Reviews tagging 'Death'

The Book of Life by Deborah Harkness

36 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

sarah_sedai_blueajah's review against another edition

adventurous dark informative mysterious 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Torture, Blood, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Rape, Sexual violence, and Pregnancy

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

abirej's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark tense slow-paced

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

2.0

God almighty. No. When Gallowglass de Clairmont confessed his undying love for Diana, I almost quit. Like I did not want to pick the book up to find out how it ended. Along with the pacing problems, Diana’s increasing Mary Sue complex was entirely too grating in this book. Matthew’s as well. Graphic for no reason at all. I was sick to my stomach reading the scene with Benjamin and the witch; I understand I was supposed to have feelings during that scene, what I don’t understand is why a trigger warning was notably absent for this story. No, I definitely did not like this book. Very unsatisfactory ending. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Miscarriage, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Torture, Blood, Stalking, and Pregnancy

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

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

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).

deenene's review against another edition

adventurous emotional fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Sexual assault, Blood, and Medical content

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