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Reviews tagging 'Animal death'
Serpent and dove. La strega e il cacciatore by Shelby Mahurin
23 reviews
gimmiiie's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
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
3.0
đ: 3.0/5.0
My initial thoughts were that it was a 4.0. But the more I thought about it I think it's a 3.0. Reflection has pinpointed some things I didn't enjoy.
~~~SPOILERS BELOW~~~
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What I enjoyed:
-The growth that both Lou and Reid went through. They were able to work through their biases and see who they had dehumanized as human (Reid more so and he still needs to grow).
-Cosette is my favorite character. I wish she had more time in the book. Though I loathed how the nickname the author gave her "Coco".
-The Enemies to Lovers trope. One of my favorite tropes and I will read nearly any book with this.
-I appreciate that the book didn't end with a betrayal. I'm sick of reading fantasy books where the love interest betrays the MC.
What I didn't like:
-How Ansel was treated by adults. He's such a sweet and innocent character. The 2 main female MCs flirted with him and he's a minor. And that's never okay.
-I wish this was a standalone book. I'm not too interested in continuing the story.
My initial thoughts were that it was a 4.0. But the more I thought about it I think it's a 3.0. Reflection has pinpointed some things I didn't enjoy.
~~~SPOILERS BELOW~~~
~~~
~~~
~~~
~~~
-The growth that both Lou and Reid went through. They were able to work through their biases and see who they had dehumanized as human (Reid more so and he still needs to grow).
-Cosette is my favorite character. I wish she had more time in the book. Though I loathed how the nickname the author gave her "Coco".
-The Enemies to Lovers trope. One of my favorite tropes and I will read nearly any book with this.
-I appreciate that the book didn't end with a betrayal. I'm sick of reading fantasy books where the love interest betrays the MC.
What I didn't like:
-How Ansel was treated by adults. He's such a sweet and innocent character. The 2 main female MCs flirted with him and he's a minor. And that's never okay.
-I wish this was a standalone book. I'm not too interested in continuing the story.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Torture, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Animal death and Grief
rinku's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
When I started reading Serpent & Dove, I was convinced that I would give it two or even one star. The beginning was so cliché and ridiculous, the characters unlikable, and the world flat. This first impression changed while reading and towards the end, I started to enjoy this novel.
Other reviews mention this as well, but the set-up for the story is so ridiculous. The witch Lou and the witch hunter Reid are forced to married because of an absurd moment: Reid is trying to catch Lou after she stole something in a theatre. Of course, it comes to a fight, and they fall in front of the curtain and the whole theatre, half-naked. For Reid to restore his honour, heâs forced by the bishop to marry Lou, just how sheâs forced to this if she wants to live. There were some other moments in the story that were just over the top like this.
Other things especially annoyed me, like this overdone twist that certain characters are secretly related to each other. This is the case with Lou being the child of the witch queen(?) and the bishop and Reid being the child of Madame Labelle and the king. I really hate this kind of plot twist . I was frustrated as well by this âcharacters get interrupted before they can tell important thingsâ-clichĂ©.
But like Iâve mentioned, the story gets way more interesting and dramatic towards the end, since the fantasy aspect starts to play a bigger role: Louâs mom is able to kidnap her daughter and wants to sacrifice her, leaving Reid and his friends with no other choice than saving her. The finale was so dramatic with Lou almost dying, Madame Labelle actually dying and the reveal that Reid can use magic as well .
I furthermore had some problems with the world. Christianity plays a huge part in the world which is a bit weird considering that this is a high fantasy novel? Besides this, there was barely any world building that we get the name of the city that the story takes place only after the first half. I generally liked the French influences in the settings, but those are rarely described, just like the magic system.
The writing style was okay, I guess. It tried too much to be âadultâ aka using many swear words and making sexual references all the time but in comparison, the humour is so juvenile. This is apparently often the case with these novels that are marketed as YA but are NA in reality â looking at you, From Blood and Ash. Capslock is also used for screaming which I never like.
Talking about sexual references, those are constantly only made between men and women. It was annoying how much alleged differences between men and women are emphasized and how they say about Lou that she âfights like a manâ or that she has âa name of a manâ. The story acts like itâs against patriarchy but stuff like this keeps the patriarchy alive. Of course, there are only male witch hunters as well.
