Reviews tagging 'Blood'

The Book of Life by Deborah Harkness

40 reviews

smargopittman's review against another edition

dark medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No

2.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture

Moderate: Violence, Child death, Blood, Kidnapping, Rape, and Sexual violence

zoenelson's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional 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

4.25

The trilogy, overall, was entertaining. The romance was convincing and thoughtful; the supporting cast was mostly wonderful and I enjoyed the character progression. I remain impressed by Harkness' ability to ground this fantasy in our historical and scientific knowledge. 

This particular book did a few things well: it left enough open at the end for the reader to interpret as they please; it solidified Matthew and Diana's love story; and gave us more time with the supporting cast. I did not like that Harkness introduced

another existential conflict in the form of Benjamin raping witches to create a superior creature race. It's related to the main conflict but felt manufactured and was really dark without warning; it also distracted from the main conflict, so the resolution there felt unsatisfying even though it was desirable. I felt that the final battle scene was anticlimactic because there were no real trials or tribulations. Additionally, Matthew's refusal to form a scion was merely a plot tool and thus felt superficial and drew the story out. Speaking of which, this book, to me, felt very choppy trying to tie so many loose ends together which impacted the plot and pacing.

I wanted to rate this a 4.75 because I loved the first book and parts of the second, but choices to add so many elements in the second and third books diminished what the first book set up so well. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Rape, Sexual violence, and Torture

Moderate: Blood, Child death, and Gore

Minor: Stalking and Pregnancy

gillian_aftanas's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Pregnancy, Mental illness, Torture, Violence, Gore, Grief, Murder, Rape, Cursing, Death, Child abuse, Child death, Sexual violence, Vomit, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Medical trauma, Sexual content, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Confinement and Alcohol

Minor: Animal death, Classism, Genocide, Homophobia, Antisemitism, Lesbophobia, Drug use, and Death of parent

aduqu's review against another edition

slow-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? No

3.0

This book is a product of the early 2010's, when paranormal romances with chosen one heroines were a dime a dozen. Diana Bishop is not exactly a Mary Sue, but this book will beat you over the head with how special and chosen she is.

It's a fun read if you like paranormal romances and don't think about it to hard. I definitely rolled my eyes a LOT reading this, but it was always entertaining.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, Kidnapping, and Torture

Moderate: Child death and Rape

Minor: Vomit

laurenfink's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional 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

4.5

I really love this series but it’s just a little to convenient how some of the plot lines work out

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Blood, Pregnancy, Child death, Miscarriage, Kidnapping, Child abuse, Murder, and Rape

deenene's review against another edition

adventurous emotional fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Medical content, and Sexual assault

booknerderika's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Gore, Kidnapping, Medical content, Child abuse, Murder, Torture, Vomit, Death, Violence, Fire/Fire injury, Pregnancy, and Blood

Moderate: Miscarriage

Minor: Antisemitism, Sexual violence, Rape, Misogyny, Sexual assault, Sexual content, and War

joey_paige's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Torture

Moderate: Blood, Death, Death of parent, Infertility, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Medical content, Stalking, Confinement, Cursing, and Medical trauma

Minor: Murder and Rape

saroreen's review

challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Injury/Injury detail, and Violence

Moderate: Rape, Pregnancy, Misogyny, Death, Sexual assault, War, Torture, Child death, and Child abuse

Minor: Racism

micaelamariem's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.0

This series started out so strong but it gradually got worse, in my opinion. I don’t think the book needed to be as long as it was, as a lot of the detail seemed to be just deliberation on how to handle their problems. There were action scenes but these seemed few and far between. I also am a little biased as I hate the pregnancy trope, so I was doomed to hate this part of the series. I also felt like this Matthew De Clermont I fell in love with in the first book was not here; I get that characters change but I did not like this new Matthew. I did like the themes of fighting for change and learning about new and strange things versus fearing them. It’s a very important theme, especially today, so I admired that’s what the characters were fighting for: loving and embracing difference. That being said, I’m glad this series is done. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual violence, Drug use, Torture, Violence, Alcohol, Abandonment, Child death, Death of parent, Murder, Sexism, Cursing, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Pregnancy, Injury/Injury detail, Rape, and Blood