Reviews tagging 'Death'

Elantris by Brandon Sanderson

42 reviews

dionysius_miller's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful inspiring 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: Confinement, Religious bigotry, War, Murder, Body shaming, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Abandonment

Moderate: Chronic illness, Blood, Ableism, Body horror, and Child death

Minor: Death of parent, Xenophobia, Alcohol, Kidnapping, Racism, and Cannibalism

mels_booknook's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious 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? N/A

4.5

Overall I really enjoyed this one! Loved the splash of romance and the intertwined storylines. It had a lot of religious and political aspects which I liked but also was hard to follow at times. Overall it was a great fantasy and had a crazy ending true to Sanderson fashion. And the audio was great.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death and Violence

Romance: kisses

aleyajo's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes

4.5

It’s Brandon Sanderson, it’s gonna be good. Some stuff was predictable for Brandon, Dilaf was also a bit too caricature-evil. Good romance, not to ton of action. Excellent world building. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Death, Torture, and Body horror

elwh's review against another edition

4.25

I really ate through this book after getting into it. Great worldbuilding and a unique premise. I was happy to predict certain parts, and it was fun to speculate as I listened. The writing’s easy to follow, and the characters are well-defined and easy to like. I wish many of the descriptions had more detail rather than referring to broad notions and vibes.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Classism, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Misogyny, and Death

Minor: Suicide

simmonsj's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful mysterious medium-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? It's complicated

4.5

After reading Mistborn Era 1, I could definitely tell Elantris was Sanderson's debut novel. Elantris moves slower, less descriptive in some areas and a little too descriptive in others, but maintains good world building and characters throughout. 

Elantris is more a focus on politics. We have a king failing, a prince shunned, a political marriage gone awry, and a neighboring country vying for power through religion. There are political maneuvers, political bribes, politics and religion getting mushed together.

In the background we have Elantris. Elantris was a great fallen city with an interesting premise. The city and its people are well described. The magic of Elantris, AonDor, is not as well described - better at the very end, but not really during the book as a whole. There are some Aon examples at the back of the book, but sometimes the ones described in the text are not in the index. Some of the text descriptions do not match the index drawings either. It was a little bit of a struggle to wade through AonDor passages until the end when things finally started clicking.

The niggle about the magic system aside, I really enjoyed this book. Good writing, plotting, and world building kept me entertained even though I don't always enjoy politics-heavy novels. Characters were fleshed out and believable, and Galladon's "Doloken" might be my new favorite book "swear word."

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Content Warnings

Minor: Death of parent, Death, Body horror, and Violence

teyn's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional medium-paced

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

3.5

I'm conflicted on this one. The story was amazing, but soooo many unchallenged problematic biases seeped into the world-building.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Pandemic/Epidemic, Ableism, Physical abuse, War, Fatphobia, Body shaming, and Chronic illness

Minor: Death, Violence, and Suicide

mkaiww's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious slow-paced

• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, Medical trauma, Colonisation, Blood, Violence, Religious bigotry, Confinement, Chronic illness, Suicidal thoughts, Slavery, Body horror, Gore, Suicide, and Suicide attempt

Moderate: Murder, Stalking, Kidnapping, Eating disorder, Alcohol, Genocide, Child death, Death, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Cannibalism, Death of parent, Grief, Bullying, and Child abuse

ravenfaerie's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad 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? No

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Violence, Chronic illness, Confinement, and Terminal illness

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts

bergha1998's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad 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

I liked it generally, it was the pacing that tripped me up a little. There were really dry subplots and then really interesting ones. Also, there were so jumps in the book.

Like how we waited the whole book for Elantra’s / the Dor too be fixed and then the way it was fixed wasn’t explained well and came about way too easy.

. Over all I was just left a bit unsatisfied by this one. 

Multi-POV, Romance Subplots, Hidden Identity

“Pain loses its power when other things become more important.”

“Truth can never be defeated… Even if people do forget about it occasionally.”

“When you can’t find reason in life, you tend to give up on it.”

“Joy was more than just an absence of discomfort.”

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Colonisation, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Slavery, Violence, Suicide, Abandonment, Blood, Chronic illness, Classism, Confinement, Fire/Fire injury, Genocide, Grief, Murder, Racism, and War

kassidyreads's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Death

Moderate: Genocide, Sexism, and Religious bigotry

Minor: Death of parent and Slavery