Reviews tagging 'Suicide'

The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon

49 reviews

guessgreenleaf's review against another edition

adventurous emotional slow-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, War, and Grief

Minor: Incest, Infidelity, Murder, Pregnancy, Pandemic/Epidemic, Sexual content, Suicide, Mental illness, Death of parent, Blood, and Alcoholism

radio_02's review against another edition

adventurous emotional 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

I absolutely love the book and I honestly think I'll never find something quite like it
The characters were charming and memorable as small or as big their role was
It's a 4.75 just because it's not really my type of book and its really out of my comfort zone, it didn't really have the element to make it a 5⭐ book, but I woul recommend it to whoever would be willing to read it

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death

Moderate: Miscarriage

Minor: Suicidal thoughts, Death of parent, Suicide, and Sexual content

nurseamandarose's review against another edition

adventurous slow-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death

Moderate: Pandemic/Epidemic, War, Infidelity, Mental illness, Alcoholism, Pregnancy, Grief, Xenophobia, Miscarriage, Injury/Injury detail, and Death of parent

Minor: Sexual content, Suicide attempt, Suicide, and Domestic abuse

omnisyncd's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Violence, Blood, Death of parent, Dementia, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Sexual content, Religious bigotry, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Miscarriage, Xenophobia, Suicide, Murder, Mental illness, Confinement, Classism, and Alcohol

Minor: Torture

thiskelsey's review

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful inspiring lighthearted 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Grief, Pregnancy, Suicide, Death, Violence, Miscarriage, and Death of parent

Moderate: War and Dementia

theemeraldflame's review

challenging dark mysterious slow-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

2.25

Did not live up to expectations. Not a bad story by any stretch, but I didn’t find it an enjoyable one either. From a longtime lover of epic fantasy, this one was… fine. A decent mix of Arthurian legend and Eastern Asian myth, but fairly predictable all the way through. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Miscarriage and Xenophobia

Moderate: Gore, Vomit, Suicide, and Infertility

Minor: Blood and Addiction

talonsontypewriters's review against another edition

adventurous emotional tense slow-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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, War, Religious bigotry, Xenophobia, Violence, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, and Blood

Moderate: Classism, Terminal illness, Gun violence, Animal death, Drug use, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Kidnapping, Animal cruelty, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Infertility, Suicidal thoughts, Dementia, Misogyny, Miscarriage, Sexism, Confinement, Torture, Medical content, and Sexual content

Minor: Incest, Child death, Pedophilia, Suicide, Excrement, Self harm, Vomit, Rape, Domestic abuse, and Infidelity

Illness, epidemic.

fizzymilk22's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-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

5.0

Book is so good it got me back into reading books again immediately despite being a super dense 800 page long fantasy novel. I love how it takes a seemingly generic fantasy setup and uses it to examine human flaws and societal issues in such an interesting and natural way OH GOD it's so amazing. This has to be one of the best casts of characters I've ever seen in this kind of story, they're all so individually compelling but they compliment each other when together as well. Please read this I'm begging you

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Infertility, Religious bigotry, Sexual content, Blood, Incest, Lesbophobia, Abortion, Animal cruelty, Genocide, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, Miscarriage, Murder, Pregnancy, Suicide, Animal death, Chronic illness, Classism, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Grief, Torture, Violence, War, and Xenophobia

sinaprst's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional mysterious 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? No

5.0

why haven`t i read this sooner?

that was the very first thing that came to my mind after i finished this yesterday. this had been on my bookshelf for the last 2 years or so, because the 800+ pages intimaded me so much, but they were so worth it, this was hands down one of the best (fantasy) books i have ever read, i adored every second of it:

i mean it has dragons, sapphics, magic, pirates, female warriors, i could literally not ask for more

the world building was amazing and felt incredibly real to me and the characters were so flawed but adorable at the same time, the romance was an immaculate slow burn, the villains felt complex and well-rounded to me, the plottwists had me literally gasping and the ending was one of the most satisfying endings i have ever read (and i am usually very picky when it comes to that).

but what stood out the most to me in retrospect was how refreshing it was to read a fantasy novel that has great (queer, POC and female) represenation and that could do without racism, homophobia or violence towards women. not only are there two queer characters and three POC characters among the main four, but the book depicted and mentioned several queer relationships and POC characters in the background aswell. additionally, everything was represented in a very casual way that did not feel out of place or forced like any of it was a big deal. 

overall, i would (and will) recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a good fantasy read, especially if you`re looking for one that does not center a white men and does not feature hate towards any minorities

definetly a 5/5 stars for me

Edit: someone recently pointed out to me that one of the storylines is literally Arthur and Merlin from the BBC series and I cannot unsee that now, it's just so true

recommended reading ambience: https://youtu.be/6nRFaOFcbpk?si=1x-Hn4IvbV5NKwSX

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Death, Grief, Infertility, and Murder

Moderate: Miscarriage, Religious bigotry, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual content, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Alcohol and Suicide

thoseoldcrows23's review

adventurous slow-paced

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

1.0

 I wanted to like this book so bad, but it just didn't work for me. I probably should have DNF it a long time ago, but I kept convincing myself to push forward in the hopes that it would get better and it just never did. 

Let me begin by saying I understand why so many people love this book. Shannon's writing is very readable, and I think that the trappings of old school fantasy are potent enough and the execution competent enough, that for many people it's going to be incredibly engaging. However, I found the process of reading this book to be painfully tedious. For a 800 page book I feel like very little actually happens. The plot is pretty generic and so much of what happens is just people traveling from place to place or people sitting around and talking. This probably wouldn't have bothered me if I had liked the characters more, but I found most of the main characters to be rather boring and shallow, and none of the side characters even felt like people. They were just cardboard cutouts who the author would trot out when the plot necessitated having another person present, and then they would completely disappear from the story when they're present wasn't directly needed. 

As for the world building, I think that's probably the most interesting part of the book. The problem though is that the same bits of lore are repeated over and over and over again, and we’re constantly reminded of bits of world building that we've already been told. It became very tiresome very fast, and my interest faded quickly. 

Despite all these problems I pushed through the book, hoping that I would eventually come to see what everyone else seems to see and fall in love with it, but alas it never happened. I found the ending of the book to be completely unsatisfying and the solution to the issue of the big bad to be very predictable and unoriginal. 

I'm so bummed that I didn't like this more than I did, but it just wasn't for me. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Death of parent, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Miscarriage, Murder, Religious bigotry, Violence, Xenophobia, and War

Moderate: Grief, Infertility, Sexual content, Alcoholism, and Suicide

Minor: Vomit