Reviews tagging 'Gun violence'

The Unbroken by C.L. Clark

50 reviews

bisexualwentworth's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective 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

This book is utterly brilliant. It's one of the best things I've read so far this year. It reignited my love for high fantasy. And it's the author's DEBUT?! Phenomenal.

The Unbroken is a military fantasy set in a fantasy version of North Africa (the former Shālan Empire) that has been colonized by fantasy France (Balladaire). It follows two point-of-view characters: Touraine, a Qazāli-born conscript of the imperial army, and Luca, the crown princess of Balladaire, and their complicated relationship with each other, both as individuals and as stand-ins and representatives for their nations and cultures.

I haven't read another fantasy novel that explores internalized oppression, empire, and white saviorism in quite the gorgeous and intertwined way that C. L. Clark does in The Unbroken.

When we first meet Luca, she is a princess and a scholar, passionate about doing right by her people—so that she can take the throne that is rightfully hers from her uncle the Duke Regent. As a scholar, she has theoretical knowledge of the horrors of empire. She expresses interest in and respect for Shālan culture in a way that no other Balladairan-born character does. These aspects of Luca endear her to the reader—and draw Touraine to her as the two women grow closer. And then she loses herself to the same colonizing impulses that she thought herself better than earlier in the novel. 

When we first meet Touraine, all she cares about is the wellbeing of her fellow conscripts. They are her family, and she will do whatever necessary—even on behalf of the empire that took everything from them—to protect that family and do what she thinks is best for them. Unlike Luca, Touraine is fully grounded in the realities of her situation—and then her world shifts and expands. She makes mistakes. She fucks things up. And she is complex and heartbreaking and BRILLIANT. Touraine's growth over the course of this book stunned me. It made me feel so many things so deeply. Her entire mindset changes, gradually and painfully, over the course of the novel, without changing what makes up her essential self. 

The worldbuilding is delicious. C. L. Clark obviously draws all of the aesthetics and language of both Qazāl and Balladaire from the real world, but she also incorporates trade, religion, political theory, and even disease in ways that make the world feel unique and fresh and lived in. 

I don't want to talk about the plot too much because I think that readers should discover its twists on their own, but I cannot wait to discuss their book at greater length with more spoilers at some point. 

My one real critique of this book is that I didn't feel like I understood the magic well enough for the heavy lifting it does in the climax and resolution of the book to be totally satisfying.

Additionally, if you are looking for romance, this is the wrong book for you. To be clear, it is VERY sapphic. And if you enjoy hot women with swords, you are absolutely going to eat this shit up. But I would not call the extremely fraught entanglement between the two main characters romantic. It is far more complicated than that, and I feel like boiling down Touraine and Luca's dynamic to the sexual or romantic desire of it would be an insult both to Touraine's character and to the overall goals of the novel. There is not a romance between the leads in this book, nor should there be.

There IS a sapphic side couple in this book that will likely break your heart, though.

Oh, and HOLY MOMMY ISSUES OH MY GOD.

Favorite quotes:

• "Maybe she had been a dog all this time, but she was ready to fight back."
• "It was easy to be a villain when she felt like on inside."
• "A smattering of applause. Less than she'd hoped for, more than she had any right to expect."

It likely goes without saying that this book handles its diversity brilliantly. The world is queernormative and seemingly lacking in any sort of gender roles, but it has all of the other violences and bigotries and evils of our own world. Luca is physically disabled, and the book handles her disability beautifully. 

C. L. Clark is the sort of writer I want to be. I can't wait to read The Faithless.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Death, Violence, Colonisation, War, Slavery, Murder, Racism, Blood, Gore, and Torture

Moderate: Xenophobia, Religious bigotry, Racial slurs, Child abuse, Sexual harassment, Kidnapping, Sexual assault, Rape, Grief, and Terminal illness

This is a very heavy book overall. One of the very first scenes is a hanging. Be prepared for that sort of thing throughout, and if that sounds like too much, it is likely not the book for you.

solenekeleroux's review

adventurous emotional 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: War, Colonisation, Confinement, Blood, Murder, Slavery, Kidnapping, Racism, Violence, Death, and Gun violence

Moderate: Sexual harassment, Sexual assault, Ableism, and Torture

ashatroyal's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional lighthearted sad tense slow-paced

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

2.75

The story was interesting enough but lolled as the story progressed. Took me a very long to finish. It turned up in the second half though. Definitely some plot twists I didn’t expect. The book is described as fantasy but is more a war story with touch of magic. I also felt like magic was used a crutch to resolve certain conflicts. We really only saw it to save someone’s life. Although this wasn’t a romance, I didn’t feel the chemistry between Touraine and Luca. 

