Reviews tagging 'Emotional abuse'

One Night in Hartswood by Emma Denny

15 reviews

lovelyandmorbid's review against another edition

adventurous hopeful 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

3.5

I love these tropes: arranged marriage but gay, royal couple were one is good with politics and the other is good with sword against the world, fantastical/historical homophobia but we make it work and get a happy ending anyway. Delightful, but if you like this, a better, more complicated plot, gorier verison is anything written by Foz Meadows. While I enjoyed it, it seemed very basic and within the tropes (great tropes! but still)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Homophobia, and Abandonment

acozypumpkin's review against another edition

adventurous challenging medium-paced

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

3.0

Very sweet romance. The tense parts were fairly predictable.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty and Torture

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Blood, and Classism

sariereads's review against another edition

adventurous emotional lighthearted 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? No

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Sexual content, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: War

callidoralblack's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny lighthearted

• Loveable characters? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Medical content, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Body shaming, Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Death of parent, and Abandonment

jess_justmaybeperfect's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Sexual content, and Violence

Moderate: Child abuse

magic_multicolored_miracle's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

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

4.0

A delightful romantic romp, between two young men who are smart when it comes to other people, but incredibly dumb when it comes to one another. The will-they-won't-they keeps you on edge through every twist of their journey, and the book will keep you on edge until the very last page. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Homophobia, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Confinement, Emotional abuse, and Gaslighting

Minor: Animal cruelty, Deadnaming, Suicidal thoughts, and War

booksthatburn's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective medium-paced

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

5.0

ONE NIGHT IN HARTSWOOD is everything I hoped for, and more; a gay romance which mostly takes place during a several week journey by horse, as one man returns home and the other flees an oppressive household. I love romances that are built on communication, which is somewhat ironic, given that both Raff and Penn are keeping major parts of their identities secret, even if they talk about everything else. Normally, lying in relationships stresses me out, but the symmetry of the fact that both of them are keeping the same level of secret and don’t know if the other one is safe to trust with it helped it be less stressful for me. 

This is set up to have at least one sequel, though its particular story is self-contained. Rather than leave an obvious story hook open, it ends with the characters in new situations which grant the possibility of future events without demanding any particular follow up. 

I love Penn and Raff, I like them as individual characters and I enjoy how well they work together. They each have very different relationships with their families. Penn seems to be close with two of his several siblings, despite neither showing up for very long. His father is terrible, rather unambiguously playing the villain. Raff has close and mostly loving relationships with his sister and brother, and, despite their differences, they seem to understand each other fairly well. Not much is shown of Raff's relationship with his father, but what is there seems to be filled with respect and care.

Other things I love, in no particular order: how much of the time is spent just traveling and sleeping in the woods and dealing with inns; the wound care towards the end of the book; the way Penn obviously grows as a person; the more subtle ways that Raff starts to trust in other peoples' competence.

This was great, I want more, and I'm eager for the sequel.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Medical content, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Confinement, Deadnaming, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Sexism, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Grief, Medical trauma, Murder, Gaslighting, Alcohol, War, and Classism

Minor: Child abuse, Vomit, Death of parent, and Pregnancy

ronan_lesh's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful lighthearted 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Sexual content, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Homophobia, Physical abuse, Violence, and Blood

cateemma's review against another edition

adventurous emotional slow-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content

Moderate: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Confinement, Homophobia, Panic attacks/disorders, Vomit, Death of parent, and War

craftyhilary's review against another edition

emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

3.0

I want to preface this by saying I think that Emma Denny has a lot of potential as a writer. That said, this book just didn't work for me. It felt almost like a plot outline than a fully-realized story. There was a lot of moving from place to place, eating, sleeping, and assorted random encounters, but not a lot of character development. Since both Penn and Raff were lying about who they were for most of the book, it was hard for me to believe they were forming a serious attachment, and the agonizing about the deception became tedious. And once both their secrets were out, I was very disappointed in how Raff handled his

feelings of betrayal. He had been just as dishonest with Penn, which he conveniently forgot about till reminded by Ash. Raff also knew Penn had been seriously abused, yet struggled to understand that Penn had much better practical and emotional reasons to lie than Raff did

. Some of the plot elements felt overdramatized in a way that would make more sense in a movie, such as

Raff chasing Penn for days and riding up to the keep just as Penn was being dragged inside

. There were opportunities for more complex political issues to be explored--I was hoping

Penn's father was holding Raff's father hostage, and they'd have to come retrieve him

--but those were dismissed in favor of less complicated or believable ones, like

Penn suddenly finding he is both brave enough to stand up to his father and also a brilliant political strategist

I am fairly certain that the throwaway references to

Oliver were intended to set up a book for Ash, but including almost nothing about him, when his existence clearly impacted Raff and Ash in a way that's relevant to Raff's feelings about Penn,

was a wasted opportunity. I expect Denny may not have wanted to give away too much of what will presumably be Ash's book. The

correspondence between Jo and Lily

was a bit more deftly handled. Overall, I would definitely consider reading another book by this author, but this one was only ok for me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse

Moderate: Physical abuse and Medical trauma