Reviews with content warning for Gore - Midnight Riot

Reviews tagging 'Gore'

Midnight Riot by Ben Aaronovitch

42 reviews

the_cheerful_necromancer's review against another edition

adventurous funny medium-paced

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

4.5

Ported over from my now-abandoned Goodreads:
I'm a sucker for an urban fantasy. A British-set urban fantasy chock full of geeky pop culture references, authentic slang, brilliant wit, quotable lines, genuinely tense mystery, an amazingly unique premise, excellently crafted magic system, lovable and complex characters, gloriously hateable villains- how could I possibly refuse?

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itsnotalakeitsanocean's review against another edition

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adventurous medium-paced

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

2.75

This book was really promising and had a very strong start, but as things went on I think it suffered from having too many ideas that didn't mesh cohesively together. It resulted in a lot of repetition and a lot of descriptions of the main character walking, driving and running everywhere and limiting the interesting parts of the action (then again given he was a police officer, I'm not surprised).

Things I liked:

Having a POC protagonist and going into detail about the struggles of his childhood was interesting.
I really loved the idea that every river in London was represented by a character that was either chosen by the river or born into the family of rivers.
I liked Nightingale's character and, ironically for a mystery book, the fact that his past wasn't spelled out and gave him some sorely needed intrigue.

Things I didn't like:

The protagonist didn't really have a strong character or any flaws that weren't certain characters bashing us over the head with "oh you have a shit home life and you fucked up your education" or "you need to be more focused". To me those aren't really flaws, or at the very least strong flaws that could cause interesting conflict in the story.
On a similar side note,
while it was nice to have the protagonist and the rivers be POC/mixed as generations went along, I feel like the author was trying to express how they were both African-British families from a different diaspora from one another, but didn't. The rivers family seem to have some kind of West African/Yoruba heritage, but the protagonist was just "African-British".
As mentioned above, the story suffered from too many ideas that didn't mesh well together. In particular, I feel as if the story suddenly spinned into
acting out the play of Punch and Judy, with the culprit being the ghost of an actor for Punch out of nowhere.

I think the author should have leaned more into the idea of people being forced to act out the roles of fictional characters if he wanted to include this element in the book
. This also meant the titular rivers of London characters felt superfluous in a book that was named after them. The tensions between the two river families went nowhere and was an absolute waste.
Part of me should have honestly expected this but some of the descriptions of the women were a bit leery.
cw for rape
Towards the end, a bit character ends up having part of his penis bitten off after trying to force himself onto someone and we're expected to sympathise with him. Nah mate, you got what you deserved for forcing yourself on someone.

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fionamatilda's review against another edition

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adventurous funny lighthearted mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

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mags_'s review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny informative mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

3.25

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book_snail's review against another edition

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adventurous informative mysterious 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? No

3.5

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kartoffel_00's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious slow-paced

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

3.5

23/02/23:

It was a fun and okay read. Like not particularly exciting but also not particularly boring. The MC's musing and observations were fun to follow, like comments about bureaucracy. I didn't enjoy the male gaze parts though. Its not at the level of Dresden files but still there, which not going to lie, made me really uncomfortable. Not to say there weren't varied personalities of female character. The MC is just horny and makes it really really obvious. If I could reach inside the book and smack his head I would rate the book much higher. (jk)

Final rating: 3.5/5

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