Reviews tagging 'Drug use'

Empire of the Vampire by Jay Kristoff

57 reviews

raedet's review

adventurous challenging mysterious slow-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? No

3.0

Baby! This book felt LONG. Not really the book for me, I can’t believe I didn’t DNF it, but I really didn’t feel like searching for a new book to try. 

Some of the things I liked were, the world felt believable. I liked the method of storytelling, how the MC was recounting his life story to someone else. The religion of the Silver Saints felt familiar and believable. I liked the smattering of French words throughout. I liked the words the writer used to describe battle.

I didn’t like how slow it felt sometimes. It starts at the end of the story, so I didn’t really like that. It made me not care as much about his early beginnings like before joining the silver saints and his early battles as a silver saint. 

I can’t believe after all of that storytelling, there is still more story to tell. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use and Drug abuse

ferouz's review against another edition

I stopped reading Empire of the Vampire when I crossed the 200 page mark. I wanted to try something different and it didn't work for me. I can see the appeal for this book, after all, it's been a very long time since we've had a vampire - fantasy story. Three things bugged me : the use of french language was a bit childish and didn't make sense ; the "blood" kink (if you know, you know) and the way the story is told. I strongly dislike jumping from time period to time period when it comes to the narration of the story.

A miss, unfortunately.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Blood, and Gore

taryn_g's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual assault, Alcoholism, Animal death, Body horror, Drug use, Grief, Homophobia, Murder, Sexual content, Alcohol, and Blood

Moderate: Religious bigotry, Addiction, Cursing, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Torture, and War

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Slavery, Pregnancy, Outing, Self harm, and Vomit

andromeda_1998's review

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcohol, Blood, Sexism, Sexual violence, Injury/Injury detail, Religious bigotry, Torture, Gore, Mental illness, Misogyny, Murder, Grief, Sexual content, Violence, Body horror, Child death, Drug use, Homophobia, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Vomit, Physical abuse, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, War, Animal death, Classism, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, and Genocide

alanis_thespookyreader's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Bullying, Child death, Death, Drug use, Grief, Animal death, Addiction, Alcoholism, Homophobia, Cursing, Misogyny, Murder, Religious bigotry, Sexual content, Violence, War, Blood, and Body horror

sandrae04's review

dark emotional mysterious 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Alcoholism, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Sexual content, Sexism, Violence, Cursing, Death, Physical abuse, Blood, Child death, Homophobia, Addiction, Grief, and Animal death

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Child abuse, Death of parent, Torture, War, Fire/Fire injury, Outing, and Drug use

clairew97's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad tense 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Blood, Child death, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Vomit, Gore, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Infidelity, Ableism, Animal death, Addiction, Body horror, Confinement, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Genocide, Grief, Murder, Religious bigotry, Sexual content, Abandonment, Bullying, Cannibalism, Misogyny, Pregnancy, Torture, Alcoholism, Sexism, Toxic friendship, Violence, and War

thewereraven's review against another edition

Extreme misogyny that permeated the entire book. It became impossible to overlook after

Dior was revealed to have been binding their chest

It was even transphobic in how it handled that. I no longer had any interest.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Religious bigotry, Misogyny, Murder, Blood, Cursing, War, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, and Sexism

Moderate: Racism, Sexual assault, Body horror, Bullying, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Transphobia, Child abuse, Classism, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Addiction, Alcoholism, and Sexual content

Minor: Rape, Adult/minor relationship, and Pedophilia

thedevouringbookshelf's review

adventurous dark funny tense slow-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Addiction, Violence, Sexual content, Death, and Child death

Moderate: Homophobia

Minor: Rape, Adult/minor relationship, and Sexual assault

anntharai's review against another edition

adventurous dark sad slow-paced

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

3.5

The bits I liked I REALLY liked. 
The issues I have with it REALLY irk me. 

The world building is immaculate if a bit on the nose, really vivid writing and visceral descriptions, a great mechanic. Love the use of tattoos and the lore building. Overall I liked the story itself. 

The issues, though? 
I found myself rolling my eyes at a lot of the vulgarity because it was genuinely ludicrous at times. Swearing doesn’t bother me in the slightest but the lengths to which these characters went just to get a “banged your relative” joke in was over the top. 

Everything has a simile. Everything. The doors locked like a secret. The floors cold like the night. The night air cold like knives. Wind like knives. Words like knives. Running frightened like a startled horse in a barn on fire and the devil whipping it all the way. The lips red like red things.

The repetitive phrases (fuck my face, like his lady’s lips the last time he kissed her, better a bastard than a fool) stopped feeling symbolic and started feeling like a crutch about half way through and using the same *twist* mechanic used twice (gender neutral names being the crux of two stories told so closely together) made it feel less polished than it could have been. 

Thanks to various reviews etc I was also expecting a “big thing” to shock me at the end but I kind of felt it was obvious…? 

Anti-climactic, in a word, but I do want to know what happens so it’s not like I hated it. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Violence, War, Torture, Suicide, Slavery, Sexual violence, Sexual content, Religious bigotry, Physical abuse, Outing, Murder, Misogyny, Injury/Injury detail, Homophobia, Hate crime, Gore, Excrement, Addiction, Drug use, Drug abuse, Alcoholism, Animal death, and Blood