Reviews tagging 'Cursing'

El Portal de Los Obeliscos / The Obelisk Gate by N.K. Jemisin

10 reviews

bergha1998's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad 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

3.75

This book is so full of big ideas, one of the most ambitious feats of literature I’ve read. I liked this one being a dual timeline with the daughter Nassun. Though part of it being in second person, although that person was obviously Essun or Hoa, felt a bit off to me. I’m sure plot wise perhaps in the third book it will make more sense as a choice. I just am not a fan overall of second person. 

Found Family, Duo POV, Second Person

“Like those weird cults that crop up from time to time. I heard of one that asks an old man in the sky to keep them alive every time they go to sleep. People need to believe there’s more to the world than there is.”

“The dreamer, the rebel, always reconsidering the way things have always been because maybe they should never have been that way in the first place.”

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Alcohol, Blood, Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Drug use, and Gaslighting

gandalf_a's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Confinement, Genocide, Murder, Toxic relationship, Violence, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Child death, Terminal illness, and Medical content

Minor: Animal death, Alcohol, Blood, Cannibalism, War, Alcoholism, Body horror, and Sexual content

mrsjodihunter's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, and Panic attacks/disorders

Moderate: Child abuse and Emotional abuse

Minor: Cursing

zombiezami's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Confinement, Domestic abuse, Murder, Death of parent, Child death, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Grief, Genocide, Death, Blood, Body horror, Xenophobia, Child abuse, Cursing, and Physical abuse

Minor: Deadnaming

kemrick19's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious sad 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 of parent, Murder, Child death, Grief, Cursing, Death, Injury/Injury detail, and Violence

Moderate: Gore and Blood

cryosphinx's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional 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

4.0

Kind of slumpy compared to the first book. The first one follows three characters and this one cuts that down to two (it does have a third, briefly) and it slows down the plot but makes up with it with character growth and world building. A lot of things get answered about the world and how the magic works and all the Guardians, Stone Eaters and orogenes exist. Since the plot doesn't move quite as much as Book 1, there is a lot more dialogue and I found it quite slow in the first half so be prepared for that.

Hoa definitely becomes the most interesting character aside from the main two. I do love the found family, depictions of grief and trauma and Jemisin's prose is still so beautifully written, there were times where I just read a passage over and over to fully observe how lovely it was written. You also get more informed of Essun's time in with her family, though it's told from the perspective of Nassun.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Child abuse, and Grief

Moderate: Death of parent, Murder, Child abuse, Cursing, and Child death

Minor: Bullying, Cannibalism, and Sexual content

sup3r_xn0va_maya's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-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

The Obelisk Gate is the sequel to N. K. Jemisin's "The Fifth Season" and it definitely does not suffer from "bad sequel syndrome "as one goodreads user put it. This was an amazing follow up, with so much wonderful and vast world building and character growth.

I loved this and I see why it also won the Hugo award (and many other awards).
I was drawn in to the story and my interest or excitement never faltered. This book reminds me of how enamored I was while reading Octavia E. Butler's Patternist series, I see some elements of OEB's stories come through in The Fifth Season and The Obelisk Gate. Mainly a dystopian setting, found family, and found community to help survive the recent disasters.

I read this in 5 days only because I was buddy reading with my boyfriend and we had to read around his schedule. If I had read this on my own I probably would have finished it within a day or two. It was that good.

 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Physical abuse, Violence, Child death, Blood, Child abuse, and Death of parent

farleighelse's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

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

4.0

expands on stone eaters. more on what happens during a season and how it affects environment.

a guardian lost, losing his original drive. starts to care for oregones. Fucked up moon.

child abuse and trauma. multiple POVs. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Child death, Racism, and Child abuse

Moderate: Cannibalism, Cursing, Domestic abuse, and Hate crime

Minor: Sexual content and Torture

some_random_person_hi's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

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

4.0

Second book syndrome (or maybe the other books in the trilogy were just too good).

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child abuse, Death, Medical content, Physical abuse, Violence, Abandonment, Grief, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Mass/school shootings, Murder, Body horror, Child death, and Vomit

Moderate: Alcohol, Confinement, Cursing, Stalking, and Gore

Minor: Animal death, Drug use, Genocide, and War

vigil's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad 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

4.5

not as good as the fifth season, but nowhere near bad. the entire book is a slowburn for the real plot coming in towards the end, but i didn’t mind what i was reading in the meantime.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Animal death, Cannibalism, Grief, Blood, Death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Murder, Violence, Colonisation, Cursing, Gore, Terminal illness, War, Body horror, Confinement, and Injury/Injury detail