Reviews with content warning for Blood - A Game of Gods

Reviews tagging 'Blood'

A Game of Gods by Scarlett St. Clair

15 reviews

whatkatyread87's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional informative mysterious relaxing 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? It's complicated

4.0

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tiffanne11's review against another edition

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dark tense fast-paced

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

4.5

The penultimate book in the Hades X Persephone series and the war is starting to unfold. This book not only has Hades perspective, but also Dionysius and Thesus. While jarring at first, it made the story that much richer.
In both this book and the fifth one (Persephone's perspective of these events), the spice felt overdone. It was as often as five pages apart. And while both of the main characters know that sex doesn't solve problems caused by miscommunication, they constantly use it as a band-aid.
Overall, this installment was amazing and I am excited to see how the series ends.

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nonotyoshi's review against another edition

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dark 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

5.0

*screams*

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ariel_99's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional 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

4.0

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yarisbooksandbevs's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny 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? No

3.5

Definitely enjoyed this one better than the last. The ending was so surprising but overall a good read I enjoyed it. Still absolutely love Hecate and Hermes

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thethirtiethofjanuary's review against another edition

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dark 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

5.0

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savage_book_review's review

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challenging dark emotional mysterious 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

4.0

This book has confirmed my feelings that I prefer the story told from Hades' point of view. The story feels like it has so much more depth and scope than in Persephone's novels; his solo trips and the bits that Persephone doesn't see are far more engaging and add to the levels of intrigue, threat and mystery perfectly. From a practical perspective, without these books I think the upcoming finale would be missing a lot of background information that I suspect will become important.

Getting to understand and appreciate Hades' internal struggles is also a massive bonus of these books. He's a great characters through Persephone's eyes, but seeing his world-weariness, the depth of his love for Persephone and his darker impulses rounds him out so well. In some ways, it also gives the spice a bit more of a reason for being; he readily admits he's insatiable!

Similarly, the pacing of Persephone's trauma and recovery seems to be reflected better through Hades' eyes. His determination to take things at her pace, his fear of inflicting further hurt and his genuine horror when things go awry feel more true-to-life and more deeply considered here. There are still moments that don't sit quite right with me, but it's certainly better.

I also loved the insight into the Dionysius and Ariadne relationship and the twists introduced to that part of the mythology. Likewise, I'm really enjoying the twist of making Greek heroes into anti-heros or outright villains, and there is a big part of me that hopes the author rips up the rule book in the finale and Hades and Persephone end up as King and Queen of Olympus as well as the Underworld...

My biggest criticism is that it appears the author got slightly lazy towards the end of the book. The closer to the end you get, the more errors there are in the text - definitely needs another going over by an editor. And then to find that the last chapter is just cut, copied and pasted from Malice is quite disappointing - I was hoping for a little extra to bridge the gap between this and the finale.

So glad I don't have to wait very long for the next book in the series to come out!

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