Reviews tagging 'Gore'

The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang

1510 reviews

val_theburrowofstories's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional sad 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

4.0

I knew I would take my time to read this book but the fact that I was in a reading slump made it worse. Thankfully I was out of it when I finished this so I was able to enjoy it.

This book was SOOO good, it was 4 ⭐ for me.

Despite the story, I find the narrator’s voice soothing and I love how she makes a different voice for each character.

I did not expect the story to go so quickly. I’m used to books where stories usually happen in such a short amount of time but this was maybe 3-4 years? I think if the author would’ve decided to make 1 book for each year of her in the school I would’ve read them too and they would’ve been great.

The first half is Rin basically preparing for school and then getting in and being a very good student to keep her place there. I liked it so much because I was proud of her and it felt like learning history with all the information about the other Poppy Wars.

Maybe she didn’t know completely what she was doing, but I admire her for literally eliminating menstruation and all that shit to be unstoppable. I’ll be needing the formula lol

Once the war started I was so in shock that I could not even cry from the horrors (check trigger warnings!), I wonder what the author has prepared for the next books.

I want to know more about the 13th division, I want to get to know them all because I think she might be spending so much more time with them and well I need to connect to someone to cry when they die lol besides their powers seems interesting.

The only two I kinda care about if something happens to them are Kitay (bc that’s maybe her only true friend) and Ramsa (he’s literally just a kid!)

I’m so ready to see how Rin will burn the enemy to the ground 🔥

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Death, War, Injury/Injury detail, Rape, Murder, Gore, and Blood

Moderate: Animal death and Infertility

Please be sure to check ALL the trigger warnings by all readers because a lot of things happen and I imagine the next books will be even darker.

- Menstruation / Infertility: She got her first period in the school, and what’s shocking is how she drank something to stop it forever, basically killing that organ.

- Death / Murder / Genocide: because of the war

- War: it’s literally on the title lol, it mostly happens in the second half of the book

- Injury / blood / gore: when they find all those people in the end...

- Animal death: She killed a dog to defend herself

- Rape: Someone she knows was raped and she describes how so many other women too. It's pure horror.

- Addiction / Drug use: They take a drug to be able to connect with the Gods?

kendall32's review against another edition

challenging dark 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gore, Addiction, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Torture, Violence, Murder, and Rape

hevlav's review against another edition

challenging dark 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Drug use, Torture, Rape, Blood, War, Gore, and Drug abuse

Moderate: Classism, Body horror, Child abuse, and Domestic abuse

laura_jay_'s review against another edition

dark emotional 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Gore, Blood, Death, and Drug abuse

Moderate: Addiction, Misogyny, Racism, Rape, Abandonment, and Classism

aribookishly's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Child death, War, Ableism, Misogyny, Vomit, Addiction, Body horror, Colonisation, Blood, Emotional abuse, Gore, Grief, Toxic friendship, Drug abuse, Torture, Drug use, Genocide, Murder, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Slavery, Toxic relationship, and Violence

Moderate: Bullying

makaylasb's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad 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? Yes

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, War, Rape, Blood, Sexual assault, Bullying, Classism, Drug use, Fire/Fire injury, Addiction, Colonisation, Death, Drug abuse, Genocide, Gore, Grief, Murder, Physical abuse, Self harm, Racism, and Sexual violence

elizabeth_helmer's review against another edition

challenging dark tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Rape, Torture, Gore, War, Xenophobia, Fire/Fire injury, Racism, Drug use, Drug abuse, Death, and Addiction

imds's review against another edition

• 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Colonisation, Confinement, Blood, Body horror, Addiction, Genocide, Gore, Misogyny, Child abuse, Abandonment, Death, Bullying, Drug abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Hate crime, Infertility, Kidnapping, Medical trauma, Suicide, Murder, Police brutality, Pregnancy, Rape, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Violence, War, and Xenophobia

mangooba's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark 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

LOOK UP A TRIGGER WARNING LIST PRIOR TO READING. if you think youre fine and dont need one, do it anyways. this book goes heavily into graphic descriptions of genocide, SA, war, death, child death, and abuse. take care of yourself.

that being said, i found that this book was very well written and the character development was both realistic and well done. the mc has drastically changed, while shes obviously the same person in several ways, she is also not the same person in many other ways. that might not make sense without reading the book. if you dont have the reading comprehension to understand that decisions made are supposed to be poor decisions, and that characters will not be all good or all bad and its an incredibly complex situation just dont read this.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Genocide, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Slavery, Blood, Murder, Physical abuse, Child abuse, Child death, Sexual assault, Drug abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Death, Drug use, Kidnapping, Racism, Rape, and War

Minor: Death of parent

the racism tag is fantasy racism inspired by real world values and views held by racist individuals, and racist regimes/systems.

jays_secret_garden's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad 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

“How could she compare the lives lost? One genocide against another—how did they balance on the scale of justice? And who was she, to imagine that she could make that comparison? ‘What have I done?’”
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•6/5⭐️ 

Nothing could have prepared me for the third part of this book. I foolishly thought that the second part was absolutely crazy, but the third? Devastating. This book completely changed my perspective on life. It was so beautifully written that I feel like people don’t write books like this anymore. The FMC, Rin, is one of the best characters I have read in my entire life. From the first line she had in the book, I knew. Her absolute rage and hate actually means the world to me because how dare they make women and children hurt this much?

The topic of war, genocide, r*pe, etc., is HEAVY. I didn’t really read the trigger warnings because I like to go into books blind, but please read them :). Nothing could have prepared my heart for the heartbreak it would experience while reading the Golyn Noriis part, and even more so after reading the author’s note and finding out everything was inspired by real-life experiences of Chinese people. It broke my heart to read Venka’s story—I was sobbing!!!

I cannot wait to continue with the series because every two pages, something insane and unpredictable happens, and I AM SO EXCITED FOR THE NEXT BOOK!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, War, Police brutality, Pedophilia, Self harm, Physical abuse, Child death, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Drug use, Medical trauma, Sexual harassment, Rape, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Suicidal thoughts, Kidnapping, Gaslighting, Emotional abuse, Gore, Murder, Violence, Suicide attempt, Suicide, Drug abuse, Trafficking, Xenophobia, Cultural appropriation, Death, Death of parent, Genocide, Gun violence, Torture, Slavery, Sexual violence, Sexual content, Sexual assault, and Blood