Reviews with content warning for Violence - A Torch Against the Night

Reviews tagging 'Violence'

A Torch Against the Night by Sabaa Tahir

92 reviews

alexllange's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful sad tense fast-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

4.75

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lydiasturges's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional tense medium-paced

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

4.5

Okay, okay, I see what you did there. I did not see the twist with Elias coming. Let the slow burn, burn baby! Helene gives off MAJOR Chaol vibes from ToG to me.

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what_karla_reads's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional informative inspiring reflective 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? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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bzliz's review against another edition

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adventurous dark 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

4.5

This book builds greatly on the foundation laid in its predecessor by adding Helene’s point of view. Its addition allows readers to see vastly different slices of the world and 2-3 plot lines that bump together occasionally but lead to crucial information that I’m sure will be necessary in the next book.

There’s an interesting theme of isolation between our three leads- Laia with Keenan, Elias with the Soul Catcher, and Helene’s loss- and how they face this isolation and forge ahead shows how special they are. This is also a spot I find frustrating as a reader because I’m certain these characters will all have to trust each other eventually to defeat the final evil but they don’t right now so they lack the full picture that they’d have if they worked together.

Sabaa Tahir excels in creating complex characters that thrive in murky gray morality and I absolutely love it. I was concerned about Helene’s story being consumed by lovesick feelings but I’m thrilled she’s coming in to her own. Elias’s journey is fascinating- he does everything in his power even as he’s dying to fulfill his vow to Laia (obligatory: Ladies, don’t settle. If he wanted to, he would.) and it leads to a big twist I know will be crucial and probably necessary as the series builds. And I already didn’t care for Keenan (he has big Gale energy) but there’s no way I could have predicted his deeply layered secrets.

I appreciate the well balanced push-pull between the different forces at play. It can be frustrating when you read something where the villains never slip up and are always one step ahead. Even as the Commandant builds her secret plans, Helene manages to foil some, which is a huge accomplishment when you consider the Commandant’s unearthly ally. Laia and Elias also discover a weakness in the Nightbringer despite the power imbalance between them. These successes make the world grim but not entirely bleak.

Content warnings: this world is brutal and survives on groups enacting violence upon each other. I’d recommend you stay away from the series if you can’t stand true cruelty.

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bellanr34's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-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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reckless_reader's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional sad fast-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? N/A

4.0

This is one of the most emotionally heavy fantasy series I’ve ever read. After rereading books 1 and 2, I remember why I never finished book 3 or started 4. While the story is well written, there’s so much brutality among these pages. It can be hard to digest.

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tsar's review

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adventurous challenging dark emotional medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
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

“Your emotions make you human. Even the unpleasant ones have a purpose. Don't lock them away. If you ignore them, they just get louder and angrier.”

If there is one thing that stopped me from being very much impressed with the first book is how it made care less about the characters when they are the key figures of the book. As I've mentioned in my review of An Ember in the Ashes, Tahir stuck in figuring out their exact roles as protagonists instead of a proper characterization since their first introduction. In return, it seems that the second book transforms all of that uncertainty in a swift motion—it revitalizes the plot and characters that they equally take off in a high note.

Chapters and chapters of violent delights might be predictable due to the brutal nature of the plot itself, yet Tahir swiftly transforms them into a character-driven tale—she takes time to elaborate on what is happening to each protagonist and how it determines their precise characterization that suits the characters. As an illustration, the written backstory of Helene adds another complex layer of an already strong established foundation of her determination as a person. On the other hand, Laia and Elias receive a peculiar settlement of their position in this convoluted war: Laia becoming the conduit between earthly beings and the paranormal realm forces her to be a more assertive individual who has to be quick in her action, while Elias has to face the haunting truth of his blood descent as he takes part as the soul catcher who gradually loses the identity of himself as a human being.

Most of all, the more character-driven story does not suffer in a drowsy pace, but it is surprisingly fast and steady in illustrating the pieces of the game. As a result, it is engaging, keeping the thrill delivered to the readers despite that the brutality of the narrative is toned down a bit for the sake of focusing on the characters' heightened journey.

However, I presume that this is where the second book falls behind in capturing a neat set of villains. Marcus comes off as a needy child, throwing tantrums along his way when he does not receive what he wants as the current emperor. Sure, his tantrums are terrifying when we look from the perspective of the characters as well as the extreme misogynistic attitude exemplified in his actions, but taking it from a reader's perspective, I'd say that his aggression is truly more of an attempt to show that he is the best choice of a ruler that would exact revenge to his bitter enemies including Helene and Elias. On the other hand, the effort to paint the Commandant as the secondary antagonist who is discreetly pulling strings also falls short. Tahir seems to try illustrating her as a redeemable, harrowingly tragic yet cruel villain, but her presence is far too middling to deliver such a message.

Overall, A Torch Against the Night does not disappoint as a second installment that heightens the narrative's rich elements beyond the realistic impression it pulls from the oppression of the old days.

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