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dancingwithourhandstied's review
Graphic: Grief and Child death
Moderate: Chronic illness and Mental illness
emilia_mb's review
- 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
Graphic: Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Gore, and Violence
anniereads221's review
- Loveable characters? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Death, Grief, Mental illness, Abandonment, Acephobia/Arophobia, Domestic abuse, Body horror, Death of parent, Gore, Murder, Racism, Suicide, Violence, Ableism, Blood, Child abuse, and Chronic illness
eviecate's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Notes after 24 hours: While i initially loved everything about this book there are a few problematic elements that I can't look past. I have knocked this book down a star because of the implications of the problematic representation. A lot of the representation is rooted in stereotypes. The worst of which being (MINOR SPOILERS) the Belle character from Beauty and the Beast's love interest is a trans woman. This character is also tied to the Ugly Duckling fairytale. This implication makes me feel very upset as I did love Svenja's character in the book, I just hate the portrayal of her as "beastly" or "ugly." Other stereotypes include: mean lesbians, the asian main character's arc revolves around parental pressure to be perfect, one character's mental illness being introduced by another character asking her if "she's taken her meds, yet." While i feel like this is still a good book despite stereotyping, I wish the author had put more thought into portraying identities other than her own.
Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Murder, and Violence
Moderate: Acephobia/Arophobia, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, and Suicide
Minor: Eating disorder
bookedandbusy's review
- 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
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Murder, Grief, Death of parent, Chronic illness, Child abuse, and Blood
Moderate: Ableism and Suicide
Minor: Deadnaming
Also has graphic mentions of drowning,ehmannky's review
- 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
3.75
Graphic: Child death, Death, Murder, Mental illness, and Chronic illness
Moderate: Violence and Suicide
Minor: Homophobia and Racism
foreverinastory's review against another edition
- 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
The Grimrose Girls follows four main characters: Yuki, Rory, Ella and Nani. The first three have been going to Grimrose Académie for a year. They're coming back for a new year after losing their best friend Ari, whose death was ruled a suicide. But when Nani uncovers a fairytale grimoire in Ari's old closet, the girls are sure there was foul play involved in Ari's death. As the four begin to investigate, they find that Grimrose has hidden a string of murders at its campus.
Y'all this book was soooo good. I just wanna yell about how much I loved it. Throughout the book we get clues onto the students fairytale fates. I've so far figured out everyone except Nani. So I'm like super curious to find out more.
I loved the murder mystery in this! I had no idea how it would come together, but I absolutely loved it. Seeing how things worked on, I'm sure there are still MANY secrets to be revealed. I can't wait for the sequel. I also loved all the relationships in this book. The friendships, the romances, ugh YES. I'm here for it all. I love that our four main girls also don't pursue romantic relationships with each other. I really loved that we got to see the friendship between these 4. Loved it sooo much.
After reading this, I'm for sure adding Laura to my auto-read list.
Rep: Aroace Japanese MC, white lesbian female MC with fibromyalgia, white biromantic demisexual female MC with anxiety and OCD, fat Black-Hawaiian lesbian female MC. Black sapphic female side character, white sapphic female side character.
CWs: Abadonment, blood, chronic illness, death, grief, injury/injury detail, mental illness (anxiety & OCD), murder. Moderate: Gore, racism.
____________________________________________________________
I just finished The Last 8 and was curious to see what else the author had written and came across this book coming out November 2021!! AND LOOK AT THIS REP STATEMENT:
The Grimrose Girls has 4 main protagonists: 2 are lesbians (on page), 1 of them is a biromantic demisexual (doesn't use these labels on page, only mentions having no preference of gender as long as she feels a connection), and the fourth is aromantic asexual (written on the page).
AND
It has:
🌟4 fairytale retellings
❤️f/f romance
🍰an aroace protagonist
🏰boarding school shenanigans
⚔️swords
📚magic and murder mystery
Content warnings include: suicide mention, depiction of anxiety and OCD, parental physical/emotional abuse, mention of parental death, light gore.
I feel like Laura Pohl has answered my sapphic fairytale dreams.
Graphic: Abandonment, Blood, Chronic illness, Death, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, and Murder
Moderate: Gore and Racism
rogueblackwood's review
- 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
Characters: Super Queer! trans, ace, aromantic, demi, pan/bi, and lesbian main characters. And a variety of races, home countries, and skin tones!
Subjective rating: 5/5
Writing: 4/5 (it's YA for sure but was well done!)
Plot: 5/5, the pacing was really well done. You could tell it was well planned and that you had clues that were available but not glaring.
Characters: 5/5, each character felt real, and each character had a distinct voice and motivation
Themes: 5/5, found family on point!
Narrators: Multi, Each chapter goes back and forth between the main 4 girls. Rory, Yuki, Ella, and Nani
POV: Multi 3rd person
Genre: YA Paranormal Mystery, with light Romance side plot. YA LGBTQ
Type: Series, Book 1 of ? from Grimrose Girls, no date for sequel yet
Content Warnings: death (on and off-page not too graphic), betrayal, child abuse (light and off-page), talk of suicide, chronic illness
So this is more of what I wanted from Malice but didn't really get. It is a unique retelling in every way, it plays into the tropes I love without being predictable fully. You see the parallels but nothing is completely as it seems.
As far as rep, can you get better than this? I don't know if there are straight characters lol! We have trans, ace, demi, pan/bi, and lesbian characters all of whom are very flushed out and none play into harmful stereotypes. You also have a character with chronic illness in this which I found so amazing. Rory has fibromyalgia that she battles with but doesn't allow to control her life.
I felt like the little side romances felt genuine especially for teens, the first flutters, and how everything is life and death at that age. None of them felt forced and you saw the attraction.
Graphic: Child death
Moderate: Chronic illness
Minor: Blood and Child abuse
themixedpages's review
- 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
Graphic: Murder, Blood, Death, Domestic abuse, and Chronic illness
Moderate: Acephobia/Arophobia, Fire/Fire injury, and Vomit
Minor: Deadnaming