Reviews tagging 'Bullying'

Red Rising by Pierce Brown

46 reviews

tokiberry's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark 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

4.5

Red Rising
⤷ ⭑⭑⭑⭑.𝟱

⟢• ❝ I would have lived in peace. But my enemies brought me war. ❞

I rated this a 4.5 but I’m rounding up my rating to a 5. For some reason, it felt wrong to keep it at a 4. This book is another title I kept seeing on social media and I admit, it was more better than I expected. You’ll love to hate and hate to love characters. This was one crazy rollercoaster of emotions that kept building and building.

THE AUDIOBOOK IS AMAZING. I urge you to listen to it.

I’m not into sci-fi genres, but I can’t help but wonder what comes next after that crazy ending. I’m happy I only got into this now because I am definitely reading the next books in the series.

“You do not follow me because I am the strongest. Pax is. You do not follow me because I am the brightest. Mustang is. You follow me because you do not know where you are going. I do.” •⟢

┆ Bloodydamn.

“Break the chains, my love.”

⋆˙⟡♡

post-read: WHAT THE HECK

pre-read: i couldn't resist

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Deadnaming, Death, Gore, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Slavery, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, Sexual harassment, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Bullying

Minor: Alcohol

insideunder's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional tense 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? Yes

4.0

A vivid young adult sci-fi dystopian novel with interesting world building and a main character who absolute goes through it. I like Darrow, especially since he has a character flaw - rage - that I find cathartic and relatable. His anger makes him impulsive and passionate, and gets him in trouble as much as it helps him. The performance of this audiobook elevated the story for me by at least one star. Wasn't sure I'd care for another War School story, but this one managed to have enough new and interesting ideas to keep me on my toes.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body shaming, Bullying, Death, Slavery, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Toxic friendship, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Moderate: Ableism, Alcoholism, Animal death, Rape, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Police brutality, Stalking, Murder, and Alcohol

Minor: Excrement and Cannibalism

needread's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

Usually I stay away from sic-fi but I was persuaded to read this. 

And I’m glad that I did. 

It’s a very raw and real and heavy story. 

I love the concept, the dialogue, along with the clear changes characters experience. Even the inner monologues changed as time went on. Very well thought out. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gore, Physical abuse, Slavery, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Colonisation, War, and Classism

Moderate: Animal death, Bullying, Alcohol, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Animal cruelty, Toxic relationship, and Toxic friendship

rmb27's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

1.0

This book is a very dark hunger games full of vengeance, death, loads of swearing, and frequent discussion of sexual assault. I wouldn’t recommend this book to anyone and wish I had DNF. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Physical abuse, Blood, Excrement, Grief, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Sexual harassment, and War

margarcia's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Cursing, Death, Physical abuse, Slavery, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Murder, Colonisation, and Classism

Moderate: Addiction, Child death, Rape, Violence, Medical content, Grief, Cannibalism, and War

mayabaxx's review against another edition

dark sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

Who TF is recommending this as YA?
Picturing a white man sitting down and writing this level of graphic violence, gore and sexual assault makes me uncomfortable. And it’s only ever been recommended to me by a man who says it’s their favourite book ever. Like ok. Don’t ever come near me, thanks.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Bullying, Death, Gore, Physical abuse, Slavery, Suicide, Violence, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Animal death, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Excrement, Vomit, Cannibalism, and Colonisation

bookishholly's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

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

3.0

I have so many conflicting feels about this book.

Potential spoilers and TW for r*pe mention

Overall I enjoyed Red Rising, I liked the setting and the overall story. I don't think it's saying something new or really adding anything of value other than entertainment to the world and sometimes that's ok. 
There were multiple times where I felt uncomfortable with the clear misogyny that I don't even know if the author is aware he has written. I admit that it was written 10 years ago but I thought even then that the insult of doing something "like a girl" was outdated. Also to me it feels like there is an undertone of casual homophobia. 
Essentially all of the main cast are insufferable and the fact that one character's attempted r*pe of another is so quickly moved on from is hard to swallow, especially since beginning book 2 and realising that they are still around. 
At this point, I intend to keep reading but that may change.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Child death, Death, Gore, Misogyny, Slavery, Violence, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Moderate: Body shaming, Fatphobia, Rape, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Grief, and Cannibalism

Minor: Excrement

dreadspawn's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Child death, Cursing, Death, Gore, Misogyny, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Murder, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Moderate: Rape, Suicidal thoughts, and Dysphoria

Minor: Cannibalism

eefmaoam's review against another edition

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? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This story was different than I expected it to be, both in good and bad ways. 

I love the premise, world building, characters, and general ~vibes~. The story is pretty fast paced in the beginning, to slow down a bit after the first ~25% of the story, which gives you some to time to get used to the current situation and what has happened before that point; it really works. It’s clear from the very first chapter what this book will be about and it still manages to surprise me and not felt like a dime a dozen dystopian YA book, just going through the motions. 

However, even though the plot itself was surprising, the beginning (and also some minor plot points after that), was pretty obvious and felt a little too easy; it didn’t feel like it was the writers intention to make the reader more knowledgeable than the characters in the story, therefore not increasing tension but taking some away. This problem did let up, once the story ramped up luckily! 
Second point of ‘megh, why, otherwise this was a 5-star read’ is the weird discrepancy between the actual age of the main character and how he came across. Yes, Darrow sometimes even makes remarks about this himself, and, yes, it makes some sense in this world looking at his background, but it still irked me. Especially when

he has sex with his, also underage, wife (reading it felt pretty yucky, even if it fits the narrative)

and

when the other student, supposedly around his age and even less developed mentally then Darrow himself, start raping each other (yes, that happens in the real world as well, and I’ve read multiple books in the same genre that also discuss it, but this felt so much more jarring because of their age and the way it is discussed. And no, not in a ‘what a cruel dystopian world this is, that these things happen!!!’ kind of way)

, but also more generally it gave a bit of an ~I’m not like other people!!!~ vibe that reminded me a little bit too much of some YA troops. But, this problem has also (partially) solved itself now with him aging in the story. 

Over all I’m excited to start the second book. I’ve seen some people think that the story really gets going only during the second book, so I’m hopeful I will enjoy it even more and my icks will not rear their heads again! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Child death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Rape, Excrement, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Gaslighting, and Classism

Moderate: Gun violence, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Blood, Medical trauma, Abandonment, and War

n0ize's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

This book has all that we of multiple fandoms want packed into a series. This book is for Harry Potter , Divergent, Hunger Games and PJO fans alike. The plot the characters the world building is all top tier. You feel yourself rooting for just about everyone, but make sure you also steel your heart as well. Great read! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Bullying, Child death, Death, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Cannibalism, Murder, Sexual harassment, Colonisation, War, and Classism