Reviews tagging 'Domestic abuse'

Das begabte Kind by Juno Dawson

39 reviews

sassyykassie's review against another edition

challenging emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective fast-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse and Transphobia

Moderate: Animal death, Misogyny, Sexism, Gaslighting, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Child death, Domestic abuse, Outing, and War

frecklyfreak's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional slow-paced

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

3.0

Disappointing. Would have been 4 stars, I genuinely enjoyed most of the book, but I hated the ending. It was frustrating and I know it was setting up for the sequel but I felt like it undermined the end of the story and didnt allow for any feeling of closure.
*spoiler*
I also wasn't prepared for the rampant transphobia by one of the characters but at least she was the bad guy I guess

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia

Minor: Domestic abuse

readingqueerly's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious 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

4.75

It has been a long time since a book has been able to surprise me multiple times. But this one did. I legit slapped a hand over my mouth for all of the last chapter. This book left me GAGGED y'all. 
The characters were incredible. I love an ensemble cast, and this was done so well. I could feel these women. I was yelling and crying and cheering and booing at them. 
A truly magical (ha!) story about sisterhood, betrayal, and beliefs with surprisingly great rants on white feminism, racism, intersectional identities, queerness, etc. Basically, this whole book has a great message of what it means to be a woman, but how women (especially those with privilege) have a very rigid idea on this; and how the system upholds this rigid idea since it benefits them under the guide of tradition. It includes, of course, a lot of representation for WOC, LGBTQ+ people, and disabled people. 
I cannot wait to read the second one. I might actually go buy it asap because holy shit this was good. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Domestic abuse and Sexual content

atamano's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body shaming, Misogyny, Sexism, Transphobia, Murder, and Toxic friendship

Moderate: Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Homophobia, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Car accident, Death of parent, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Cursing, Domestic abuse, and Abandonment

lorriss's review against another edition

emotional mysterious

• 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Deadnaming, Death, Gore, Misogyny, Racism, Sexual content, Transphobia, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Car accident, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Outing, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Sexual harassment, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Infidelity, Miscarriage, Racial slurs, Vomit, Medical content, Religious bigotry, Gaslighting, Alcohol, Colonisation, and Classism

Minor: Child death, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Homophobia, Rape, Sexual violence, Slavery, Toxic relationship, Excrement, Abortion, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, and Pandemic/Epidemic

ariellet18's review against another edition

dark emotional tense slow-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: Transphobia and Alcohol

Moderate: Death and Murder

Minor: Domestic abuse

lindz_reads's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional reflective sad tense fast-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? It's complicated

4.5

Honestly loved this portrayal of modern magical witches, so well done. I loved the world building, character, I 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Racism and Transphobia

Minor: Domestic abuse

niamhyjay's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious 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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Misogyny, Sexism, and Transphobia

Moderate: Child abuse and Domestic abuse

Minor: Infidelity

bookforthought's review against another edition

challenging dark 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

4.0

I'm always up for a witchy read, and even more so if it's a queer one! In this respect, Her Majesty's Royal Coven completely met and surpassed my expectations. Honestly, if I'd written this review immediately upon finishing it, I had been so caught up in it, it probably would have been 5 stars. Yet, as I gave myself some time to reflect a little bit more on it, I realised there were quite a few things that didn't quite work well for me.

The book is centred around Niamh, Helena, Elle and Leonie, a group of friends who have known each other since they were children and, at one point, were all inducted into Her Majesty's Royal Coven, a secret coven of witches protecting the UK from magical threats. Yet, a long war and painful events have left their scars, none of the women is left unscathed, and their friendship is more fragile than ever. The arrival of a mysterious child, Theo, is linked to a prophecy that may destroy the coven itself: dormant tensions will rise to the surface and lines will be drawn in what promises to be a war to eclipse all others.

The story is told in alternating POVs and right from the start I immediately warmed up to Niamh. When we meet her, she has retired from HMRC to conduct a simple life as a vet, at least until trouble comes knocking on her door. Niamh was by far my favourite character and she felt like the best-developed one too. She is well-rounded and complex, fiercely loyal and ready to use her considerable powers to defend those who need help and fight for what she feels is right. I enjoyed every moment spent with her!

In contrast, none of the other characters felt quite as well-developed. I'll keep it vague to avoid spoilers, but one of the witches has quite a dramatic personality shift at one point which, while it certainly serves the plot, felt just a bit too radical in a way that was unexplained. I was also sorry not to spend more time with Leonie and her new coven, which she founded as a more inclusive coven after breaking away from HMRC. The book is steeped in political and social issues, especially those of representation, so to devote so little time to the more inclusive coven and its founder felt a little... off. This is only the first book in the series though, so this may be developed further in future books, but I would have liked to see some of that here.

With only a few exceptions, the secondary characters are also quite thin and mostly interchangeable. This is always a risk when there's a big cast of main characters, but I felt it a lot towards the end of the book when I realised I actually kept mixing some people up and could barely remember their names, let alone any other distinctive traits. This is especially true of the male characters, who are virtually non-existent except as causes of the suffering of the main characters. Now, I'm the first to champion female-centred books and to recognise the harmful role of the patriarchy in society, but the way relations between people of different genders were handled here seemed a bit too simplistic and reductive.

I don't think it's a big spoiler, but one of the characters identifies as trans. I loved this (and this character!), and having this kind of representation is so, so important. However, a lot of the conversations between different characters end up being centred on whether trans women are women, but we barely ever hear directly from this character about her experience and feelings. One POV character is also a TERF and a fair bit of time is spent with her, which is very uncomfortable and might be triggering for some.

Still, the story is extremely engaging and kept me wanting to come back until the ending (that ending!), even despite the multiple UK-centred pop culture references which were cute at first but grew old pretty quickly. I also partly listened to the audiobook for this and that was amazing! Nicola Coughlan is a brilliant narrator and SO good with accents, I could have kept listening to her for many, many more hours.

So, while this wasn't exactly the super-empowering queer feminist witchy urban fantasy of my dreams, Her Majesty's Royal Coven is a highly engaging, page-turning book with some memorable characters and a good start to a series. I'll be looking forward to reading the next book!

I received an advanced review copy of this book for free from the publisher via NetGalley. This did not affect my opinion of the book in any way.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Death, Transphobia, Violence, Forced institutionalization, and Murder

Moderate: Homophobia, Misogyny, Racism, Kidnapping, and War

Minor: Domestic abuse

samreadsthings's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Deadnaming, Domestic abuse, Infidelity, Racism, Transphobia, Death of parent, Toxic friendship, and War