Reviews tagging 'Toxic relationship'

The Unbroken by C.L. Clark

15 reviews

melliedm's review

dark tense slow-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

Overall a fantastic read, and I’m looking forward to reading the sequel. There were times that the pacing felt strange, and some of the action sequences were confusing to read. I am also not entirely sold on the romance subplot, but I’m open to seeing how it shapes up by the series’ end.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Colonisation, Confinement, Violence, Xenophobia, Toxic relationship, Racism, Death, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Pandemic/Epidemic, Animal death, Child abuse, Excrement, Genocide, Gore, and Gun violence

angiepoggi's review

adventurous dark reflective 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 didn't hate or love this book. I liked the world building being an analogy to France colonizing North Africa. Thus, it touches on themes such as racism, xenophobia and religious prejudice, but in a fantasy world with magic and many queers.

However, I didn't like the pace. It was slow (which I don't have a problem with) but boring. It took a long time for things to happen and there's a lot of time spent just talking, for example, until halfway through the book, about 245 pages, we were still building the narrative. Not to mention that, when some type of action could've happen, being running around or the characters discovering a secret on their own, a character immediately tells them everything and resolves the possible conflict quickly.  Also, after halfway through the book, the pacing becomes very inconsistent, with the ending, the very end, very rushed, but that part didn't bother me as much.

Now, I didn't like one of the main characters, Touraine.  She makes some decisions that made me so ANGRY AAA and they didn't make any sense, I mean, in theory they could've made for her, but the author didn't build much of a foundation for it.  For example, in relation to the development of this character, I know the points the author wanted to reach in Touraine's journey, but there were none to few scenes to justify the key changes in her head.

Even with all these reservations, I'm still curious to read the second one.  I heard that it's a different vibe and that the pacing is better balanced.

Anyway, I recommend this book if you want to read a fantasy that talks about colonialism with a lot of queers. There are a lot of people who love it, including a friend who wanted me to read it, so I think it's worth giving it a chance.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Physical abuse, Violence, War, Gun violence, Islamophobia, Toxic relationship, Police brutality, Hate crime, Colonisation, Cannibalism, Alcohol, Murder, Body horror, Blood, Kidnapping, Gore, Emotional abuse, Genocide, and Racial slurs

Moderate: Sexual assault, Vomit, Mental illness, Torture, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Grief

Minor: Animal death and Pregnancy

aseel_reads's review

adventurous dark 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

3.75

This one is a hard one to rate because I found it super engrossing and something I wanted to constantly read but at the same time, I found that some of the betrayals just didn't make any sense and were quite unbelievable, so I couldn't rate this as a four. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual harassment, Body shaming, Child death, Child abuse, Colonisation, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Religious bigotry, Toxic friendship, Genocide, Gun violence, War, Blood, Kidnapping, Medical content, Rape, Torture, Violence, Vomit, Bullying, Fire/Fire injury, Murder, Slavery, and Toxic relationship

vivavia's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful sad 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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Death, Medical trauma, Murder, Vomit, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Blood, Terminal illness, Injury/Injury detail, Colonisation, Bullying, Kidnapping, Toxic friendship, Violence, Classism, Emotional abuse, Grief, Gore, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Torture, Toxic relationship, Confinement, and Slavery

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

ajthequeen's review

Dnfing at 170. I usually give a book 100 pages to wow me, but i so desperately wanted to enjoy this book i gave it to 200. I didn’t even make it that far. This author is talented, but “they use too many word when few word do trick”. The author does a lot of telling instead of showing. Touraine and luca’s  backgrounds are told to us immediately with little to no build. I think this author wanted a priory of the orange tree type romance to happen, but instead got an imbalance of power and really toxic female leads. I had to stop at 170 because i genuinely dont care about what happens next. So so much exposition with little pay off. I think if you took out the entire first 100 pages and used the second half of the book to have luca and touraine bond over their pasts and grow to trust each other, the book would be 200x better.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic friendship, Colonisation, Classism, Slavery, Sexual harassment, Religious bigotry, Genocide, War, Violence, Toxic relationship, and Cursing

Moderate: Alcohol and Ableism

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

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

whailey's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Gore, and Violence

Moderate: Gore, Trafficking, Torture, Grief, Police brutality, and Slavery

musebeliever's review

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation and Toxic relationship