Rape, Sexual violence, and Torture

Moderate: Child death, Gore, and Blood

Minor: Stalking and Pregnancy

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