Reviews tagging 'Classism'

Little Thieves by Margaret Owen

34 reviews

kiwij96's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny lighthearted mysterious sad 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? Yes

4.5

Good, solid worldbuilding alongside character development. From the first page, you know exactly who the main character is and why she does the things she does. Sometimes heavy on the symbolism, but I cannot fault the pacing, the twists, the characters, the romance and friendships that seemingly blossom naturally. Nothing in this story feels forced. Poldi and Ragne honestly have my whole heard, and Barthl is on track to be up there as one of my favourites if he appears in the next book. It was genuinely such a delight to read, but it was also so genuinely heartbreaking at the same time.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Child abuse, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual violence, Slavery, Adult/minor relationship, Sexual assault, Abandonment, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Classism, Grief, and Body horror

Moderate: Animal death, Blood, Emotional abuse, Alcohol, Fire/Fire injury, Animal cruelty, Body shaming, and Injury/Injury detail

amyteurhour's review against another edition

3.5

Content warning: abandonment, child abuse, neglect, rape, classism, toxic relationship, panic attack

The pacing felt a bit slow and dragged out for me, but overall a decent amount of angst. I wish the friendship between the Goose Girl/main character and the bird girl were more developed. The bird girl's relationship felt kind of instalove. I did check out Book 2, but haven't gotten around to it/made it a priority to read, make of that what you will. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Panic attacks/disorders, Rape, Toxic relationship, Abandonment, Child abuse, and Toxic friendship

zannayo's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Bullying, Child abuse, Physical abuse, Abandonment, and Classism

Moderate: Sexual harassment, Gaslighting, Terminal illness, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Emotional abuse and Body shaming

kemikemi's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional fast-paced

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

4.5

It’s a book you finish and just have to sit there in silence reeling and thinking about everything that happened, because there was so much happening at every single point and it was a really fucking good book. I loved the prose and how storytelling and fairytales were weaved into the writing with the presentation of the story and individual chapters. It was playful, and I enjoyed how the narration played games with us and had us guessing and went back for the wild reveal towards the climax. I loved the characters; Vanja was written so well as a morally grey antihero protagonist, and everything about her story hurts so much. She and Emeric have the most complete and best enemies to lovers loveline that I’ve ever seen in a story. Her relationship with Gisele was also so interesting and painful, and I thought the development throughout the book was so good. Ragne became a favorite character of mine, she was so funny and fascinating and the best fucking friend ever.

I’m sad I couldn’t get tooooo into her loveline with Gisele just bc we barely saw it develop since it all happened offscreen, but lesbian rep!!!! I loved Ragne’s role in the final plan and their scenes together toward the end, bless them.

Despite being so long, this book managed to hold my attention well throughout my listening experience, and I had fun trying to crack the case and problem solve with them despite always being wrong! I think I enjoyed the twists and gotcha moments more because I went into this book not actually knowing the Goose Girl tale; things continuously caught me by surprise and it was a fun ride!! 

**To note, I think it would’ve been better to have the main character group be about 20 rather than 16 and have the legal adult age (referenced throughout the book) be 21. They all read as young adults rather than midteens, and the child marriage was really unsettling whenever I was reminded what the girls’ actual ages were.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Misogyny, Sexual harassment, Violence, Eating disorder, Sexual assault, Abandonment, Alcohol, and Animal death

peskilanim's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring mysterious sad 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? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism

Moderate: Rape, Physical abuse, Emotional abuse, and Child abuse

Minor: Misogyny, Body shaming, and Animal death

amelianotthepilot's review against another edition

adventurous medium-paced

4.5

A mother gives her 13th daughter to Death and Fortune rather than raise her. Instead of killing her Death and Fortune take the girl as their goddaughter and find her a place in a castle as a servant. She becomes close to the Princess of the castle eventually swapping places with her and stealing her place. She will do anything to survive and cares about no one because no one cares about her but eventually her past and lies will catch up to her.

I really enjoyed this story it's a very spooky and intricate tale of female rage. All the characters were very complex and interesting and I enjoyed the multiple deadlines rushing our characters to the end. However, I didn't really love the beginning. It wasn't until I was about halfway into the story that I was finally invested. I also didn't love the ending. It almost seemed like the author realized she backed herself into too much of a corner and just reversed it.  But I did like the little interludes that were told as tales before each section and I think the end section interlude is my favorite. I also like what she did at the end but not how we got there. The germanic words and culture were interesting but not well explained so I spent most of the book skipping over the words I didn't know since they weren't really explained. I loved the gods aspect and I love a good enemies to lovers and a good morally grey main character. I also loved the casual lgbt+ representation (including lesbians, gays, and a demi character!).

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Bullying, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Blood, Physical abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, Chronic illness, Drug use, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Terminal illness, Child abuse, Classism, Gaslighting, Misogyny, Murder, Sexism, and Sexual harassment

antimony's review against another edition

adventurous funny mysterious

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.25

kind of slow to start but OH so fun once it got going....i finished it and instantly placed a hold on book 2. and did i mention that there are ILLUSTRATIONS.......!!!!!!!!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism and Violence

Moderate: Sexual assault and Abandonment

alexijai98's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.75

Overall not too bad, but a little long and the protagonist got to be grating in the last third of the book. There’s only so many times I can read one character going through the misunderstandings trope.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Violence, Physical abuse, Abandonment, Emotional abuse, Alcohol, Classism, Blood, Child abuse, Death, Panic attacks/disorders, Body horror, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Sexual assault and Rape

beautifulpaxielreads's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny 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

4.5

To read my original review of this book (a different edition to this one), go to the following link https://app.thestorygraph.com/reviews/7aec891b-d918-40c4-b380-27dd080dbbcc

For this reread,  my original opinion of this book still largely stands - this is an incredibly good read chock-full of excellent character development, diversity, plotting, and worldbuilding. And Vanja's snarky, irreverent narration is just GOLD.

I did pick up on a couple of things that I appear to have missed the first time I read this.  The theme of privilege, more specifically around the privilege enabled by wealth, influence, and good looks. What choices do you have to make if you don't possess these things?

The other thing that niggled at me  (and caused me to drop my rating by 0.5 for this reread)was that

no one picked up Vanja's ruse/disguises earlier.

But that was only a minor irritation and did not affect my overall enjoyment.

Onto Painted Devils!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Abandonment, Violence, Child abuse, Animal cruelty, Classism, Bullying, Injury/Injury detail, and Physical abuse

Moderate: Sexual violence, Fire/Fire injury, and Sexual assault

Minor: Cursing and War

theunwelcometagalongs's review against another edition

adventurous inspiring sad 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? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment and Classism

Minor: Rape