Reviews tagging 'Cannibalism'

Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse

26 reviews

cass_ward's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense fast-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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Blood, and Gore

Moderate: Child death and Cannibalism

alyssatuininga's review against another edition

dark emotional funny mysterious 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? Yes

4.0

Really interesting book with extensive cool world building and concepts. It is a post apocalyptic book by a Native American author, where most survivors are  Native peoples. The writing was a little simplistic/YA but the concepts and ideas were really cool. Overall a really fun, quick read. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Cannibalism, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, and Violence

mireillecum's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• 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: Child death, Blood, Cannibalism, Death, Grief, Murder, Police brutality, Violence, Vomit, Death of parent, and Gun violence

aggielexi's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

1.0

I did like this book, I ate it up, finished it in less than 24 hours. Why, because I wanted to see this world get built out! I loved the idea of a "Big Water" catastrophe that decimated the world and we've got broken up United States, and the Diné are their own power in this world. I LOVED this idea. The book didn't deliver. I eagerly devoured this book looking for any tidbits on when "The Big Water" took place. Teeeny drops of information, even in passing. Spoiler alert (not really, just read other reviews), the world building doesn't happen. 

You get maybe a paragraph on "The Big Water" and that's it. I was also excited about the Diné Gods, I loved this idea of seeing them in the real world and interacting with them. It doesn't really deliver there either. We're just kind of expected to take everything at face value. And then I thought about it after reading this book. This was a YA, plug and play book. 

Go ahead and think the usual. You've got your main character, who is "your not average, doesn't know she's pretty, very angsty orphan teen girl, mentor found her in the time of need and taught her to be a warrior." You've got the estranged mentor she's in love with. The love interest who has a shady past, and isn't being fully truthful, but his roguish smile and silver tongue solve all problems. 

Plug characters into some plot about needing to kill monsters, a-la Sam and Dean from Supernatural style (season 1-4) , and there's the book. I liked Supernatural the early season though, so I did really want to read the next one. 

The worse part though, is finishing the book and then doing research and learning that our author is not of the Diné culture. I understand it is a book of fiction, but something doesn't feel quite right knowing now that she is not creating a character of her own ancestry and is depicting another culture that she may not be as intimately familiar with.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Death, Death of parent, Cannibalism, and Cultural appropriation

Moderate: Abandonment

vivavia's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful sad tense fast-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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Murder, Child death, Gaslighting, Gore, Grief, Death, Police brutality, Blood, Panic attacks/disorders, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Cannibalism, and Toxic relationship

nerodyne's review against another edition

adventurous dark fast-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? Yes

3.75

I've been reading any of Roanhorse's books that I can get my hands on lately, and while I absolutely had a good time with this book, I'll say it felt weaker than her other books that I've read so far (though this is an earlier work so that's not shocking). I really understood where Maggie was coming from a lot of the time, the way her trauma underlined a lot of her interactions with other people and the way her PTSD was portrayed in general felt true to reality (at least in my experience). I enjoyed the characterization and the world building, however I felt that the plot points were coming out of nowhere. It all coallesed in the end, but in the running up to it I couldn't stop myself from feeling like plot points were randomly being dropped to pursue something else. All in all though, it was an enjoyable read and I want to see how the sequel elaborates on this world. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Murder, Violence, Gore, Child death, and Death

Moderate: Cannibalism

redthistle's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional sad 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? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Death, Body horror, Torture, Police brutality, Violence, Child death, Blood, Gore, Grief, Abandonment, Murder, Gaslighting, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Cannibalism and Colonisation

raptorq's review against another edition

• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Cannibalism, Blood, Child death, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Gore, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Panic attacks/disorders, and Gun violence

jav094's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

3.0

A good, original story from a fresh perspective. But too often, I struggled to understand why Maggie believed or did what she did. It becomes increasingly hard to ignore as her actions impact the plot more towards the end. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Gore, Cannibalism, Gun violence, and Violence

wickedgrumpy's review against another edition

I think what I read of the book was fine.  It's a post-apocalyptic earth with gods and monsters aplenty but I didn't like the main characters.  It's right at the point where I stopped (almost halfway through the book) when you finally start getting some explanations about what is going on/how things work and it wasn't interesting to me.

I don't want to force myself to finish another book I am not enjoying and my tentative rating before quitting the book was somewhere in the 2 star region.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Death of parent, Gore, Sexual harassment, Torture, Gun violence, Sexism, Death, Misogyny, Murder, Police brutality, Toxic relationship, Vomit, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Violence, Alcohol, Cannibalism, Child death, and Toxic friendship