It took me some time to get warm with the characters, even though they are quite vividly described. Lou annoyed me at the beginning, and I hated Reid, his anger issues and possessiveness towards Lou. Later, the characters changed positively changed, and I even started to like the shipping since the romance is written well, besides this clichĂ© question-answer-thing to get to know each other. Itâs funny how she doesnât care what others think of her, but he does so a lot. What bothered me though was this implied crush of Coco on Ansel whoâs still underage.
Iâm really curious to read the next book in the Serpent & Dove series because from what Iâve seen, itâs supposedly worse than the first book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Sexual content, Violence, Blood, Religious bigotry, and Fire/Fire injury
Moderate: Animal death, Confinement, Infidelity, Toxic relationship, Kidnapping, and Murder
draculagirl's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
Iâll use this as a lesson to try not to buy/read books that are more than 500 pages and check too see if itâs even remotely good.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cursing, Death, Violence, Blood, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Sexual content
Minor: Animal death, Child death, Self harm, Vomit, Suicide attempt, Abandonment, and Alcohol
mpbookreviews's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Sexual content, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Murder, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Animal death and Self harm
victoriacp769's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
medium-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? It's complicated
4.0
I think this is a great book, not the best one I read, but itâs good and I love this type of stories. Something I will say is that it was really difficult for me to read at the beginning, cause I found the first part of the book really slow and not much was happening.. but then in the second part of the book all the things you where holding on to starts happening, all the spicyness, the challenges, the mistery, everything. It really starts being entertaining and captivating. Also, in the third part of the book it continues on being that way, which is good, but something I did notice is that the author started rushing everything in the last chapters. In the last chapters there is tooo many things going on and too many plot twist and in a certain way it can be good but for me it was really rushed and uneven considering all the other chapters of the book. Also, the end was wayyy too open, I know that maybe she wanted to do that so that more readers would want to reach to the sequel, but personally I think it was a really confusing ending.
Anyways, the book is good, really good, but the writing was not the best.
Anyways, the book is good, really good, but the writing was not the best.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal death, Body horror, Death, Emotional abuse, Self harm, Blood, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail
sophiexxjones's review against another edition
emotional
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
The first two thirds of the book were brilliant. The romance felt natural and the world building was great. However, the last third of the book falls flat with the sheer amount of exposition. The majority of the book is paced really well, but it slows right down in Part III to explain all the backstory. If it had been better woven into the first two parts, this wouldâve been an easy 5 stars. Serpent & Dove is heartbreaking, funny, exciting, and terrifying, but some pacing issues let it down unfortunately.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Blood, and Religious bigotry
Moderate: Sexism
Minor: Animal death and Vomit
emmahe's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cursing, Gore, Torture, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Religious bigotry, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Abandonment
Moderate: Animal death, Child abuse, Sexual content, and Vomit
Minor: Child death
kaitlynnnng's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
Some of the dialogue at the beginning was cringey and awkward, but that went away.
The ending clearly sets up Blood & Honey, but is satisfying enough for Serpent & Dove to be a stand-alone book.
The ending clearly sets up Blood & Honey, but is satisfying enough for Serpent & Dove to be a stand-alone book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Self harm, Sexual content, Violence, Blood, Religious bigotry, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Cursing, Suicide, and Abandonment
Minor: Animal death, Child abuse, and Vomit
valpyre's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
[audiobook]
i was pleasantly surprised at how much i actually enjoyed this book. i was pretty resistant when starting it, and was really not sold on the first couple of chapters. i really appreciated the lack of insta-love (while still acknowledging attraction) which allowed the two protags to stand on their own as characters with their own histories and goals.
i was pleasantly surprised at how much i actually enjoyed this book. i was pretty resistant when starting it, and was really not sold on the first couple of chapters. i really appreciated the lack of insta-love (while still acknowledging attraction) which allowed the two protags to stand on their own as characters with their own histories and goals.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal death, Death, Religious bigotry, and Murder
anniebookss's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-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
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Violence, and Religious bigotry
Minor: Animal death and Death of parent