Reviews tagging 'Grief'

Das begabte Kind by Juno Dawson

58 reviews

danajoy's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, Violence, Toxic friendship, and Transphobia

Moderate: Death, War, Fire/Fire injury, Misogyny, Infidelity, and Grief

jhbandcats's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious 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? Yes

4.0

The book opens the night before five young girls officially become witches. The story then jumps and follows these same characters now that they’ve matured into their more powerful and responsible lives. 

The author does a great job at showing the different personalities, not so easy when there are a lot of characters. The women are no longer close like in childhood; there’s friction between the power-hungry head of England’s coven, the mild witch who pretends to be a simple housewife, the Black lesbian who started her own LGBTQ-friendly coven, and the veterinarian consumed with grief at the loss of her fiancé during the witch war eight years ago. There are spouses and lovers and children and parents and, new to the group, a trans orphan who’s terrified and lashing out in fear. The story is told from four points of view and the voices are distinct. 

I read reviews where the readers felt the race and gender issues overshadowed the story. I thought the author raised really important points relevant to current racism, homophobia, and transphobia. The transphobia was heavy-handed but it seemed realistic given what I read online. 

I liked it enough where I’m about to start the second in the series. I want to see what happens to these people. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Lesbophobia, Violence, Fire/Fire injury, Homophobia, Bullying, Classism, Mental illness, Murder, Outing, Racism, Blood, Abandonment, Death, Gore, Alcohol, Emotional abuse, Transphobia, and Grief

livcashmere's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective 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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Murder, Violence, War, Grief, Child abuse, Death, and Transphobia

queerreaderchaos's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual content, Murder, Misogyny, Racism, Death, Homophobia, Grief, and Child abuse

raccoonteeth's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense medium-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? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Grief, Death, Dysphoria, Hate crime, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Deadnaming, Homophobia, Outing, and Transphobia

Moderate: Genocide, Vomit, Classism, Domestic abuse, Animal death, Animal cruelty, Murder, Toxic relationship, Racism, Toxic friendship, and War

dani_reis's review against another edition

informative reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

2.75

I had more hopes for this one. It is strong regarding transgender politics and belonging in the magic world. But the magic was so limited it didn't pull me far enough out of reality to enjoy it. This would be more enjoyed by a lover of women's literature driven by characters instead of plot. The first half was fairly boring. Maybe the last 25% plot really started happening. I'll probably listen to book 2 because of Nicola, but Nicola would be the main reason I push through. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Deadnaming, Transphobia, Sexual content, Animal death, Sexism, Child death, and Grief

Minor: Eating disorder

Child death

fetus graphically sacrificed in a ritual

Animal death

bull graphically sacrificed in ritual

sacredgriefsociety's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious 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

3.5

really enjoyed this book but WISH there were some spoilers attached at the beginning as i wasn’t prepared for the grief discussions around partner loss nor the transphobia within its pages. 

this was a darker book than i initially expected it to be but good nonetheless. the characters grow (some for the worse) and a few twists/surprises leave you wondering what the hell could happen next. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia and Grief

Moderate: Misogyny and Racism

emmajh91's review against another edition

challenging tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Transphobia, Death, and Murder

Moderate: Violence, Cursing, Injury/Injury detail, Infidelity, Hate crime, Car accident, Forced institutionalization, Kidnapping, Dysphoria, Confinement, Alcohol, Sexual content, Blood, Vomit, War, and Toxic friendship

blewballoon's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

3.0

Gonna get a bit more "political" than I typically do, since this is a quite "political" book. If you are the type of person who asks yourself "I don't know, I feel like the stuff JK Rowling says in her tweets isn't that big a deal?" and you are genuinely curious to know why it is a big deal, then this might be a good book to help explain it to you. If you are a TERF, you will hate this book. I didn't like this book either, but not for that reason. I didn't like this book in the same ways I didn't like The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin: dwelling on the power that racists/sexists/homophobes/transphobes/etc have just bums me out. I know things suck. I read to remind myself that sometimes people don't suck. I read to keep myself from falling into a pit of despair about the state of the world. Apart from Niamh, Theo, and Holly, I didn't really like any of the characters. I absolutely hated the ending. I felt like I knew what was coming the whole time and just wanted it to be over. I gave it 3 stars because of the intention, the world-building, the setting, and there were some funny lines. I don't think this is a bad book, it just didn't suit me even though I agree with its message. The narrator for the audiobook was really fantastic, I'll be looking for more books narrated by them. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia, Death, and Animal death

Moderate: Child abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Alcohol, Blood, Grief, and Racism

Minor: Drug use, War, and Sexual assault

blacksphinx's review against another edition

tense medium-paced

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

2.0

On one hand, I feel like the main message of this book is important and I'm glad its been so successful. But I bounced off of the extremely causal prose hard, and it was difficult to read so much misogyny directed at women by other women (please stop calling each other cunts holy shit!) 

(I am also very tired of books that go "covid happened but we used magic to make it go away" ugh! And blaming the anti-vax movement on warlocks is so distasteful.)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism, Death of parent, Hate crime, Transphobia, Kidnapping, Outing, Grief, and Misogyny

Moderate: Car accident, Fatphobia, Alcohol, Homophobia, Infidelity, Sexual content, Bullying, Cursing, Medical content, Classism, Lesbophobia, Racism, Confinement, Dysphoria, Violence, and Gaslighting

Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic, Murder, War, Ableism, Abortion, and Emotional abuse

TW: transphobic, misogynistic, and ableist slurs. Internalized misogyny. Mention of drowning.