Reviews with content warning for Sexual content - Three Dark Crowns

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Three Dark Crowns by Kendare Blake

17 reviews

pagesbycaroline's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Second read of this book. It's been long enough since I read it the first time that most everything was a surprise, which was delightful. There are many twists that I did not remember, so it was almost like reading it for the first time. I very much enjoy the dark nature of this story and cannot wait to continue reading the series. I remember in the beginning, Katharine was my favorite, but now I am leaning more towards Arsinoe.

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paperbackbookies's review against another edition

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dark tense medium-paced

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

4.25

This was a quick read! I enjoyed it more then I originally thought I would, but I did find some things very predictable.

The queens are introduced by their flaws. Right off the bat, every queen has something weighing them down.

Spoiler

Arisone being a poisoner all along, Maribella thinking with her heart, and Katherine being looked at as someone weak. I love them but I also love to hate them. I cant wait to see how they handle their rage in book 2 !!!

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the_teen_bookworm's review against another edition

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dark medium-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? It's complicated

4.0

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em_davies7019's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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claudiapr's review against another edition

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dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? N/A
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

The beginning was really boring and the ending was very predictable. I knew what the ending was going to be just by reading the first 50pages

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rinku's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional 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? It's complicated

4.0

Three Dark Crowns had so many things I love to see in YA fantasy: a predominantly female cast, main characters that have different world views, and a story with a political dimension. If it wasn’t for the flat romances, this would’ve been the perfect book for me.

I loved the general premise of this novel so much: the three sisters Katharine, Arsinoe and Mirabella have grown up in different families and cultures on the island Fernbirn and now have to kill each other to determine who the new queen of the island will be. Those three families include the poisoners, the elementals and the naturalists, each with their own abilities.

The whole story and the politics of the world are so intriguing. Yes, the story is slow, but I didn’t mind it. By this, we could get to know the characters and the different political groups better. I just love to see how different the lives of the three sisters are and how they and their family dealt with the situation. Furthermore, thanks to the third person view, we get more insight in what is happening around the sisters and other characters which I enjoyed so much. The settings of the story were great as well.

Just during this first book, the sisters develop so much in different ways, and I can’t wait where the series will take their characters:

Spoiler

Mirabella trying to escape (and failing) was so dramatic. It was even more dramatic when Arsinoe tried the same and failed as well (which was a bit tiring tbh) and Mirabella saved her from being executed – this was Mira’s defining moment in this book. At the end, Katharine gets thrown in a gorge, but she survives it. Her returning was such a creepy and well-written moment

I also really liked all the characters. From the sisters, I was rooting the most for Arsinoe, then Mirabella and Katharine but I would like to see them all winning. It was so interesting to see how different the sisters see specific people and how some people seemingly randomly meet each other. The thing I liked the least about this book though was the romance. Literally every girl had an insta love which was so annoying. Additionally, the guys are also all so jealous and one of them is a cheater; the only one I liked was maybe Billy.

Nevertheless, Three Dark Crowns was a great novel and I’m excited to see how the series will continue.

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words_and_dreams's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

Dark fantasy YA

Premise in a nut shell is that each generation a set of triplets are born and one must kill her sisters to rule and become the Queen. Each is supposed to develop a different power and live in that area. There are elementalists, poisoners, naturalists, warriors etc.

There were definitely elements that I liked including the magic systems and the world building. It had a darker atmospheric feel to it, I mean sisters are trying to kill each other. Lol.

I was annoyed that the girls didn't club together to otherthrow the archaic systems holding them back. Although this is only the first book of a series so maybe that does happen down the line.

Also Josh was the literal worst. Delirious, worst excuse ever. Eurgh.

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gardevoird's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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bookbrig's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.25

Really, really good. There's fascinating magic, great characters, and a wonderful ending that I hope means this is the start of a series. I loved all of the sisters, and it was so interesting to have the story told from so many characters' perspectives, leaving the reader in the dark about some things while still feeling purposeful and not like it was just a technique for a bunch of McGuffins. If you like weird family dynamics, great world building, and heart-wrenchy uneven romantic entanglements, this would be a perfect choice.

Also, so many reviews I see are like: "too many characters! Who lived where? What's going on?" For what it's worth, I think those people are wrong, and if you've ever read any fantasy you'll be in familiar territory.

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emily_mh's review against another edition

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slow-paced

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

3.0

A sentence that sums up how I feel about this book is: I'm glad I didn't buy it, but I am interested in what happens next. The best part about the book was its premise of three queens vying for the throne, and there was some good world-building surrounding this. Everything else was a bit meh. I didn't like the omniscient narration style, or that it was done in present tense. I think it was the reason behind the poor characterisation of literally every character (but ESPECIALLY Katharine's. Her POVs were... so bland). There was just no internal world for any of them. I was expecting big reactions from the sisters meeting for the first time in ten years, but it was literally "oh there's my sister on her platform" or "oh my sister's talking to me in this forest" which was incredibly disappointing. Flat characters also meant that all the romances fell flat. It was very insta-love. And on top of the characters being meh, the plot had no direction beyond the fact that Beltane was gonna happen in a couple of months. Literally nothing of consequence happened between the beginning and that point. And you'd expect with the whole book leading up to the Quickening, that event would have some impact. But it was over in 10 pages tops. On the whole I was just expecting a lot more from this book. What partially saved it was the unique world-building and the fact that I wasn't dreading picking it back up when I put it down - it was actually somewhat enjoyable and definitely easy to read. That's enough to make me pick up the sequel!

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