Reviews tagging 'Grief'

Lies We Sing to the Sea by Sarah Underwood

26 reviews

pau0704's review against another edition

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

1.0

This book is like  dumpster on fire. Very entertaining to watch at first because of the chaos, then it's just meh. 
Fist of all there's absolutely nothing about Greek mythology on this book, just the false advertising claiming it to be a retelling of the Odyssey (which is absolutely not). I came across it after I read song of Achilles and was looking for something similar, I may add, nothing similar to it. 
Overall, the book makes no sense, the plot makes no sense, the "curse" makes no sense, the solution makes no sense. It's very frustrating to see the whole thing developing under no foundations for anything. 
Also, the main character's very infuriating, she's an assh*le to both secondary characters, idk if the author was trying to make her morally grey, but God, I hated her and how she used the two people who cared about her because she could control her hormones. Ver very bad LGBTQ representation (or bi representation). Felt like I wasted my time reading this, also, the book is not hard to read but took me so long to get through it. 

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thebookishbugg's review against another edition

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

4.5

I couldn't put this book down. It swept me in from page one and next thing I know it's 11:00 p.m., I've read 200 pages in one sitting, and my heart aches. 


The ending made me bawl my eyes out.


Don't know how I'm going to find something to read after this, it's going to pale in comparison. 

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pencilspeaker's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • 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

4.0

This is definitely NOT a retelling of the Odyssee, rather (just) a "what if I take one side character from this myth, put them in a YA love triangle, use ancient Ithaca as a backdrop and see what happens".
There were some plot holes and inaccuracies, but I enjoyed the prose. The book kept me entertained; at times I was unable to put it down.
Leto is a really cool protagonist, I like that often times we only know what she knows. I really hate Mathias tho
like how can you fall in love with him after he had you executed
and the whole sapphic/bi romance arc was poorly executed
(I was here for the sapphic couple that was advertised, and have a lot of anger for the trope of the bisexual who cannot choose and cheats on both of the people they're (supposedly) in love with)
.
The plot of the curse was really interesting, but I do have a lot of questions that remain unanswered, because they were apparently solved off-page (hello, what happened to Adrasteia? Where did Selene get her information?). The ending was written beautifully (apart from that jump-scare-y Sex scene, wholly unnecessary at that point), however
can I for once have a happy ending in sapphic fantasy please?!

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summerspence's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

I’m wrapped up in the post-reading-endorphin-rush, so I want to give it a higher rating, but I can’t. I think I’m already being generous. There’s just something about Greek myths… However, this is so loosely related (read: under-researched and oversold as something it isn’t).  According to the author, this is a feminist retelling of “The Odyssey”, except she didn’t read it/do additional research or include the other 99% of the original story. She admitted she gathered info from “Percy Jackson” and other stories. To me, there needs to be more than 1% to be considered a retelling. The historical details are also very inaccurate for 4th century BCE. 

Even with all of that, there are so many plot holes and straight up UNCLEAR details that really do make a difference to the story. The reader is just supposed to accept that things are the way they are because the internal monologue of the MC says so. 

So, why give it 3 stars then? Idk, I still kind of liked it 🤷🏻‍♀️😂. There really is a story there, and I do think that some of the writing is very beautiful, even if it was full of holes and inaccuracies.

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em_of_swags's review against another edition

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

4.5

why is it always a tragedy, can I be allowed happy books for once?

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ntstucky's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75


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lizy's review against another edition

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challenging emotional medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0


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fossilreads's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional sad tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.5

As a story, on its own, exciting and thrilling. But as I'm not able to overlook the fact the author has called it a retelling without even reading the original story it is meant to portray, unfortunately I can not rate this better than 2,5 stars.

I'm personally not a fan of time jumps too much and the way flashbacks to memories or stories told were written, I got confused many times when we jumped from an orally told story to a memory instead.

I'm not very knowledgeable in greek mythology, so I'm not able to give an opinion on how accurate those parts of the story are.

I was happy to see Leto gather herself in the end, it frustrated me how flaky she was with going through with things she seemed to be so incredibly set on. But that's also just.. humanity.

Honestly Mathias might have been my favorite character in all this. He truly wanted the best and tried to do all he knew to be able to. I love and hate his ending, I just want him to have everything good in the world!

This is a heavy read for all the grief and especially the pain women go through (of course girls are the ones cursed and at the mercy of men, as it has gone throughout so much of history).

The ending was predictable, but in my opinion it was in a nice way and didn't ruin the book for me. Some things still felt left unanswered in the end, but at least most of it was a somewhat satisfying ending.

So in short: As a story, it's a great one with such grief and also some joy sprinkled in. In context of it supposedly being a retelling, ehhhh... It's a heavy read when you wish so much better for women in general.

I really liked the romances, but there were so many things that frustrated me within them. I understand Melantho's grief over her past lovers, but babygirl, you are allowed to love again. They are gone, taken from you, it's not like you're cheating.
Leto on the other hand... how easily do you forget Melantho as soon as you set your eyes (and lips) on the prince?

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kanadrallegria's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.75


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maddy_sofie's review against another edition

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emotional sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? N/A
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0


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