Reviews with content warning for Fire/Fire injury - The Witch King

Reviews tagging 'Fire/Fire injury'

eeriekeri's review against another edition

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adventurous 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

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jaqylantern's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional medium-paced

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

4.0

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solo_shelf's review

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funny mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

This was a nice friends to enemies to lovers. Fae and witches living together in hiding from humans, except fae and witches hate each other. Also, queer characters all around! Love that the main character is trans and other characters too!

I do have some issues with the writing though.I believe the characters are like 16-18 which to me is odd because they read and the way they talk is either like 18+ or teens on twitter. Also, sometimes the way they speak is off because

there’s so much human lingo even though we know that the fae and witches have very little contact with the humans, only a few actually have communication.

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bisexualwentworth's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious

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

2.5

My feelings about this book are definitely complicated.

There were a lot of things that I liked. The dialogue was fun. Wyatt’s narrative voice was incredibly entertaining (though I can definitely see why some readers wouldn’t like it). Every scene that was just characters hanging out and bantering was extremely enjoyable.

I loved several of the side characters, especially Briar (though I’m not sure how I feel about the twist regarding her character, even though it was totally unsurprising).

The politics and the ruminations on oppression were interesting, but more on that later.

But then there were a LOT of things that didn’t work for me. Here is the list, in no particular order:

First person present tense is my least favorite POV/tense choice for novels, and I especially didn’t like that the flashbacks were still in present tense. That was the part that really got to me.
I HATE the term “theydy.” Hate it.
Super fascinating that this is a book that is largely about indigenous climate activism, both in a real way and in a fantasy metaphor way, WRITTEN BY AN INDIGENOUS AUTHOR, that still centers a white main character. Maybe it’s not my place as a white reader to have an issue with this. But I thought it was a weird choice and I certainly don’t think it helped the book’s message.
Wyatt was a deeply frustrating main character generally. He is annoying and oblivious, and every bad thing he does is justified as self-defense or something. I think I would have liked him better if he’d been a worse person, honestly. Maybe that’s just an issue with this book being YA. I don’t know.
Honestly the fantasy oppression metaphor was very confusing. Were the witches a metaphor? The author was trying hard to make them NOT be one by creating a cast that was super diverse in a variety of ways. So they weren’t a metaphor for queer people or people of color, at least not intentionally, but it ended up feeling like they were an unintentional metaphor for disability, especially since there were no disabled characters in the book. Regardless, it felt messy.
All of the interpersonal conflict was kind of annoying, but again, that’s probably just a YA thing that I’ve mostly avoided by only reading really good YA.
I absolutely hated the whole soulmates/fated mates thing. ESPECIALLY when only one partner even felt this special draw to the other one. I think that’s an awful, nonconsensual way to wrote a relationship, and this book totally failed to interrogate this really really weird idea that there’s one person who’s perfectly fated to be with you. I kept thinking it would, especially after the whole Clarke thing, but NOOOOO the main couple is meant for each other and we just have to suck it up and root for them! Very frustrating.
The transitions between scenes and the action scenes generally were simply not well-written. I was very confused about how the characters arrived at certain locations and conversations in almost every chapter.

Anyway, I guess I’d recommend this book if you’re looking for YA low fantasy with a soft magic system and a trans main character. It does those things well. It just also has a lot of issues.

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the_vegan_bookworm's review

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adventurous inspiring 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? It's complicated

5.0

What an incredible and beautiful story focusing on a complex and layered main character. I love the world building, the language and the characters

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thewildmageslibrary's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny

5.0

This was such a fun book. Wyatt is so dramatic and probably needs a life coach to help with decision making, but I love him. Emyr was a great surprise and idk, he can be my king any day. I love how supportive the main group in this is. Also, the ending - RUDE. Off to buy the sequel. XD

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