Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

Ninefox Gambit by Yoon Ha Lee

6 reviews

pedanther's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense medium-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? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Suicidal thoughts, War, Violence, Suicide attempt, and Rape

Moderate: Body horror, Colonisation, Blood, Confinement, Grief, Mental illness, Sexual content, Torture, and Xenophobia

Minor: Ableism, Drug use, Gun violence, Slavery, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Alcohol, Bullying, Child death, Classism, and Cursing

m3lwar3's review

adventurous challenging dark tense fast-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Violence, War, and Murder

Moderate: Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Violence, Torture, Suicidal thoughts, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicide, Grief, Genocide, Suicide attempt, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Murder, Mental illness, Gun violence, Death, and Colonisation

Minor: Gaslighting, Cursing, and Blood

lucystolethesky's review

challenging tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Murder, Religious bigotry, Genocide, Sexual assault, and War

Moderate: Gun violence, Drug use, Forced institutionalization, Mental illness, Suicide, Sexual assault, and Sexual content

ailsaod's review

challenging dark tense slow-paced

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

4.0

 This book took a bit of getting into - the first chapter is set in a battle scene in which horrible things that are both gory and confusing happen to the soldiers. It took quite a while to figure out what the deal was with this book (when people say it is ancillary justice crossed with divergent they are certainly right!). This combination sounds improbable and when I first saw it did not fill me with joy but it is more like Ancillary Justice (in that the setting is a massive evil space empire and everyone is queer) with the faction system being a little more complex than that of Divergent and there is a bunch of stuff a bit like astrology? I'm not a fan of astrology so those elements took a bit of getting used to. Lee also has a somewhat disorienting way of progressing a story which was the only thing that stopped me from giving this book five stars. Sometimes scenes or joins between scenes were a little disorienting or I found it difficult to visualise what was happening with the tactics.

However, despite these obstacles in the way of my enjoyment I still had a great time reading this book. Something about Lee's characters made me get very attached to them in very short amounts of time - even minor side characters - so when they inevitably met a nasty end I was like :( . Cheris and Jedao are the main characters and I liked both of them (for very different reasons!). Jedao is terrifying! From the beginning we know his reputation while his motivations are very much unknown and this combined with him basically being a ghost make him a little scary already. Then Lee wrote a couple of terrifying scenes and the I was feeling just as scared as Cheris! Jedao is the kind of person MCU Loki wishes he was! I think Lee does a good job explaining why Jedao went on his murder spree without forcing the reader to sympathise.

I would advise anyone who doesn't like reading about genocide, weapons of mass destruction (and their gory effects on squishy humans) to maybe skip this one as although the way people are killed is very abstract it is still quite disturbing.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gore, and War

Moderate: Body horror, Colonisation, Genocide, Mental illness, and Suicidal thoughts

Minor: Dysphoria, Sexual assault, Suicide, and Torture

cerilouisereads's review

adventurous dark tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• 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: Blood, Death, Genocide, Violence, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Mental illness and Suicidal thoughts

Minor: Body horror and Dysphoria

trazac's review

challenging dark mysterious sad tense slow-paced

• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

I had a particularly difficult time reading this book. It is outright confusing and meant to be. There is borderline zero exposition, so all details are scrapped from conversation and narration, precious though they be. Also borderline zero descriptions of what anything looks like. Perhaps that won't be an issue with some readers, but I had a hard time picturing anything that was happening which only lead to more confusion. The middle 60% of the book is outrageously boring, with interspersed sections of brand new POVs of characters who are spun up with a lot of detail only to die immediately.

Otherwise well written. Good character dynamic and somewhat compelling theater of war style writing that I just personally cannot find interest in. Character growth somewhat limited and complicated. World is built somewhat well but utterly confusing. For a relatively short book, a ton of information is introduced and never explained. Perhaps that makes the world more true-to-life but it also means many people will walk away with a totally different idea of what happened.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Cursing, Death, Genocide, Gore, Mental illness, Suicide, and Violence

Moderate: Sexual content and Gun violence

Minor: Confinement and Suicidal thoughts