Reviews tagging 'Classism'

The Kingdoms by Natasha Pulley

6 reviews

clarabooksit's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious slow-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Animal cruelty, Violence, Murder, Mental illness, Death, Gun violence, War, Kidnapping, Sexism, and Animal death

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Xenophobia, Blood, Colonisation, Slavery, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Homophobia, Racism, and Suicide

cateyeschloe's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective relaxing medium-paced

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

4.75

This is the first book in years that made me feel about reading the way it did when I was a kid. 

I absolutely loved this story and I know I’ll want to read it again eventually!

The story of The Kingdoms in a historical alternate reality. The majority of the story centers around the 1800s in England and France. 

This is a timey wimey story (apologies for the Doctor Who reference), and I really enjoyed that aspect of it! It was concise and clearly demarcated when there was a switch in time or place. Time travel is one of my favorite sub genres so I was really excited it was done well in this book!

My only real criticism of the writing style was that so many scenes in the book are very emotionally charged and had the potential to carry a lot of heavy-hitting weight with them. Occasionally, though, these scenes either ended a little quickly or fell just short of where I felt their potential lied. I wish Pulley had invested a little more in these scenes because these characters have great chemistry with each other and it would be so easy to really pack in the emotional gravity of some scenes. 

The queerness of this book also isn’t front and center, and, really, is hardly addressed at all. By the time I was about halfway through, I was still trying to decide if the MCs were actually queer or if I was just coloring it with my own perceptions. 

Maybe this is intentional or maybe this is another aspect that could have been a little more fleshed out. I really didn’t mind this part, though, because it wasn’t the main focal point of the plot but did serve as a pleasant secondary story. 

Overall, this is a really exciting, engaging, and mysterious story with some GREAT plot twists multiple times throughout. I really enjoyed this one and absolutely want to add it to my collection. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Classism, War, Fire/Fire injury, and Slavery

Moderate: Child death, Gun violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Confinement and Blood

augustar14's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious 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? It's complicated

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Confinement, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Mental illness, Child death, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Alcohol, Blood, Colonisation, Cursing, Forced institutionalization, Murder, War, Grief, Slavery, Torture, and Violence

Moderate: Misogyny, Death of parent, Racism, and Sexism

tamara_joy's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional tense fast-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: Death, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Violence, Classism, Gore, Slavery, Gun violence, Colonisation, and Grief

Minor: Abandonment, Murder, Alcohol, and Animal death

cocacolor's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated

4.5

A brisk, clever time-traveling, alternate-dimension-hopping adventure. The characters are immediately likeable and memorable, although they don't have much interiority;

even after Joe/Jem regains all his memories, it's difficult to place his relationship with Kite in the context of his marriages to Alice / Madeleine, and what Agatha and Jem also felt for each other is a mystery

. Pulley's style is delightful, lyrical and lucid at the same time. It feels strange to be rooting for the British Navy, here buckling under French colonialism; on the one hand, a keen attention to historical detail is counterbalanced by the narrow scope of telling a story of British soldiers fighting French occupation with barely a mention of Britain's own empire. I'm still discontented with the way some threads are tied up:

When does Kite reckon with the consequences of killing a teenage boy? A freak change killing off Toby and Alice and dropping children into Kite and Joe's laps seems like a cop-out way to give them a nuclear family.

But overall, a thrilling tale with immediate, powerful characters that turns on the tropes of amnesia and the horrors of war.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Violence, War, Colonisation, Animal death, Death, Hate crime, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Injury/Injury detail, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Confinement, Racism, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Rape, Suicide, Blood, Child death, Classism, Homophobia, Physical abuse, and Sexism

Minor: Alcohol and Genocide

On rape:

though the narrative seems to acknowledge that the main character is forced into sex by his wife, it stops short of condemning her.

On racism:

The aforementioned wife is one of the only Black characters in the novel, and also killed off in order to give the white and white-passing main couple her children.

unboxedjack's review against another edition

reflective medium-paced

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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Classism, Death, and Fire/Fire injury