Reviews tagging 'Pregnancy'

King of Scars by Leigh Bardugo

110 reviews

trintrin's review

adventurous dark 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

4.25

I'm so confused? It got me hooked right from the beginning which definitely says something because not even Six of Crows managed to do that and it's one of my all time favs. I'm aware it's because I already know and love these characters but-

THE CHARACTERS!!!
Man I was already in love with Nikolai and Zoya and this is not helping!! Nikolai was the sole reason I picked up this book, and I enjoyed every bit of him. I did not expect to love Zoya's POVs but girl snatched my wig fr. I would die for these two at any given time istg. Isaak, you sweetheart, you stole my heart, and so did Hanne. And Nina, of course, I was beginning to worry she didn't contribute as much as she did in SoC, but she pulled through towards the very end. One more thing, I wanted to see Nikolai doing more king-y stuff. I wanted to see him in court. I wanted to see him rule. I wanted to see more of Sturmhond, more of the too-clever-fox, more of him charming people and just doing the Nikolai thing. By the looks of it, it will get more political in Rule of Wolves and I can't wait for that!

I have a love/hate relationship with the multiple callbacks to the previous books. Like yes I was nearly squirming with joy and even in tears at one point every time a throwaway reference to Kaz or Jesper or Alina were made but also they felt a little too much- a little overdone at times. They almost got me wanting to go back to those old characters instead of going forwards with the story, but the character dynamics were god tier so I'll ignore this one.

The plot
I was very surprised when I realised the first 2/3rd - aka the sloooow part where pretty much nothing happens - was actually my favourite. Felt like that's where the characters shined the most. And then after that it was just uhhhh???

I wasn't really vibing with the whole Saints in the Fold thing but yay go Zoya the dragon ig? And I'm absolutely 1000% not a fan of reviving the Darkling or the monster inside Nikolai for that matter at all. Reviving characters in general tends to feel very cheap. Reviving villains who were firmly put to an end is on a whole other level of cheapness and I absolutely cannot handle that. Nina's plot line, which was my least favourite in the first half, was my most favourite in the end. I wanna see more of whatever drugs the Fjerdans cooked up and more of Hanne as well.

It did get super interesting in the last like 5 pages and I'm excited to see how that plot will be continued in RoW. Fingers-crossed it's better than this one. 

So yeah an exciting-but-confusing-but-still-got-you-wanting-the-sequel read

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Grief, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Animal death, Religious bigotry, Murder, and War

Minor: Child death, Infertility, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Sexism, and Vomit

kazurfav's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Miscarriage, and Pregnancy

chloenrogers's review against another edition

adventurous slow-paced

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

3.0

The first book in the Grishaverse that I haven’t been totally in love with. The plot felt somehow crowded and slow and the same time and could have benefitted from having Nina’s story in a separate novel. I’m not totally sure what it is about this instalment but it just never clicked with me, even though it features some of my favourite characters. I’m so used to feeling high stakes from the Grishaverse but this, unfortunately, fell flat. I feel like so much happened, yet the characters remained essentially the same as at the start as we got very little time with any of them beyond surface level observations. There was also next to no romance (or there is but there’s little chemistry compared to the other books)

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Addiction, Child death, Sexual assault, Slavery, Trafficking, Kidnapping, and Pregnancy

dancing_on_ur_muml0l's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny tense slow-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

4.0

nina slayed

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Sexism, Blood, Pregnancy, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Addiction, Cursing, Alcohol, and War

jackiepreston's review against another edition

adventurous emotional lighthearted tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Medical trauma, Pregnancy, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Child death, Death, Drug use, Misogyny, and Grief

zachtrotz's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Rape, and Pregnancy

spaghettii's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Addiction, Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Genocide, Gun violence, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Sexism, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Kidnapping, Medical trauma, Murder, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, and War

shahdhazem's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional tense 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

This started off as really bad for me as I went through I was getting more and more disappointed about certain characters and the whole plot of the book but the last bit of the book was such a nice surprise. I was honestly thinking of giving it a 3 star because at the start it was very plain no story literally got no new info about nikolai and ravka than what I already knew from shadow and bone but I adore nikolai very much so I was just pushing on for him. Also I want to mention that I hate leigh for messing up Nina's character like that she's soo different from what she was in six of crows and I know some will say because of a certain tragic event but I honestly don't think that this event should've changed her completely no on the contrary. Also her chapters lacked any connection to nikolai's and zoya's chapters which was irritating. Last thing I'll come to the bit I liked which was the plot twists in the end that were literally mind blowing for me they were really well enacted and I gave a whole star for that and I have kind of some high hopes for rule of the wolves.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death, Forced institutionalization, Grief, and Pregnancy

Minor: Miscarriage

jelliestars's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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? It's complicated

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Violence, Blood, and Grief

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Sexism, Slavery, Trafficking, Pregnancy, and War

Minor: Ableism, Body shaming, Gun violence, Infertility, Pedophilia, Vomit, Kidnapping, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

siennakt30's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious 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

Minor: Addiction, Confinement, Death, Sexism, Slavery, Torture, Violence, Blood, Trafficking, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism