Reviews tagging 'Emotional abuse'

We Free the Stars by Hafsah Faizal

34 reviews

niclantsov's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny 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

4.0

 Two words: Nasir Ghameq

Where should I start? Honestly I couldn't put my words into it.

The sequel was by far better than the first one, the story progressively getting interesting and the characters really do have a special place in my heart. I always love a founding family trope and this one nailed it perfectly, you've got the banter, the romance, the emotional impact (parfait *chef's kiss), and everything you could've hoped for in a founding family book.

The characters flaws and fears really showcased in this book, and it was really moving to read. Especially Nasir, for he was still haunted by his father's shadow. And of course Zafira and the uncertainty of her future, she no longer become the huntress because the whimsical forest that made her her is gone. So, throughout the book we follow their characters complexity. Then ending was what I would hope for and better.

 "Did the stars fall from the sky to adorn you in their luster? No–liquid silver. You are the well that forged every blade in the world"

It has been so long since I felt this way, I thought romance's dead, but it rekindled when I read this. You see, after reading Romantasy (and the rise of the Romantasy wave)I feel that I never would experience a fantasy book with just having romance as a subplot again, and for a moment I forgot why I fell in love with fantasy genre in the first place. It's like after reading tons of Romantasy it just overwhelms you, you know, and it somehow made my reading experience lessen (especially in fantasy genre). Hence I seek the oldest book on my TBR, and this was it, and I fell in love with fantasy again. This has a minute (my-NOOT) romance element but in an old fashion slow burn way, and that made it really good.

This has the slowest of the slowest slow burn, I mean the angst and the yearning was so so good. And also I love the fact that this is not as a forced proximity as the first book, it came naturally. I lost count on how many times Nasir Bloody Ghameq made me blush, I felt like an idiot.

It's is also beautifully, lyrically, poetically written. Well done Hafsah Faizal, can't wait to read Tempest of Tea now!! 

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camiclarkbooks's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny hopeful mysterious 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? Yes

4.0

Exquisitely written book, Hafsah Faizal has true talent. 

On an unrelated note, there were a lot of instances where a character gave a two finger salute and jogged backwards. Which seems very specific to me. 

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cami08's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective 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

4.0

Find yourself a partner that loves you as much as Zafira and Nasir love each other. 

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queer_bookwyrm's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark hopeful 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? No

4.0

4 ⭐ CW: violence, blood, oppression of women, death of a parent, abuse (physical and emotional), death

We Free the Stars by Hafsah Faizal is book two in the Sands of Arawiya duology. Lately, I've been disappointed by the second book of a duology, but not with this one! I will say it was a bit long and slow paced, but it was worth it for the ending our zumra got. Warning for potential We Hunt the Flame spoilers. 

We follow up with the zumra after their escape from Sharr with the hearts only to realize they left Altair and one of the hearts behind. We see the consequences and struggle of Zafira after unwittingly binding herself to the Jawarat, a semi sentient magical book. The Jawarat is all chaos, darkness, and violence from it's time on Sharr, and tries controlling Zafira. A good chunk of this story is Zafira having an identity crisis, since without the Arz, she is no longer needed as the Hunter. 

Nasir gets so much character growth! My grumpy, dark, abused boy is learning to feel his feelings and learning to let the zumra love him. I love his dynamic with Altair. They truly are two sides of a coin, darkness and light. We finally get povs from Altair! This guy would be fantastic at chess. He is ten steps ahead of everyone, which makes him seem like he's not always on the zumra's side. I love the twist between him and the Lion of the Night. Such layers. We even learn a bit of the Lion's backstory which gives us insight to why he seems revenge. It doesn't soften him as a villain, but does give motivation. 

Lana, Zafira's little sister becomes a little healing badass, and we learn that Kifah is aroace! I do wish we had gotten to see more of the magic of the people and not just the Lion of the Night's. We do learn more about ifritkind, and we get messages about how oppression can make villains of the best of us. Nasir learns that he doesn't always have to kill to succeed.


As I said before, I do wish it hadn't been so slow at the beginning, but like book one, it really picks up in the last third. The ending was very satisfying, so I could finally stop yelling "just kiss already!" At Zafira and Nasir. Faizal's writing is so beautiful. Definitely worth the read. 

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sammuraichan's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional tense medium-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

4.75


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shannnne_reads_words's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful sad 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

4.25


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maple_dove's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional inspiring 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

In my humble opinion, this book did not fall into the pit of sequel in a trilogy/duology syndrome (I forgot what it's called). I'm stuck between rating this 4.75 or 5 stars. I chose the latter.

This book just made me love the characters and the world even more. I binged this book in two days.

There's also aroace rep! It's nice to not have every character to have a romantic love interest. :)

I didn't write any quotes down, however, there are a lot of good quotes in this book.

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tahsintries's review against another edition

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emotional

4.25


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bri__'s review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

The last part of this book was great but I definitely found that alot of the middle was dragged and that caused me to take a week in completing this book. The writing is impeccable and the plot is insanely complex.
I loved Nasir so much throughout this series but I found Zafira to be a very complicated character to deal with due to her tendency to run away from her problems (being her relationship with Nasir). Yes there was some partial enemies to lovers in this duology but he fell in love with her during their time on Sharr so I wouldn't say it was that long a period of time. As stated already I did enjoy the ending, I'm just disappointed we didn't get to see more of the possible dynamic between Altair and Yasmine or the actual effect of magic among the community since we only got to see snippets.

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sydapel's review against another edition

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adventurous dark 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? No

3.75

wowzers this book was LONG. It's so intricately done, and the characters really are given their time to shine here, but a lot of the plot intricacies I felt I should have understood completely flew over my head. Though I don't believe that the length was justified and I felt only minorly satisfied at the conclusion (just let Zafira and Nasir have ONE cute moment I'm BEGGING you), it gets a high rating bc there just aren't enough epic fantasy stories out there that capture the lore and culture of the Middle East like this does. 

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