Reviews with content warning for Religious bigotry - The Sun and the Void

Reviews tagging 'Religious bigotry'

The Sun and the Void by Gabriela Romero Lacruz

16 reviews

solar_power's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious 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

5.0

Content Warnings

corallydeer's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious tense 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

3.75

Although the beginning was kind of slow for me I enjoyed this book by the end. The fantasy elements were unique and explored in a racial way that I don't see too often. The extent of the portrayals for racism and religious bigotry was often quite sobering and a bit tough to get through, but it felt worthwhile by the end. It was also a bit tough, at first, to sympathize or relate to the characters since many of their situations felt so dire and the choices they had to make so manipulated, but by the end of the book I really rooted for the main group. They all grew in really great ways and I wanted so many of them to achieve real happiness and freedom from their abusive origins.

I will say, as someone who doesn't speak/know a lick of Spanish, that I made sure to pair the book with the audiobook so that I could hear how words and names were pronounced and I definitely think that was a 10/10 decision.

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Pregnancy, Racism, Violence, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Religious bigotry, and Gore

Moderate: Racial slurs, Kidnapping, Cursing, Murder, Grief, and Blood

Minor: Misogyny, Slavery, Gun violence, Homophobia, Incest, and Colonisation

Child Abuse

(young babies are used to check if someone is a reincarnated wife of Rahamagut by being abandoned on a mountain and potentially left for dead)

| Death (of Parent(s) & Child)

(Doña Laurel and her baby pass away in childbirth; babies left on the mountain as mentioned in first tag; various dead relatives mentioned from the past or experienced through the course of the book)

| Domestic Abuse

(Javier physically abuses his wife, Eva, once they're married and treats her poorly once they're legally and magically bound)

| Gore

(attacks, especially from the tinieblas, are graphic)

| Pregnancy

(Doña Laurel becomes pregnant and labor is described somewhat graphically)

| Racism

(Reina and Eva are both mixed-race characters who experience open and hidden discrimination regularly)

| Religious Bigotry

(Eva deals with religious bigotry related to the fact that she's part valco; bigotry against those that don't follow the human's religion of saints; Eva's curandera mentor is burned alive for being a "witch")

| Violence

(Reina gets attacked by monsters; sword fighting training; valcos are known to scalp antlers from other valcos they best in battle)

| Blood

(moderate depictions of blood, gore descriptions are worse)

| Cursing & Racial Slurs

(moderate levels of cursing around the fantasy racial slurs)

| Grief

(moderate depictions of grief over lost loved ones, choices made, etc)

| Kidnapping

(Reina and Javier kidnap young girls to help with reincarnating Doña Laurel, but the process isn't described in too much detail)

| Murder

(Don Enrique openly kills a witness to their plans; Reina kills her grandmother; Reina's grandmother murder's seven of the nine wives)

| Colonization

(it's mentioned in passing that humans colonized Venazia, taking nozariels as slaves, valcos as warriors, and eradicating yares)

| Gun Violence

(mentioned in passing as part of a story)

| Homophobia

(not really outright, but insinuated here and there, and explained to be a colonizer mindset brought in related to the ability to produce heirs)

| Incest

(valcos are mentioned to have inter-bred for breed purity in passing)

| Misogyny

(Javier makes some remarks to Doña Laurel about her role being for breeding)

| Slavery

(slavery of other races used to be legal, but was outlawed so it's mentioned in passing somewhat frequently)

shottel's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional tense fast-paced

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

3.25

Oh, how much I wanted to like this book more. And yet, unless you’re a fan of the fantasy genre specifically, or perhaps of South American-inspired settings, I couldn’t recommend it to you.

Let’s start with what went well: The setting. One of my favorite fictional settings I’ve encountered in a long time. I’m a huge sucker for religious themes and topics, which weigh heavy on the plot. I personally haven’t read much inspired by South America, so it was refreshing and new to me to see a fiction book draw heavily on its history and culture. I might read the sequel just for further worldbuilding.

Additionally, I felt the one-on-one fights were excellent. Clear and visceral. I’ve read more than a few good novels with confusing, poorly wrote fights that drag down the whole thing.

Now, what didn’t go well: The characters. There are two main protagonists in this novel. I deeply disliked them both. One of them is self-righteous, to the point of overlooking her own deeply heinous actions; the other is cowardly and perpetually impulsive, an awful mix that made for a character that repeatedly made her own situation worse and regretted it moments later. That’s not enjoyable to read. It’s frustrating. At times, I was rooting against both of them.

To make matters worse, there was only one character in the book I felt was compelling, and the author hid away his motives until about 80% of the way through the book. When his backstory got more detail I was actually frustrated because it made him deeply interesting. I would’ve greatly preferred reading the entire novel from his perspective. That’s notable, because I read this novel in part because I love sapphic women leads, but I now wish the book was about the straight guy.

