Reviews tagging 'Injury/Injury detail'

Jade War by Fonda Lee

31 reviews

unboxedjack's review against another edition

dark emotional tense slow-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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Gun violence, Misogyny, Racism, Blood, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Rape, Sexual assault, Xenophobia, Sexual harassment, and War

saucy_bookdragon's review against another edition

emotional 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

Sequels are hard to review so here's just a bullet list of thoughts:
-I found this addictive to read like the first book and couldn't put it down whenever I picked it up
-however the first half was a slog
-I support both Shae and Ayt Mada because I support women's wrongs, they can be criminals if they want
-I like that Wen got a bigger role!
-the world building expanded nicely by showing us what Espenia is like 
-there were a lot of couples in this book which helped with the themes of loyalty to the clan, family, and/or nation and how to deal with those when they conflict. Though I didn't "ship" any of the couples that wasn't the point of the book
-this also dealt with a cycle of violence as characters continually got revenge, fucked around, and found out 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Violence, Xenophobia, Kidnapping, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Drug use, Misogyny, Blood, Grief, and Abortion

takarakei's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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

4.5

When I first started this series I really knew nothing going in except kung-fu inspired jade magic and mafioso type families (based on a talk I saw Fonda at). About halfway through this second book in the series I realized that (at least so far) these books are really a mastery of political intrigue and strategy. Honestly, now I am marveling at how much Fonda must have researched and understood about the way power-struggles often work in relation to a global chess board. The continued character development (especially of Hilo) throughout the course of this book is fantastically done. I am SO intrigued (and a bit scared for my own well being) to see how the final third book will pan out.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Racism, Violence, and Murder

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Drug use, Misogyny, Sexual content, Torture, Xenophobia, Grief, Abortion, Pregnancy, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Pedophilia, Rape, Slavery, and Police brutality

Rape (off page, in non descriptive detail) Animal cruelty - like book 1 a lot of derogatory language involving animals, cock-fighting (not extremely explicit) and 'testing' magic on mice.

jessiereads98's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense medium-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

4.75

While this one doesn’t hit quite as hard for me as Jade City did, it’s close. If I could give this like a 4.85 or 4.90 it would be more accurate. Fonda Lee continues and expands her masterful world building here by interweaving international cultures and politics with that of Kekon. The crafting of politics and international relations here is truly an impressive feat. Unfortunately with the new politics, settings, and characters we end up losing some time with Kekon and the Kauls. The time jumping around and pacing in this book just felt messier and more inconsistent to me than the first book. The pacing doesn’t seem to pick up to where it was in the first book until the last 150-200 pages when the separate threads laid out throughout the story start to come together. Overall a strong follow up to Jade City but does seem to suffer somewhat from the second book syndrome of largely setting things up for the third book. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Violence, Xenophobia, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Gore, Gun violence, Racism, Torture, and Blood

Minor: Confinement, Cursing, Homophobia, Misogyny, Rape, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Grief, Abortion, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Colonisation, War, and Classism

adhdru's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Death, Drug use, Gun violence, Racism, Sexism, Sexual content, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, War, and Injury/Injury detail

redthistle's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark tense medium-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: Addiction, Body horror, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gore, Racism, Violence, Blood, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

sarah984's review against another edition

adventurous 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

5.0

It's pretty rare to find a sequel - especially part 2 in a trilogy - that's as good as the original, but Jade War surpassed all of my expectations. It's got a broader scope this time: many scenes take place in other countries and the Kauls are contending with foreign militaries, expat communities and trade agreements on top of the clan war situation and general family drama. It was easy to romanticize what was going on in Jade City, but Jade War draws back that curtain a bit to show the darker side. The characters are fantastic and unfortunately all of their terrible decisions are absolutely consistent with what you'd expect them to do. I can't wait to read the third book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Violence, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Drug use, Gore, Misogyny, Racism, Sexual content, Torture, Xenophobia, Blood, Police brutality, Medical content, Grief, Abortion, Pregnancy, and War

Minor: Ableism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Chronic illness, Fatphobia, Genocide, Homophobia, Pedophilia, Rape, Suicide, Excrement, Vomit, Kidnapping, Fire/Fire injury, Colonisation, and Classism

theespressoedition's review against another edition

challenging 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? Yes

3.0

It's a little hard to compress all of my thoughts about this book into a review.

There's a lot that occurred in Jade War and I struggled to comprehend all of it. In fact, it took me about three times as long to finish it as I expected (I don't know why I thought I'd finish it sooner when it took ages for me to finish Jade City as well).

It's a thick book with a thick plot that's often really hard to follow. The primary theme is "political intrigue" and the author gives us that element in abundance. However, because of that, it often becomes sluggish and almost too dense. While the first book had almost equal amounts of informational chapters and action chapters, this one fell heavily on the side of information and left the action to happen in short spurts throughout.

However, when the action did occur, I found myself holding my breath, waiting to see what would happen next. I was never sure who would live and who would die, whether there was a traitor in the midst, or if a romance would occur. There aren't many other authors who could get me to sit through over 600 pages (probably 400 of which were about politics and war strategies) and still find myself interested enough to keep going. So major props to Fonda Lee for holding my attention through this one.

The ending alone was enough to make this book worth it. I honestly can't wait to find out what happens next.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gore, Gun violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Murder, and War

Moderate: Homophobia, Racial slurs, Racism, Abortion, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Rape, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, and Vomit

le_mur's review against another edition

adventurous 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Drug abuse, Hate crime, Racism, Violence, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Biphobia, Homophobia, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Abortion, and Pregnancy

jakepasseri's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny 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? It's complicated

4.75

Amazing read, definitely better than the last one (if that is possible)! The only issue was with

the constant time jumps made it difficult to follow at times

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Racial slurs, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Child abuse, Toxic relationship, Abortion, and Colonisation

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Homophobia, Pedophilia, Self harm, and Sexual content