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refrejarator'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
3.0
Moderate: Racism, War, Bullying, Torture, Confinement, Grief, Emotional abuse, Blood, Child death, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Child abuse, Death of parent, Animal death, Death, and Fire/Fire injury
taelights's review against another edition
The writing is bad and repetitive. The world building is bad and hard to understand. Plus both main characters are both so annoying to me.
Also like i don't have issues with witches and/or vampires in general becaus I think there are respectful ways to write those types of creatures. But then there are ways to write those creatures that play into antisemitism. Personally I thought this book kind of protrayed vampires, and in a way witches, with antisemitic / blood libel themes which I personally foubd uncomfortable and yucky.
Graphic: Blood, Animal death, Child abuse, Confinement, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Death, Emotional abuse, Child death, Fire/Fire injury, Physical abuse, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Antisemitism
chymerra's review
- 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
4.0
Graphic: Blood, Child abuse, Murder, and Physical abuse
Moderate: Animal death, Torture, and Child death
Minor: Death of parent and Vomit
betweentheshelves'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? It's complicated
3.0
On the other side, Kaye has been training as a Flame witch, to kill vampires. When the two collide on the night of Ava’s escape, Kaye follows Ava, planning on eventually turning her in. But the forest has other plans, and everything they thought they knew drastically changes.
Thanks to NetGalley and Wednesday Books for an advanced copy of The Witch and the Vampire by Francesca Flores to review! Fairy tale retellings are usually a good time, so I was excited to jump into this book. Especially because the twist in this (a Rapunzel retelling with witches and vampires) sounded intriguing! For the most part, I wasn’t disappointed.
My favorite thing about this was the way that Flores played with the Rapunzel story. She added some interesting twists and turns, and the characters are pretty great. For me, they were what made the story, especially the chemistry between Ava and Kaye. We’re here for a friends turned enemies turned lovers romance, honestly.
However, I did wish some of the world building would have been made more clear throughout the book. We get bits and pieces at the beginning, but never really the whole story, making some of the plot unclear. The plot itself also moves a bit too slowly at the beginning, meaning that a lot of the action is packed into the end, adding to some of the clarity issues.
Despite that, this is a quick read, and if you enjoy fairy tale retellings, you might get something out of this one! Especially if you’re just looking for something quick and easy to enjoy.
Graphic: Blood, Death of parent, and Animal death
Moderate: Torture, Child abuse, and Physical abuse
Minor: Child death, Murder, and Vomit
ezwolf's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
1.5
The most interesting character through the whole book is one of the side characters who has maybe ten lines. I disliked both Ava and Kaye and they were written with almost no differing personalities (at one point I read half a chapter from Kaye’s POV thinking it was Ava’s) and I was over half way through the book and their characters should have been well established.
The whole book was all telling, not showing, us anything and so many things were repeated and drilled in I almost feel like the author thought people would lack the ability to have long term memory or good reading comprehension. This was most problematic when it came to character relationships. I am still not convinced that Ava and Kaye like each other in any way and Tristan was just like a weird addition to try and give them friends and some kind of backstory? Nothing any of them did made me inclined to think they had ever been friends.
The way things were named was also so uncreative, ie witches who could manipulate fire are Flame witches and the ones who could use water are Storm witches, a literal wall of bones was the Bone Wall, a tree connected to the heart of a vampire is the Heart Tree.
Overall, the plot had a lot of great potential but suffered greatly from how it was written.
Thank you to NetGalley for making this available in exchange for an honest review!
EDIT: Oh, I cannot believe I forgot this part, but including crosses burning vampires seemed like a bizarre choice? By placing this story in a fantasy world you can do whatever you want with vampire lore (these vampires don’t burn in the sun so clearly we’re not adhering to original vampire characteristics), but added the cross, to me, implies that Jesus existed in this world and they adhere to some kind of religion but that’s never discussed.
Graphic: Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Blood, Death, and Emotional abuse
Moderate: Physical abuse, Gaslighting, Confinement, Murder, Torture, and Racism
Minor: Animal death, Vomit, Death of parent, and Child death