The other thing I felt went poorly was the fights that weren’t one-on-one. Most notably, there is a particular large battle in the second half which comes off as incredibly lackluster. Startlingly so, in fact, given how much I felt the one-on-one fights were great. Generously, it felt like reading a college freshman’s attempt in a creative writing class that got a B-.

All in all, I only recommend this book if you’re a fantasy genre fan or want some more South American in your fiction. Otherwise, spend your time elsewhere, because if the setting won’t carry it for you, then characters definitely won’t.

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juan_adhd_reading's review against another edition

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adventurous dark 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

3.5

There are a lot of things I want to say about this book, but I think they have all been said already and more eloquently by other people. Mainly, I would recommend @mynameismarines two-part review of the book on TikTok, as I share a lot of the same thoughts.

I hope this review won’t be too long, so I’ll start with the positive, which is Gabriela’s amazing world building skills. The world of Venazia and Fedria felt so vivid and it was incredibly detailed. The remarkable amount of effort she put in developing everything from politics, to mythology, to the familial and inter species relationships that we witnessed. You can just tell everything came from a place of love, and I greatly appreciate that. The fact that the world is latine inspired really helped me visualize everything, as it came really close to my own home. I would definitely read the second book in the series as the story was intriguing and original.

I also want to praise her realistic portrayal of colonization, and how its effects are felt even generations after “liberation”. Eva’s journey and perspective is really valuable, showing the efforts needed to decolonize one self, and the trauma it can carry.

My main issues with this book were the pacing and the characters. Firstly, the first third or I would even say half of this book can be really slow and challenging to read. This is because it focuses mainly on the world building and developing character’s relationships and goals, rather than advancing the plot. That being said, after it picks up, it does so wonderfully, as the rest of the book is full of action, adventure, tension, magic, and drama.

As for the characters, it was incredibly hard for me to love them. For the majority of the book, the goals of most of the characters are selfish, naive and stupid; their actions, despicable (sometimes even downright evil). However, the place from which they make these terrible decisions is one of desperation, lack of autonomy and grief. So while I don’t agree with their actions, most of the times I do understand them.

Here’s a rundown of what I think of each character:

Javier is by far the most unforgivable of all the main characters. To me, having him be possessed by a Tiniebla does feel like a cop-out to justify his terrible behavior. Only because of this, he’s not a downright villain, but still mostly irredeemable. I hope the story follows suit with the very well deserved punishments that await him.

Reina follows suit, and while I do agree her character is way more understandable and redeemable than Javier, she should’ve faced more consequences for her actions. It’s because of her that seven women were brutally murdered, and undoubtedly even more of the ones initially mistaken as Damas del Vacío, without even mentioning the countless infanticides. Yet she gets to be Ches’ hero, the one who stopped Ramaghut, so she doesn’t face any repercussions.

Eva didn’t do anything as dastardly, but she definitely had her flaws, including her incredible naïveté, and lack of action when it’s needed the most (think, when she didn’t defend Doña Rosa).

Maior is by far the most likable, lovable character of the bunch. Although it is acknowledged that initially she was racist to Reina (and called her a duskling, which would be a slur in this world) at the time she was also kidnapped by her, so... And it is pretty obvious that she grows by the end, and does not hold these views any longer (which were mostly forced on her by the hyper religious, racist culture of the Apartaderos).

I have nothing to say of Celeste, except the way she treated Reina with an air of superiority all the time, even when she calls her a friend, annoyed me to no end. I was really glad this was also acknowledged in the last chapter.

Though at the end all characters grew, it was definitely an effort to enjoy the story because of them. At the end of the book, I would say they are at a place where I would enjoy their continuing growth if I read the next book.

Content Warnings

lanid's review against another edition

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adventurous dark

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

3.5

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blacksphinx's review

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adventurous dark mysterious medium-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

4.0

How much you will love this story comes down to one thing: your willingness to watch traumatized and abused people make bad choices from the very limited ones they have. If you want your abused heroines to be out here from page one owning their abusers with a witty one-liner, you will hate this.

This is a book about people making bad decisions under duress, and by the end I think it may be fair to say one of our PoVs is a villain protagonist. The story set into motion by these events is fascinating, and I want to watch these girls become both better and worse.

(I wanted to give this book five stars, but people constantly keeping secrets from each other + a really annoying love triangle dragged it down.)

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scrubsandbooks's review

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1.0

Despite getting drawn into this story, I found out there were several highly problematic themes in this story, particularly from queer Latinx reviewers. I myself am a queer South Asian American and I can’t say anything on the culture in this book other than the fact that a lot of the bigotry written in the books was giving me major off vibes and I couldn’t pinpoint what until I read the reviews.

I strongly recommend reading the review written by “Christopher’s Colorful Corazón” on Goodreads under this book for an in-depth thoughts on the entire book.

Content Warnings