Reviews tagging 'Sexual harassment'

The Witch King by H.E. Edgmon

40 reviews

asahome's review against another edition

3.5

Two people struggle with the balance of power their relationship has been built on. They must decide how they will allow the expectations of others to determine their course.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Abandonment, Death of parent, Gore, Violence, Classism, Deadnaming, Racism, and Colonisation

Minor: Sexual assault, Drug use, Toxic friendship, Cursing, Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, Infertility, Miscarriage, Toxic relationship, Suicidal thoughts, Vomit, and Sexual content

kybrary's review against another edition

adventurous emotional 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

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual assault, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual harassment, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide attempt

rmperezpadilla's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny 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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Xenophobia, Homophobia, and Panic attacks/disorders

Moderate: Transphobia and Drug use

Minor: Terminal illness, Sexual harassment, Sexual assault, and Sexual content

abarnakwn_ourcolourfulpages's review

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful 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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Content Warnings

Graphic: Xenophobia, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Gore, Death of parent, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Deadnaming, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Cursing, and Blood

Moderate: Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, Sexism, Child abuse, Slavery, Outing, Miscarriage, and Transphobia

Minor: Sexual content

buttermellow's review against another edition

adventurous reflective 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fire/Fire injury, Emotional abuse, and Bullying

Moderate: Colonisation, Infertility, Physical abuse, Violence, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Deadnaming and Death

warlocksarecool21's review

adventurous dark 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

3.25

I thought the Witch King was an interesting take on the Fae and how they usually appear in fantasy novels. 
Overall, I thought it was a fun story even though I had some issues with it. 
First, I enjoyed that queerness was present and centered throughout the entire book and that it wasn’t added on or minimized like in other fantasy novels. I thought the magic system and the Fae’s origin was really interesting and it’s something I hope to read more about. I also really enjoyed the characters, I thought Emyr and Wyatt were so cute together and I adored Wyatt’s friendship with Briar. Although there were times that I felt that the story would have been better if the characters, especially Wyatt and Emyr were in their 20s instead of high school age but it didn’t bother me that much. 

I did have some issues with the writing style and narrative. There were times where I thought the dialogue/Wyatt’s inner monologue were too juvenile for my taste, and it came off as very fanfic-y. It wasn’t necessarily what they were saying but rather the way in which they were saying it. A lot of the language used was so Gen Z/Tiktok slang and meme language and at times it was kind of irritating like it just took me out of the story. And I felt that the author tended to over-explain the symbolism, like most people should be able to see the parallels between transphobia and queerness with how the witches were treated in the fae world, but the author decided to literally spell it out for us. In regards to the plot (other than it was kind of a generic YA fantasy at times) I felt that the pacing was off sometimes and I thought the ending was rather rushed, especially with Wyatt and Emyr’s third act break-up and reconciliation (hate hate hate that trope). I still think it’s worth a read, it’s nice to have a queer fantasy that subverts a lot of the popular tropes in the genre. I do hope the next book will be stronger than this one, as I think the characters and story concept are really interesting.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death

Moderate: Transphobia, Dysphoria, Sexual harassment, and Police brutality

hilmi's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional 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

This is an excellent book overall. The plot and world building is enjoyable though the magic system was... Meh? And that's important to me. Some twists I didn't see coming (at least not fully) kept the book interesting throughout. The world building could have been more thorough as well. 

Even though I'm always attempting to be an ally, sometimes the outright anger to/hate for cisgender or straight-identifying characters made me have a visceral reaction and I almost dropped the book because I wasn't in the mood to absorb the anger. Then I realized: a) that's a privilege (that I can choose not to be angry) and maybe it would be worth working through my aversion - and it was worth it; and b) historically, trans characters in particular and lgbtq characters at large have been depicted in pretty vile ways so turnabout is fair play. 

So, come for the good fiction and the feels. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia

Minor: Physical abuse, Sexual harassment, Violence, Bullying, Emotional abuse, and Child abuse

noellelovesbooks's review

4.75

 Content Warnings: Transphobia, deadnaming, sexual harassment, sexual assault, fire death/fire injury, violence, child abuse, and mention of infertility and miscarriages.

I've been meaning to read this book since it's release and I'm so glad I finally did! We get found family, being true to yourself, romance, soulmates, and so much more. I'm looking forward to reading book two and for them both to be available in paperback so I can buy and annotate my own copies 🥰 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Deadnaming, Sexual assault, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual harassment, Violence, and Transphobia

Moderate: Infertility, Child abuse, Miscarriage, and Fatphobia

Minor: Pregnancy

brianneh's review against another edition

adventurous 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

3.0

I really liked the beginning of this book, but I thought it got a little bogged down and flat in the middle. I wasn’t quite sure what the goal was at certain points and felt like the plot meandered a bit.

I loved that there was so much good representation and diversity in The Witch King. I really enjoyed several of the characters we are introduced to, my favorites being Briar and Jin. I wish we’d had more of Jin overall! I’d also love to hear more from Briar’s side of things, I think it would be really interesting.

At first, I really found myself drawn to the main character Wyatt and his story. One of my favorite lines of his in the early pages of the book was:

“Gender is weird. The rules are all made up and people should just do whatever they want”

But as the book went on I found Wyatt to be a bit annoying at times. The book is told through first person point of view, which I think contributed to the meandering I mentioned, as a lot of time was spent on Wyatt thinking about things, then not really communicating those thoughts to people in a conducive way. Throughout the book, Wyatt comes up these schemes which he doesn’t really seem to think through, then never really has to face any real consequences to many of his actions. This way of thinking and acting may be true to course for some teenagers, but it’s not the most compelling thing to read. 

There were also quite a few mentions about pregnancy, specifically unwanted and/or forced, which wasn’t marked in the content warnings here on StoryGraph. 

Overall, I know a lot of people love this book, and while it wasn’t one of my favorites, I can see why others enjoyed it.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fire/Fire injury, Transphobia, Violence, Homophobia, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Injury/Injury detail, and Murder

Moderate: Sexual assault, Child abuse, Sexism, Pregnancy, and Deadnaming

Minor: Abandonment

karcitis's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Hate crime, Fire/Fire injury, Death, Gore, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Domestic abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Police brutality, Murder, Death of parent, and Blood

Moderate: Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Colonisation, Drug use, Child abuse, Sexual harassment, Emotional abuse, Pregnancy, Confinement, Deadnaming, Vomit, and Dysphoria