Reviews with content warning for Murder - The Cloisters

Reviews tagging 'Murder'

The Cloisters by Katy Hays

101 reviews

poetology's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional informative mysterious reflective medium-paced

3.75

An atmospheric and engaging book with a few weaknesses in dialogue and plot. I fell for the dark academia vibe and read it in two days.

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pwiant17's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

3.75

A murder mystery thriller centered around an ancient set of tarot cards. Honestly, I thought this book was going to be more fantastical than it was, and so I was disappointed by the execution of the idea. Decent, but Ann Stilwell was reduced from a serious academic to a calculated murderer. Was a little weird to me

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teganbeesebooks's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.0

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kiwij96's review against another edition

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challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.5

I absolutely adored the concept for this book and the cover art so I had to give it a go. I went into this thinking it would be a dark academia type book with the focus on tarot and fate and choices. However, none of this really happened on-page. All the reasons I picked the book up and what made me want to read it happened off-page and so that was a major disappointment.

However, I stuck with it purely to see where the story would go, and I can honestly say I don't know where it went. All the characters were plain and unlikeable. Ann was way too trusting, and was constantly comparing herself to Rachel and genuinely came across as obsessive sometimes it was a bit unnerving. And then the romance sub-plot was completely unnecessary. The book would have been the exact same without it. The FMC was also just too nice and trusting, she went along with everything. I was getting frustrated at how much everyone just avoided her questions and hid everything from her, and she just,,,let them?

For all its faults, the book was okay. The discoveries and the twist that happened towards the end were good. But I'm not sure if it has any rereadability. But it was an easy read, it just lacked the academia that I wanted.

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knightannae's review against another edition

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dark slow-paced

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

1.5

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gabie_reads's review against another edition

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dark medium-paced

Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No

1.5

Sadly, this was disappointing...
The whole experience felt kind of flat, superficial. I only finished the book because it was the choice for my book club, otherwise I would have easily put it down and abandoned it (which is a shame because I enjoy topics like power dynamics, ancient history, art, and themes like legend, astrology, tarot).

The characters were annoying, I couldn't buy the interactions between them. At various points I felt like I was being forced to believe that more had happened than actually did. And the ending was predictable and yet a bit hard to swallow.

At least the atmospheric writing was good, I would like to visit The Met Cloisters at some point.

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