I like that essentially there are no gender roles. This books underlying theme is violent women in positions of power. 

I could tell from the beginning that Touraine was a bit naive of what’s really going on in this war. She’s a bit brainwashed. My biggest issue is that Touraine isn’t loyal. She goes where she’ll be accepted at the time. Between Touraine and Luca, it was bad decision after bad decision. 

Who tipped the soldiers off where Touraine was? If the other soldiers found her bound, how did she kill the Beledaire soldier? Why wasn’t that brought up? What took Luca so long to ask questions at the hearing?

Great world building and details. It was a lot of characters to keep up with. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Colonisation, Torture, Gun violence, Murder, Violence, Racial slurs, Racism, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Sexual harassment

alexalily's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious 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: Classism, Medical content, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexual assault, Grief, Gun violence, Murder, Colonisation, Confinement, Death, Kidnapping, Medical trauma, Violence, Genocide, Injury/Injury detail, Terminal illness, Gore, Police brutality, Slavery, and War

Moderate: Blood, Bullying, Chronic illness, Physical abuse, Torture, and Alcohol

Minor: Ableism, Animal death, Excrement, Self harm, Vomit, Cursing, and Child abuse

kyladenae94's review

adventurous tense medium-paced

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

4.5

the beginning felt a bit…scrambled, but i’m glad i trusted the tikky-tokkers & stuck it out. i hope the threads set up in this book—

the “reveal” of what happened with cheminade feels a bit stilted to me, and we still don’t know how touraine got knocked out & also What About Cheminade’s Husband, he seemed nice

—will be tied up in a future book!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Physical abuse, Violence, Police brutality, Trafficking, Kidnapping, Torture, Gun violence, and Colonisation

Moderate: Sexual assault, War, Rape, Sexual violence, and Suicidal thoughts

pwindmill's review

challenging dark emotional tense slow-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? Yes

3.5

I was recommended this book by several of my favourite authors, and it aligned with the types of fantasy I usually read, so I thought that I’d give it a go.

I enjoyed that the narrative challenged your assumptions about characters, often not revealing details about them until it became relevant. The world building felt very strong, perhaps because it was so heavily based on French colonisation in North Africa. Each character was interesting and unique.

Sometimes though, characters made terrible decisions that weren’t well justified, and felt like they did it just to push the story in the way the author wanted it to go, without much reasoning behind it, and for characters that are presented as clever, the lack of thought felt a bit out of character to me. Maybe it’s just that I didn’t pay close enough attention to between the lines though! I also felt that the middle third felt a little slow compared to the first and last thirds? 

This sounds more negative than I’d intended, I did enjoy The Unbroken, and will definitely be reading the sequel! Just I maybe won’t instantly pick it up for a re-read as often as I thought I would based on the recommendations that I heard.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Sexual harassment, Colonisation, Death, Gun violence, Genocide, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, and Racism

Sexual violence threat (repeatedly mentioned)

leaflit's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Blood, Racism, Death, Gun violence, Violence, Colonisation, Confinement, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Grief, Lesbophobia, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Slavery, Torture, Toxic relationship, Ableism, Alcohol, Child abuse, Genocide, Medical content, Outing, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Sexual content, Sexual violence, and Terminal illness

serena_hien's review against another edition

challenging 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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Racism, Toxic relationship, Colonisation, and Gun violence

Moderate: Kidnapping and Sexual assault

theirgracegrace's review

emotional inspiring reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

The Unbroken asks the question: what about those parts of the fantasy world that are the "colonies"? Set in a queer-positive fictional setting that mirrors French-controlled Saharan Africa, Clark's characters live in the awkward space of either benefitting from or being the product of the colonial state. Clark cleverly deconstructs how the colonial state of Balladaire's oppression has separated the people of Qāzal from their culture and their heritage and made many into soldiers to further that oppression. A book that I cannot stop thinking about and eagerly awaiting the sequel of!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Cursing, Death, Confinement, Gore, Murder, Physical abuse, Police brutality, Alcohol, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Classism, Colonisation, Excrement, Alcoholism, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexual violence, Trafficking, Violence, War, Emotional abuse, Grief, Gun violence, Hate crime, Xenophobia, Sexual harassment, and Sexual content

Moderate: Death of parent, Gaslighting, Stalking, Torture, and Sexual assault

Minor: Cultural appropriation and Pregnancy

szuum's review against another edition

adventurous dark medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Death, Gun violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Racism, Classism, and Violence

Moderate: Sexual assault