Reviews tagging 'Blood'

Angels Before Man by rafael nicolás

53 reviews

nerdyspinster's review

dark emotional 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Physical abuse, Self harm, Torture, Violence, Blood, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Physical abuse

Minor: Rape, Sexual assault, and Sexual content

theminnesotawitch's review

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

A book that blew me away. The prose is beautiful, and the style changes as the protagonist becomes more obsessed with himself. A queer retelling of the fall of angels.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Self harm, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, Toxic friendship, War, and Injury/Injury detail

okays1331's review

dark emotional tense medium-paced

3.75

The author warns of all the graphic triggers in here and it is no joke. The wirld building and characterizations anre really well done and the story is horrific. 

It’s marked as a queer retelling of the fall of Lucifer. I don’t think that is central to the story. The characters are man-shaped but so is everyone. There is no real romance, the tender feelings of the two central characters tip over into obsession immediately. Sexual content is almost all violent and violating. 

Note: Sometimes difficult to read because of the way the author chose to format dialogue. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gore, Incest, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Grief, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail

mpbookreviews's review

dark emotional tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• 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, Body horror, Gore, Self harm, Sexual content, Torture, Violence, Blood, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Sexual assault

a_crow_in_the_sky's review

challenging slow-paced

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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Body horror, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Blood, Suicide attempt, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol

osladek's review

dark emotional tense slow-paced

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

3.0

This was an interesting read. Although much of it was beautifully written, there is no plot for the entire beginning of the book and it took me a month to finish a 360 page book that would normally take me a week. I think the idea and the prose was there for a fantastic Satan retelling, however I was incredibly confused by the choice to make Lucifer the most timid and sweet angel and then end

with him committing horrific violent acts on fellow angels. Although it fit the character progression, it was extremely hard to believe where the character starts to where he ends I believe a better ending would be the character realizing that there are things outside of God’s “rules” that aren’t immoral instead of becoming incredibly violent and disgusting. Or simply starting the character a little less sweet.

Also the grammar of this book needed an editor badly. I kept having to reread sentences because they were missing a conjunction or ending word. This might’ve been a stylistic choice but it made it difficult to read and make sense of. Also the romance was an interesting plot point. I thought it would be more fleshed out but it felt like the entire book built to it and fell off at the end. I did however find a lot of quotes I enjoyed:

“is father good because he is good or is father good because he says he is good?”

“because the angels had only known obedience to be goodness, they did as they were told”

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Gore, Self harm, Torture, Violence, Blood, and Injury/Injury detail

nevermoregothic's review

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Physical abuse, Torture, Violence, Blood, Murder, Gaslighting, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Alcohol, and War

Minor: Incest, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Cannibalism, and Fire/Fire injury

peacholino's review

adventurous dark emotional inspiring lighthearted sad medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Self harm, Violence, Blood, and Abandonment

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Cursing, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, and Fire/Fire injury

androgynous_child's review against another edition

dark reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Sexual assault, Blood, and War

Moderate: Rape and Gaslighting

Minor: Self harm

thecatconstellation's review

dark sad slow-paced

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

3.75

There are some beautiful parts of this book. There are some tender moments I found very moving. There is also a deeply unsatisfying ending that is delivered at twice the speed of the rest of the book. I think a follow up book is coming, which I will definitely read. I just had some issues with pacing and clarity behind some of the choices that were made by the characters. Hopefully that gets fleshed out. 

I will say - if you have religious trauma, please do a LOT of research before deciding to read this book. It was pretty triggering for me. 

Also - I would not label this as a romance and only a portion is cozy - the rest is quite intense and at times difficult to read (trauma, gore). 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, and Blood

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Gore, Self harm, Sexual content, Torture, Toxic relationship, Grief, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail