Reviews tagging 'Death'

Two Dark Reigns by Kendare Blake

12 reviews

grayscale08's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Murder, Violence, Death of parent, and Blood

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, War, Cursing, Child death, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, and Gore

Minor: Grief, Sexism, Sexual content, Kidnapping, Ableism, Alcohol, Body horror, Confinement, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, Mental illness, Animal cruelty, Forced institutionalization, and Classism

zaesbookshelf's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

4.75

What a beautiful, haunting, intriguing continuation of the story! I would’ve read this book in a day if I hadn’t started it so late in the evening. The character growth is not quite as strong as book 2,

but I did really enjoy seeing Kat’s softness and compassion come back! So glad to see her starting to separate from the dead queens.

as there are less characters that need to grow (a lot of that was covered in book 2). 

Kendare Blake is a master of plot twists, with tiny little surprises sprinkled throughout the story. The multiple plot points going on throughout the story really helps to drive it and keep the reader engaged. Such an absolute fan. Cannot wait to see how this ends. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Murder, Death, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Grief, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Infertility, and Sexual assault

mia_luvsreading's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Blood, and Death

Moderate: Gore, Sexual assault, and Violence

Minor: Confinement, Infertility, and War

_dear_reader_'s review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Minor: Sexual content, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Self harm, Murder, Pregnancy, Kidnapping, Confinement, Death of parent, Torture, Toxic relationship, Physical abuse, Grief, Death, and Infertility

rinku's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious slow-paced

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

3.0

 Two Dark Reigns is the first book of the Three Dark Crowns series that I didn’t enjoy as much but I still gave it three stars because I’ve bound with the characters so much and it has its great moments here and there. 

The plot was simply not as great as the one in the books before. The storyline following Mirabella, Arsinoe and Billy, who are now on land, was at first interesting. I loved to see how the queens had to adjust to this new situation, but everything was sadly so slow. The most annoying and boring storyline though was Jules’. The warrior people (I don’t remember what they were called) are planning a rebellion with Jules as the head – that’s it. We also get to know a prophecy about Jules, but this was just not enough to be engaging. 

Even though I don’t like Katharine at all, her part of the story was the most interesting since it focusses on the political dimension of things. There’s also some drama happening at Fennbirn because there’s a mist coming from the sea which kills everyone who gets in contact with it. This was a bit weird, just like the fact that

the dead queens inside Katharine make her kill people

. But towards the end, the story got good and dramatic:

The mist, which is apparently Queen Illian, is coming closer and Katharine – or the dead queens inside her – kills Jules’ mom which leads to her losing her mind and unleashing her full abilities

. 

From all off the queens, Mirabella is now my favorite, I love her so much. It was especially interesting to see the relationship between her, Arsinoe and Billy since they have such a great dynamic. In comparison, there were loads of characters I couldn’t stand, like Emilia who’s just so annoying. Jules and Arsinoe started to annoy me as well towards the end because they

force Billy and Mirabella to fight in a war which they never wanted to in the first place. The new Jules also creeps me out so much

. 

It's obvious that Two Dark Reigns is more a filler book and after reading all books, it would’ve been better if the series would’ve been a trilogy. With this, many of the slow moments that are especially prevalent in this book could’ve been avoided. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Blood, and Death

Moderate: Gore, Violence, and Sexual assault

Minor: Infertility, War, and Confinement

kibiiiariii's review against another edition

adventurous dark fast-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, War, Sexism, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Lesbophobia, Death of parent, Death, Child death, Violence, and Pregnancy

esme_may's review

adventurous emotional hopeful mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.0

Wen I started reading this I was reminded of how much I love reading about this world, so I was really sad that I didn't love this book as much as I expected. I think the strength of this series is the interpersonal conflict/relationships between the sisters and how they fit into Fennbirn's system, which doesn't feature very much in this book at all as it ended up going down a typical rebellion route, which is less original/interesting to me. I was much more interested in reading about Mirabella and Arsinoe than anything else. I wasn't sure whether to continue with this series but judging from the blurb the last book sounds like it will be more in line with the first book, which I adored, than this one so I'll definitely give it a try!

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Gore

Minor: Death

taryn_g's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Death of parent

Moderate: Child death and Violence

emily_mh's review

adventurous mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

This is definitely my favourite in the series so far. I actually quite enjoyed reading it, as the mystery of the Blue Queen and the mist made everything so much more compelling and gave the book some real plot direction. HOWEVER there were some definite issues that reduced the quality of the read. First and foremost, why wasn’t there more discussion about the magnitude of overthrowing the queen system? It’s everything everyone on Fennbirn has ever known, and also considered the will of the Goddess, a divinity that everyone believes in. But also, where was the grief over Joseph? That was a major character death at the end of the last book, but it’s barely even talked about in this one. And finally, I found it hard to believe that Mirabella and Arisnoe just automatically knew how to be loving sisters when they were raised to hate one another for nearly their entire lives. I think if Blake had really explored this connection it would have added a lot of depth to their characters and relationship. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Violence, Death, Child death, Murder, Pregnancy, and Blood

Moderate: Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Ableism, and Animal death

Minor: War, Abandonment, Death of parent, Sexual content, Animal cruelty, Sexism, Fire/Fire injury, Body shaming, Xenophobia, Physical abuse, Alcohol, Vomit, Grief, Infertility, Confinement, and Infidelity

bskell's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional fast-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Murder and Death