Reviews

Beyond the Black Door by A.M. Strickland

cheryl_88's review against another edition

3.0

3.5

marieintheraw's review against another edition

4.0

Another book I am kicking myself for not reading it sooner. It's a pretty unique dark fantasy with some great representation.

I received an ecopy of this through Netgalley; however, all opinions are my own.

castoffcreature's review against another edition

medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes

3.25

serpina's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious 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

4.75

chaosandbooks's review against another edition

3.0

The plot of this book dragged on for much too long and the main character was not the most interesting of people. Her abilities outshone anything in her personality and even though I recently finished the book, I'm having a hard time even remembering anything about her aside from the abilities.

The novel highlights asexuality as in what it means, how it can be different for everyone, and normalizes it. I thought that was refreshing and handled well. It is definitely the biggest and best reason to read the book. If I'm being honest with myself, the book was actually closer to two stars otherwise. But given that this is an established theme from the start that is handled with grace and woven into the plot in a way that matters, is enough to bump it for me.

lunaballz's review against another edition

4.0

Personal score is actually 2 star, but because of great representation that I want to see more of I've given it an official 4 star.

vidya_is_vidya's review against another edition

4.0

really really good book overall but i could not get past the fact that razim, who was like a sibling to kamai, was trying to get with her. i get that they’re not technically related but they grew up together in the same household like siblings. like come on

that gave me the ick but like genuinely the rest of the book is really really good

karebear1092's review against another edition

dark mysterious medium-paced

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

3.25

I thought the writing was engaging and it was easy to get sucked in. There was a lot at the beginning of the book about the character being broken because of her asexuality and I thought that could have been handled better. 

speculativeshelves's review against another edition

3.0

This book had a lot of cool concepts, worldbuilding, and overall aesthetics that I really enjoyed. That being said I felt both the plot and the relationships between characters could've been expanded more. I enjoyed the book overall but I was not invested as much as I could have been.

All that said there were two main reasons I read this – asexual representation and a hero/villain romance – and those were the strongest part of the book for me (though I still would've liked to see the hero/villain relationship develop a bit more) so if you're looking for either of those things in a fantasy novel I would still recommend this!

elanna_g's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional 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

4.0